Ken May’s Stories, Lessons & Insights

Ken May shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.

Ken, it’s always a pleasure to learn from you and your journey. Let’s start with a bit of a warmup: What are you most proud of building — that nobody sees?
I would say I’m most proud of building human networks. People drastically undervalue human connections, and it can take years for even casual friendships to lead to big opportunities. But you never know where something amazing will come from. Friendships I’ve made 10 years prior just trying to help out led to things like me being in a Twisted Sister music video. So you never know!

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My name is Ken, but professionally I go by DJ Scythe or just Scythe. As a DJ, I mostly focus on industrial/goth/witchhouse music, and I love getting the dance floor jumping!
My musical project, Scythe, is witch house/wave focused and I’m really happy to say it’s been growing quite a bit over this past year. I did gigs in Tokyo and Moscow as well as a US tour and made some amazing friendships along the way. I can’t announce details yet but I’ve already got an East Coast tour in the works for this year and Thailand confirmed.
I’m always looking forward to doing collabs with other artists and seeing what kind of fun things come from it.

Okay, so here’s a deep one: What breaks the bonds between people—and what restores them?
Not living up to your word. It seems like it’s a habit of people in the entertainment industry to make endless promises without truly intending to follow through on them. I think a lot of people do this because they want to hedge their bets in case something better comes along. But it’s an utter disrespect to the other person who then gets strung along endlessly and has to potentially turn down other opportunities while they’re waiting for promises to come through or not, I would much rather be given an honest and quick no so I can focus my energy elsewhere.

What fear has held you back the most in your life?
I think it relates to imposter syndrome, the feeling of not being good enough despite having successes along the way. As an artist, I think it can be very difficult to have an objective viewpoint of oneself. And that fear of not being good enough holds a lot of people back from even trying to start in the first place.

Next, maybe we can discuss some of your foundational philosophies and views? Is the public version of you the real you?
Pretty much!
I like to say that whatever I lack in talent, I try to make up for it with passion. And I’m incredibly passionate about all the different things that I do. I don’t think there’s much in my various personas that’s not completely me.

Okay, we’ve made it essentially to the end. One last question before you go. If you knew you had 10 years left, what would you stop doing immediately?
Working.
I would devote all the rest of my time to making art and spending time with my kids in a meaningful way.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ooscytheoo/
• Twitter: https://x.com/scythe000

Image Credits
Manual Antonio Zavala