John Otto (drummer)
John Everett Otto (born March 22, 1977 in Jacksonville, Florida) is the drummer and an original member of the band Limp Bizkit. Unlike many modern drummers, he learned jazz-style drumming.
Limp Bizkit
Otto, along with his cousin Sam Rivers, and Fred Durst, founded Limp Bizkit in 1994. What started as a small band from Jacksonville, Florida escalated into one of the most popular nu-metal and rapcore bands in the world, selling over 33 million records worldwide.
In November 2004, rumors on Limp Bizkit fan boards began to surface of the departure of John Otto from Limp Bizkit. These conclusions were derived from the fact that new pictures of John Otto had not shown up on Limp Bizkit's official site for several months. Also, some rumors arose that John Otto had become a Benedictine monk. These rumors were addressed by Fred Durst himself in a post on his official website entitled "People are Dumb". Fred did not address the topic directly; he chose to give subliminal "hints" that John was indeed still in the band. Pictures of John Otto later surfaced on Limp Bizkit's website, disproving the rumors altogether.
John wrote and recorded drums for all of The Unquestionable Truth Part One but before he did this, producers and band members recorded with Sammy Siegler without John's knowledge. The other band members and producers made the final decision as to which drummer would be on the final recording. John does not want his work to be confused with Sammy Siegler's, who he believes to be a good punk style drummer. According to John, Sammy did not achieve the stylistic groove imprint that is unique to his (John's) sound and style which is the backbone of Limp Bizkit.
Today
Currently, Otto is clean from drugs. He lived in Marina del Rey, California, and was giving drum lessons for Star Education [1], but currently lives in Hollywood, California. He keeps in touch with the other members of Limp Bizkit, and will be joining them for the band's next album.
Recently, John has shown fans his interest in rapping. Going by the name 'Johnny Ottomatic' he's shown several songs on his MySpace, along with his rap group known as Sun Zoo, with fellow rapper L.A. Jay. John states that he doesn't intend for it to get in the way of Limp Bizkit.[2]
On October 1, Otto stated that he is currently working on a solo album, and put a demo of the first song, "Apocalypse", on his MySpace. Otto later revealed that his new project was in the form of a new group known as Stereochemix with the other members being Ceekay, DJ Apokalypze, Fin and Norm. Http://www.myspace.com/stereochemix The group recently unveiled their first music video on the website.
He is joining Scooter Ward formally of Cold to play drums on his new project When November Falls. It was announced through When November Fall's MySpace page along with Cold's MySpace page as well.
Trivia
- John is known to enjoy the sport paintball. ("limpbizkit.com". 2004-05-20. Retrieved 2006-07-27.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|date=(help)) - Like his cousin Sam, he too was once in a Jazz band (The Matt Butler Quartet)
- John has a daughter from a previous relationship.
Quotes
- "Success is not in never failing, but rising every time you fall!" [3]