AVATARI creates music rooted in lived experience rather than strategy. He isn’t aiming to be enigmatic or iconic. Even his name, taken from the word avatar, points to that impulse: a symbol of survival and renewal, like the phoenix he’s adopted as his emblem. His songs simply tell the truth he carries, tracing both where he’s been and what he’s still working through.
He grew up watching artists who knew how to command a stage: Elvis, Bowie, Prince, the swagger of Jagger, and the theatrical power of Mercury. Later, acts like Imagine Dragons and YUNGBLUD also shaped his outlook. What stayed with AVATARI, though, wasn’t the spectacle; it was the conviction. That same sense of purpose fuels his own music, shaped by different battles with addiction, recovery, fatherhood, and the long search for identity once the noise fades.
His first singles drew notice: “Legacy” appeared in a Rolls-Royce ad, while “High Like This” was praised for its honesty. Melody Maker even named him a rising star, highlighting the video’s cinematic edge and his shifts between characters to tell the story. Yet none of it feels like a victory lap. “Fighter” turned inward, revisiting childhood bullying and the role martial arts played in rebuilding from within. His latest release, “Hold On,” carries that thread forward into a wider reflection on resilience.
At its core, “Hold On” confronts uncertainty and disorientation, where the world feels stripped of warmth and safety. Images of fading light, encroaching night, and an ever-colder landscape evoke a collapse that’s both external and internal. The song sketches a reality burdened by the past and unmoored in the present. Yet within that bleakness lies not surrender but endurance, a refusal to give in, even when nothing feels stable.
The music video for “Hold On” follows a grieving father, a mother in recovery, and a young woman facing homelessness. Set in Los Angeles, it zeroes in on intimate human moments that cut through the city’s chaos. Directed and shot by Abigail Welkom, AVATARI’s wife, the film relies on natural light and handheld shots for authenticity, with a cast that brings depth without overstatement. The message is clear: even when everything unravels, holding on matters.
AVATARI wrote “Hold On” in Joshua Tree, seeking silence from the surrounding noise. What came out was a line he kept coming back to: just hold on. Not as advice. Not as a slogan. Just something he needed to hear. Maybe you do too.
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