Meet Orphan Prodigy, the genre-blurring, emotionally charged force redefining what it means to create music in the digital age. With his latest track, “Traitor,” from the debut album Medication for a Modern World, the Queens native dives headfirst into honest themes of rejection, identity, and resilience—wrapped in pounding drums, layered synths, and unapologetically vulnerable lyrics. From leading a rock band to building an entire sonic universe solo, Orphan Prodigy opens up about heartbreak, healing, and the creative fire that never fades.
Pinch of Sol: “Traitor” hits like a gut punch. What emotional storm were you in the middle of when that track came to life?
Orphan Prodigy: The idea for this song had been in my head for a long time, and at first, I thought it was about someone, but as time went by, I realized it was about rejection and the subsequent pain that comes with that.
PoS: You repeat the question “What was I supposed to do?” like a mantra. Was that desperation, defiance, or something else entirely?
Orphan Prodigy: I think it’s a bit of all of those things. I write with emotion and feeling first, not so much in a black-and-white literal sense, so when this song came out sounding so literal lyrically, it surprised me.
PoS: Is the ‘traitor’ in the song someone real or symbolic, or do you think we all carry that shadow version of ourselves?
Orphan Prodigy: Yes. I think it’s about every time I’ve felt the pain of rejection, whether that was in a toxic relationship I was in for many years or feeling abandoned by a childhood best friend who gave me no reason other than the fact his mother had taken him out of my class to put him in a class that had Latin as a language option. As an adopted person, rejection has obviously played a significant role in my life in the way I deal with things.
Now, many years later, I’ve come to terms with these emotions and have learned to deal with them in healthier ways, but in my childhood and young adult life, it was a real challenge.
PoS: The production on “Traitor” feels like it’s closing in on the listener. What choices did you make sonically to match that emotional weight?
Orphan Prodigy: Thanks! That’s a really cool interpretation. This was my first time engineering and producing my own music, so it was fun and exciting from a learning perspective. With my music, I write kind of in a backwards way. I always start with drums, then synths to get the chords and general vibe and feel of the song, then guitars, and the melody and lyrics come last. I never edit my lyrics from the first take, so those words, like all the other songs on the album, are just what came out.
I think the drums are what drive the songs, and there are only really three chords in it. From an engineering standpoint, there isn’t a lot of compression. I wanted to preserve the dynamics. Even during the verses when most of the instruments drop out and it’s just me singing, there’s still a lot of force in my vocals, especially in the second verse. I think there’s this almost apocalyptic, devastated feel to the whole thing. I wanted to make the song sound and feel like that all throughout.
PoS: You stepped away from a full band and came back as a one-man sonic force. What flipped the switch for you to become Orphan Prodigy?
Orphan Prodigy: I think it was a combination of things. In 2019, it was clear my band, Metorana, was not going to tour again, partially due to the band members not wanting to and also because I was dealing with an agoraphobic episode that required therapy. After I faced it and beat it, I began to rethink my place in music and decided to move to Arizona to attend the Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences to study engineering and music production. I thought about taking a more behind-the-scenes approach to the music industry. It was there that I learned to work with digital audio workstations like Logic and Pro Tools.
I’ve always written all my songs digitally using MIDI (musical instrument digital interface), so using Logic felt like a natural next step. The first song I wrote using Logic was “Get Away,” and after that, I had 24 songs within a few months that I was pretty happy with. Then the pandemic hit, and I started streaming performances using the backing tracks from the songs I’d written.
Slowly, I started building a virtual show, and then I did an EP with some demos from what would eventually become the album Medication For A Modern World. I tried being behind the scenes, but the songwriter in me just couldn’t sit still and not compose. That’s how Orphan Prodigy was born.
PoS: You’re bending genres and smashing expectations. When someone asks, “What kind of music do you make?” What’s your off-the-cuff answer?
Orphan Prodigy: I had trouble with that for a long time! I do a lot of virtual concerts on platforms like Twitch and YouTube, and I’m also a gamer and stream that too. One day, a guy says “gamer rock” in the chat, and I was like, “Hell yes! I freaking love that!” In reality, I’m creating all of the music electronically, so I guess officially it’s electronic rock and unofficially it’s gamer rock.
PoS: You’ve been in this game for a while. What still lights a fire under you when you sit down to create?
Orphan Prodigy: I think it’s the same thing it always has been. Just opening my laptop and seeing a blank screen of sheet music waiting to be sonically explored and filled is the most exciting thing for me. I recently learned I have what’s called synesthesia, so it’s also a visual experience for me as well, and I think that also plays a part in what drives me to write.
It’s an experience. Some people enjoy painting or arts and crafts. For me, it’s building, seeing, and feeling a piece of music come to life. I get the same joy and fulfillment from writing music that I do from building Lego. It’s pretty much the same thing. Before I know it, a day’s gone by and I haven’t eaten or slept.
PoS: If someone could only hear one Orphan Prodigy track to understand your world, which one would you play for them, and what do you hope it wrecks or wakes up inside them?
Orphan Prodigy: That’s a good question and a tough one. I think “Traitor” is the most accessible song because it’s straightforward but still open to interpretation, which is an important thing to have on every single track. But for me, “Get Away” or “Medication For A Modern World” are great examples of the atmosphere I try to create: fun, exciting, ironic, a little sarcastic, slightly psychedelic, energetic, rhythmically driven, and sonically adventurous with clean instrumentation and a slightly edgy or dirty vocal for contrast. “Vodka Build” is another good example.
I do want to be clear, though: I don’t write songs to be singles or anything like that. I write them to be part of a whole, like feelings. Feelings don’t represent all that we are—they’re chapters in our day-to-day and in our lives. So too are the songs. They are chapters that make up a whole experience, an album, telling a bigger story. We should always face our problems and demons head-on and not let them simmer until they reach a boiling point. That’s when damage gets done. That’s the idea behind “Medication for a Modern World.” Obviously, the world is full of beauty and problems. But let’s face it together.
Listen to the full album below: