Last week, as Knock2 prepared to release his debut album, Nolimit, smoke plumed outside his Southern California crib. The Eaton fire, which has since leveled thousands of structures, was picking up momentum in the mountains near his apartment in Pasadena. The 25-year-old electronic music artist, born Richard Nakhonethap, says he and his girlfriend grabbed their 10-year-old cat, Reese, and bolted to a friend’s house.
“I’m originally from San Diego, and wildfires aren’t that uncommon, but I think this is definitely the first time I saw the fire right outside my window,” says Knock2, who has since returned to his home. “It was full survival mode at that point.”
In the last year, he’s gone from winning fans as a bootleg remix DJ to rocking Miami’s Ultra Music Festival as a main stage performer in March; playing Coachella as one-half of dance duo ISOKnock a month later; and closing out 2024 by co-producing San Diego’s 4Evr festival, named after ISOKnock’s first LP.
Knock2 and ISOxo, born Julian Isorena, first met as teens, DJing local events in San Diego. Reflecting on their all gas, no breaks Coachella show, Knock2 pays it forward to his childhood friend. “I’m still processing,” he says. “It just feels amazing to do something so special and real with someone you believe in.”
On Friday, the Laotian-American artist released Nolimit, an explosive electro-trap album that fuses early-2000s pop, hip-hop samples, and techno-house basslines across 17 tracks. To Knock2, the album’s title serves as a mantra for himself and his fans: to push the boundaries. With a North American tour in support of his album launching next month, Knock2 is determined to live with no limits. “I’m ready to share it with the world, and I just want people to enjoy it,” he says.
Rolling Stone spoke with Knock2 about the album’s animated mascot, Dash, how breakdancing led him to Djing, and his performance at Coachella with ISOxo.
The following questions and answers are edited for clarity.
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You have this dystopian, pirate-radio-hosting avatar, Dash, that you’ve used throughout a lot of your imagery. Can we talk about who Dash is to you, and what the album art symbolizes?
This Dash character is hijacking the satellite waves and the speaker systems, interfering with the noise outside and putting my music on — Nolimit music on for the world to hear. I love the character so much because I really wanted to cater to my hardcore fans, too. They’re insane with trying to dig up my music and conceptualize it.
During a 2022 podcast, Dillon Francis called you one of the best producers right now and talked about how much you learned from YouTube. How did you use that platform to teach yourself?
YouTube was the best place for me to find songs and learn production. Learn what DJing is. Learn everything I know. My parents were musicians too, but it was one of those things where it’s like, I love them to death, but they didn’t really teach me a single thing about music. But I was always around it, and I think that’s how I developed my ear to hear certain chords and keys.
Both your parents were musicians? What instruments did they play?
My mom sang, and my dad was a pretty good keyboard player and guitar player — honestly, a prodigy. He touched anything, and he was good at it. I grew up going to their band practices and seeing them play.
How did you get into electronic music?
I started breakdancing first and through that, I found turntablism, because DJing and breakdancing — at the time I was in middle school — that shit is hand-in-hand. More and more, I learned about this culture. More music was coming out in those eras. It was crazy, infectious. I just fell in love with everything music.
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The DJ aspect really took off for me when I started creating these bootleg remixes, and posting it on SoundCloud, and I was able to actually start open-format DJing really young. When I was like 15 and a half, 16, I was already playing in dive bars and clubs in San Diego.
ISOxo and Knock2 performing as ISOKnock at Coachella’s Sahara Stage
Tylor Vi*
You met ISOxo while DJing at a local fair in your teens, and you just played Coachella togther. What was that like?
It unlocked a whole other side of us that we had no idea we were gonna tap into on a performance level, and honestly on a grind level. We worked so, so hard and put so much time towards it. Our intention was like, man, we’re gonna be on the stage and we’re gonna represent dance music, we just want to really highlight and showcase how we can push the culture, the scene, and ourselves.
I feel like a large part of your music is about that in-person experience — head-banging in the crowd, thrashing in a mosh pit…
We all pull up to the party to let go, and that’s just a feeling I would always want to provide for anyone listening to the music. It’s like, “All right, let’s let go.”
