And The Writer Is...with Ross Golan - Ep. 209: d4vd | The Kid Hacking Pop Music From His Phone

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

Today’s guest is a genre-shifting phenomenon who’s redefining what it means to break through in music today. With a sound that fuses indie, alt-pop, R&B, and emo influences, he’s crafted a raw, emotionally charged catalog that’s connected with a generation—and he did it all from his sister’s closet on a phone. In just a few years, his music has racked up billions of streams, topping global charts and earning him a fiercely loyal fanbase. But beyond the numbers, he’s an artist who leads with vulnerability, reshaping how young creators think about art, success, and authenticity. He’s not just making songs—he’s shifting culture, and sharing how at the same time.And the writer is… D4vd!0:00 Trailer Hook — Billion Streams Surprise 1:32 Intro — From Phone to Playlist 3:15 Growing Up — Early Life and Music Influences 8:45 First Uploads — BandLab, YouTube, and Finding His Sound 13:20 Going Viral — The Moment Everything Changed 17:50 Pressure and Expectations — How He Handled the Blow-Up 20:42 My Process — How I Make Music on a Phone 23:10 Behind the Hits — How ‘Here With Me’ + ‘Romantic Homicide’ Happened 26:17 What SZA Told Me That Changed Everything 34:08 Advice for Young Artists — Make Music Nobody Wants 36:09 Beyond Music — Directing, Acting, Manga Dreams 43:35 Disrupting the Industry — Freaking Out the Business 44:40 Validation Moment — Sitting Where Legends Sit Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You have two songs over a billion streams. They did with four tracks on your phone. It was the craziest thing because it wasn't even supposed to happen. What was the original plan? I was going to try to be like a professional gamer. I was making a good amount of money off YouTube. It was like, you have to have a trending song in your video or it won't go. I treated Fortnite like it was a movie, like I was soundtracking, like a TV show or something.

I'd make a montage and I make a song for it. How does somebody make a song from nothing except for a phone? I'm going to show you how I made romantic homicizer. Do you feel the pressure to repeat that success? I remember 2023 was really tough. Stuff that was going viral in 2022 wasn't going viral anymore. People are growing out of things every single day. And then I went on tour with Siza.

And that didn't change my whole thing. I sat down with her. What she loved about my music was everything that I hated about my music. What do you tell a 17-year-old now who wants to be David when they grow up? How did they do it? I mean, Welcome to And The Writer is. I am your host, Ross Golland.

There are millions of singers and thousands of artists. but only 40 songs per genre at a time. This podcast aims to shed a light on those creators who make those songs. I produce this with my friend Joe London, in association with Mega House music group. Special shoutout, Charlotte Isidore, Jad, and Michael White. And you can follow us at And The Writer Is on all your socials. We'll see you there.

Now, this week's episode. Welcome to And The Writer is. I am your host, Ross Golan. Today's Rising Stars, I mean, not even rising, just straight up stars, unique blend of atmospheric pop, indie sensibility, and raw emotion, has captivated fanatics around the world. He crafts deeply personal songs that are still universally relatable, weaving poetic lyrics with haunting melodies over soulfully vulnerable,

modern alternative production. From his phone to your playlist, this guy has truly humbled the music business, all while still being one of the good guys. And the artist is, the writer is David. That was the best, like, summary of my music ever, bro. Thank you for that.

Hey, man. How you doing? Look, I mean, part of it is that, like, it was really fun. You know, I know I'd listen to your music before today, but it's like you listen to it with the idea, okay, now I'm actually going to know this person. But like, it's hard not to be, like, proud of that journey. Yeah, man.

Like, I feel like it's really, uh, it's super inspiring. Like, musically, it's inspiring. But maybe it's just knowing the whole story and everything around it just makes the music come to life in a way that's, that's just, it's inspiring, man. I don't know how to say it. It's cool. Thank you. Let's start from the beginning.

So, uh, you're a New Yorker. New Yorker. Queens, New York. What are your parents like? Are they musicians? Not at all. My dad is a litigator for a law firm. My mother was a teacher.

She doesn't do it anymore, but she does notary now. You know, when your dad's an attorney, your mom's a teacher, I feel like the last thing you'd want to do is have a kid that's a musician. Dude, it was the craziest thing because it wasn't even supposed to happen. It was not even supposed to happen. Well, what was the original plan? plan was because I was doing YouTube and content creation. I was like blogging, Fortine Montages, College Duty Video, stuff like that. I was going to try to be like a professional

gamer. So I was like on YouTube 24-7. My mom's like yelling at me to go off the game every day, you know. And then in 2017, 2018, I got homeschooled. So around seventh grade, I got homeschooled. And then the next five years, I was like full on with YouTube. I'm making money now. I was making a good amount of money off YouTube. And then like I started getting copyright strikes and ruined the whole thing. Yeah, I mean, this is one of the more public stories of your journey. But let's start with that. Why the copyright strikes?

So, like, in the four, people that watch and listening are going to know, like, the Fortnite community was really, really popping, like 2018, 2019, even into 2020. And the format of videos change so much every season because Fortnite drop the season every six months. And every six months, you have to try to find a new way to make a video. So before the recession of Fortnite, basically you can make a montage with no music and it'd blow up. But then the algorithm changed on YouTube. And in order to have your video blow up, you'd have to use a popular or trending song. It almost became like the pre-Tick-Tic-Tac of TikTok for Fortnite. It was like, you have to have a trending song in your video or it won't go. So I was like,

making money because it was no sound. It was royalty free. And then as soon as I hit the, you know, the popular songs trends and stuff, I get all the deep. EMCA strikes and all the copyright strikes, my other labels. And it was like, man, what do I do? How much did that process teach you about the IP part of the music industry? Then nothing, because I didn't care about the music side. I only wanted to upload my gaming videos. But now it's like, man, like, there's so many opportunities that we kind of steal from good content creators because of the copyright situation.

So now what I do is when I drop a song, like, you and not. or any of these fast-paced or indie rock songs that kind of fit the gamer community, I kind of white-listed all so everybody can use the song in the videos for free, make their money off of it, you know, because I came from that community, so I got to give back any chance I get. Are you then your own publisher? No, I'm not. But I can choose with songs to whitelist and give people the freedom to do it.

And that's so classy. Do you feel like you're missing an opportunity to make money off that? No, not, not. I mean, nah, because I like watching people be able to use a song they love and a video they love and then also spread that love to other people. So it's like, I don't even care about the money at that point. It's really about the experience. Okay, so let's go back, you know, a few years before the gaming side. Like, you're, you know, you're raised with two siblings and, I mean, your sister would have been a baby, but, you know, your dad being an attorney.

your mom being a teacher, I guess, I don't know, like, those don't seem like they're screaming like culturally relevant music. Not to say that they weren't. They might be like super attractive. But what music did you have around the house? That's the best question because it was literally nothing. It was all gospel and, like, classical Mozart Bach, like, all that kind of stuff. Because my parents wanted me to be really smart.

They never, like, talked about college or anything like that, but they always wanted to be very intellectual, very put together, have an idea of what I'm doing. but they never like listen to music like that at all. Who introduced you to music outside of, you know, I mean, basically, you mean Bach is religious music, of sorts. So like who's introducing to secular music? It was this kid and before I was homeschooled in the sixth grade, it was this kid on the bus blasting little pump in his backpack speaker.

And it was Gucci gang, bro. And I was like, yo, what is that? And it was like switching from M&Ms to Skittles. They look the same, but they're not the same, bro. So I was like, yo, what? is day. He was like, yo, it's Lil Pump. Like, you gotta download SoundCloud, bro. You have to, bro. And I was like, all right, bet. So I downloaded SoundCloud that same day. I started listening to X, X, X, X, X, and Tatcion, so I listened to the Carthias. So I listened to Lill Pump,

smoke, all of them. And then it kind of just went from there. My first introduction to real music, to real music was Little Pump. This is the craziest thing. And how old are you? That's so bizarre. Like, 13, 14. That is not who I would have thought. It is a weird thing, those revelation moments when you're like, how, how, there must be so much out there. Bro, yeah. If this is the gap between Bach and Lil Pump, it's like, what is missing here? It was such a stark contrast because after that, I listened to rock and after that I found pop and all this. And all these songs that I would hear passively throughout the years, but still not be able to listen to it attentively was like, yo, that's Justin Bieber.

Like that, Sean Mendez? Like, it was so crazy, bro. Did your parents put sort of a cap on what you couldn't, couldn't listen to it? No, I was sneaking around. I was something like that. I had this little iPod. I used to sneak. I got it with me right now, too.

I still got these wrong. The OG days. It's all broken up. I used to sneak around with the iPod Touch. I used to sneak around the iPod Touch and download things off iTunes and stuff like that all the time around. Why do you carry that around? It's just like, I love nostalgia.

I love just like having it around, bro. OG iPod Touch. Yeah, man. Is it filled with music you live? Listen to? It's dead right now. But dude, this thing has so many songs on it, bro. So many songs on it.

What's your most listen to song on there? Probably, I think back in the day I used to listen to a lot of, probably Billy Isles, I don't want to be you anymore. Heavy on it. I was heavy on it. I had a crazy Billy phase. Crazy Billy phase. I mean, considering where your career ended up, that's even crazier, which we'll get to,

but that's awesome, man. just like the darker relationship. It's just like dreams. Domino's destiny, all that. So you come home

and you're like mom listen to a little pump no probably not. No, at that time she was took away every device I had for like a week, bro.

Nah. But what that there's a huge jump from okay there's music out in this world that exists that is different

than gospel music. But you can sing. I can sing. So, like, were you like a, where did you sing growing? Were you a church kid singing? Yeah, I was in choir for about like a year and a half. I quit because I got bored. And then I was in piano lessons for another, like, month or so.

I quit because I got bored. And then fast forward to when I moved to Texas, I played the flute in middle school band. Quit because I got bored. Like, music never stuck with me. Like, every single opportunity I had to be a musical kid, it never clicked. So. Yeah, but the weird thing is those feelers, those tastes, is what you need to be in a way a better songwriter, producer.

When you land in that like, I'm a trombone player, do or die from third grade on through college, you're like, you finish being really good at trombone and you just speak that language. But if you have like a taste of piano and a taste of singing and a taste of band, then you start thinking like, oh, I get it. all these things make the music. I found it more advantageous that I was a similar thing. It was like the two years in this instrument, one year in this one, that made me into

the musician now. Yeah, yeah. I didn't even realize it then either. I started realizing when I started making the music too that I'm bringing back melodies off the flute. I'm bringing back melodies off the piano. I'm bringing back this and that and all the soulfulness from the gospel I used to listen to.

And like, yeah, it just all came together at one point. And I just became a conduit for everything I've been listening to for the past like, what, 13, 14 years, bro? Why did you move to Houston? My dad's job. He was at a law firm in New York, and then they moved him to Houston. And at one point we were going to go to North Carolina. There was a law from my dad.

I was looking at him as a prospect, but he never moved. What was the – how did that affect you the move from, you know, New York to Texas? The move from New York. It wasn't that bad because I hated New York at that point. Why did you hate it? I didn't like my school. I was in private school, and they treated me so. horribly, dude. It was insane. I don't know. All the teachers had it out for me. My little brother

could testify to that too. Dude, they just had it out for me all the time. I don't know what it was. I would just do nothing to nobody and the teachers would just pick on me and bully me for no reason. I wanted to leave that place so bad. So bad. So what happened when you go to school in Texas or no one had something against you? Right. I went to school in Texas. What grade was I am when I moved probably like third or second and third? And dude, I loved it. I loved it. Everybody had a different accent. That was probably what stuck with me the most. Everybody talked different.

Everybody acted different. There was no like overly hustle mentality. Everything was chill because Texas is chill, bro. Like, it's just calm. You land and it's just peace, you know? So I was in second grade. I was just making a whole bunch of friends, bro, like people that were just like me, people that love video games and all that kind of stuff.

I just found my people in Texas, but I love Houston. Shout out to Houston. I mean, there's no question that when you're outside of the major city, I mean, the thing is Houston's obviously like a major city and so's Dallas in Austin but you know San Antonio but none of them feel like that they all just feel suburban yeah um okay so you're you're now in Houston what gets you into the gaming world um my dad has always been like the biggest gamer in the world he showed me yeah I was playing video games in Queens heavily we had this basement we didn't have a basement in Houston but we had a basement in Queens and it was like his

Man Cave. He had like PS3s, OG PS2, PS1, Nintendo 64, like Game Boys, all that kind of stuff. And I used to play infamous on the PSD with him all the time and used to play like OG games, Mario Kart down there. He used to play like a lot of, oh, Dragon Balli-Z, Budu Ketankeachi Kaiachi-Ka-Tachi 3 on a PS2, but all these anime games, like he got me in anime then too. And that just like carried over to Houston. I was playing a bunch of online games at that point too. Fortnite came out. I was playing Colorado Duty a lot. I was playing a lot of Gears of War, I was playing a lot of infamous again when Second Sun came out on the uncharted series on PS3 carried over crazy.

I was playing The Last of Us, but all these different types. I'm a crash bandicoot, everything, bro. It's weird. When I think I'm probably the first generation to have like, you know, video games is a big part of their life. And I just remember thinking when parents are like, don't play, you're like, no, you don't understand there's problem solving. Yes. Like, you know, the, the value.

value of it, I think you can argue is just as much as, I mean, I shouldn't say as normal math, but there are certain kinds of problem solving that you get from high level math that isn't applicable to a normal day. Yeah. As much so as sometimes some of the problem solving from an intense level of a video game and having to redo and redo these. It's a lot of figuring out. Yeah.

Yeah. Like, I would imagine, I don't know, how do you feel about that? I mean, dude, it's like insane and amazing for me. Like every time my mom would say, get off the game, you're rotting your brain, I'd run to my dad and like he'd talk to her and let me play for like an hour or two longer because these video games taught me more critical thinking than real life. Like the puzzles you have to solve and uncharted, all the like kind of quests and missions you gotta go to, even in GTA, bro.

Like, GTA 4 on a PS3, bro. I learned like mad conversational skills from GTA because of the DTA. Dialogue is so, like, potent. Like, there's so much to take from these video games that I wasn't getting just because of just, like, how I was as a kid. I wasn't really social like that. But I learned so much from video games, but that's a super big part of my life. Starting to, I feel like if, you know, saying I'm going to start a YouTube channel

and then I'm going to start, you know, live streaming my life. Yeah. Like, I feel like as a parent, and I know at this point you got homeschooled from 7th grade on, you said, I feel like as a parent you'd be just like so nervous. Yeah, I mean, the good thing about these things is every time I would discover a new hobby, I'd have to hide it for a little bit and then like ease my parents into it. So I wouldn't be like, Mom, I made a YouTube channel. Like, nah, I had to like gain the followers, be super discreet with it, post some gaming videos,

gain some views, gain some notoriety. And then bring it to my parents and be like, yo, these people like me. You have to like it too. Because they wouldn't let me do it if they didn't see the price. progress and the actual product of what I was doing. They'd have to see the proof before they'd let me do it. So when I started the YouTube channel, I already had like five or six videos up all amassed about 10,000 views each. And those videos were like Minecraft tutorials and stuff like that. And then they let me finish. What makes you create music?

Good question. Back then, when I first started, it was purely for Fortnite. Like I treated Fortnite like it was a movie, like I was sinking or soundtracking like a teardacking like a texie. TV show or something. I'd make a montage, then I make a song for it. I make a montage. I make another song for it. But that was for the first six or seven songs I made. And then I was getting bored of making it for four-nine montages. So I started looking elsewhere for inspiration. And I was still homeschool. So I didn't go outside and have any social circles to kind of, you know, pull inspiration from. So I watched movies. And the first hit I made was here with me. And I was watching the Disney movie up. And I was looking at Carl and Ellie. And when Ellie died, it was like the saddest thing

I watched a movie like 150,000 times. And every time Ellie dies, I cry every time. And I was like, yo, I got to finish their story. Like, this is so sad. He's moving on. He went to Paradise Falls without her. I got to do it. So I wrote the song about Carl and Ellie making it to Paradise Falls together.

That's the whole chorus. That's what the chorus is about. So. NMPA is the premier organization for music publishers and their songwriter partners. It's their mission to increase the value of music. And that's exactly what they do. NMPA is working right now to raise. raise royalty rates for songwriters from streaming services, radio, social media, and everywhere,

music is essential. From the courts to Congress, NMPA works to get songwriters what they deserve. I know because I've served on the board before, and I'm the current co-chair, along with Ryan Teter and Liz Rose for the Golden Platinum Club. So again, thank you NMPA for supporting and the writer is and songwriters everywhere. Where does your name come from? Video games, man. You know when you put in your name on video games and somebody already has it?

So you have to add numbers to the end or underscores and commas and appos. Yeah, all this kind of stuff. I just took the A out, put the four and took the I out. And it was free. And there it is. The, I still can't believe that, you know, you're doing this, writing a song for, you know, for like a soundtrack. every most, I would say 95% of people have been on this podcast

when they were producing music it was because they always wanted to be like a rock star. There's a difference between writing for that and then seeing, you know, then all of a sudden being a musician. I mean, what's the thing that makes you say like, okay, let's actually release this song and not just like put it, you know,

there's one thing to write a song. It's another thing to be like, I'm going to put myself out there, especially if it's a hobby. You know what? I think the fact that I'm not so precious with my music, I mean, I do respect my art and I love my art to death, but I don't have such a perfectionism about it.

I'm like, oh, I'm so scared to do this. I don't know what's going to be received. Like, I would be making songs and putting them out every single day if I, you know, have the liberty to do so. But I just like releasing music as much as I like making it. How do you get from making that music? Well, first of all, let's just talk about band camp and like, you know, our band lab. Yeah, band lab.

Bandcamp is a separate music thing. BandLab and like creating music on your phone. Also, this is like maybe the most legendary story. And I think it, like, struck fear in the hearts of every studio owner because. All of a sudden, it was, here's somebody who's really in touch with what his fans want, what he wants, what his fans want, and you were able to do it like with nothing. Yeah, yeah, man. So how does that work?

If you're, how do you explain that to a studio owner in Los Angeles? How does somebody make a song from nothing except for a phone? I'm going to show you how I made romantic homicide. It's easy as easy way I can put it. So basically, when I was 17, I was in Texas, just got fired from Starbucks, doing homeschool work, building PCs, learning how to code at the same time. I was looking for YouTube beats, and I just go on YouTube and search up indie type beat. And then I find the beat, I import it into the app. And then after I imported into the app, let's search of that romantic.

I go to my sister's closet because I don't have any space to kind of record. I don't have a walking closet. My sister's a spoiled one. She has a walk-in closet. I put up all these robes, all these clothes to insulate the sound. After that, I sit down and it's like a little claustrophobic space with no AC, and I just start cooking. And I literally freestyle the entire song front to back. And this is how most of my songs go. Like, this is a like a writing podcast. I barely write. Like it's always off the dome, off the top, freestyle one and done moves to the next song. I don't like to spend two. much time on songs. It never ever works like that. I'm about to play this. You see on my camera, my brightness. Where's that, where does that first sample come from? Cheers YouTube. And this is all one stem. There is no vocal comping. There's no other takes. It's just one take. I was happy with it. Close the app. Now it was done. That's how it goes for most of my stuff. And wait, but who's like when you're looking at YouTube, are you looking at like royalty-free?

Not even. So there's this app called Beat Stars too that I absolutely, we have a love and hate relationship because there's like this leasing thing they have where you buy a beat for $20, you're able to release it. But then like other people can buy for $20. And you also have the rights to the song. And then you have multiple people that have the same song. But I would just look up Andy type beats, heartbreak type beats, Billy Addo's type beats, Waddle's type beats, like whatever artists I would listen to that day is the type beat I was. search up, trying to find my sound. So how I made this song, You and I searched up Wallace type beat, how I made the song Dirty Secrets. That's such a post-punk type beat. Romantic Homicide was sad indie type beat. Here with me was Beach type beat. It's just whatever I'm feeling in the day is a type beat I search up for the day.

How do you describe your genre? I'd say, I mean, people like to call me genre defining, but it's pretty much just bedroom pop. I don't know why people keep reading it to a deeper than what it is. It's just bedroom pop works too. Yeah. is of a certain era when you kind of... Yeah, it's...

I think it's like nostalgia invoking bedroom pop, though, because it makes you think of other stuff, like older songs, like romantic homicide sounds like it was made like the 80s or like the 90s, kind of, you know? Yeah, you also are really a singer. Yeah. You know?

And I don't think, you know, it's like... It sort of belongs with, like, the cure, something like that. Like, I think it's closer to the cure So I don't know how to just, you know, it's like it feels like, it feels like 1985 email, like in like a really good way. It feels like a band. It's like a band. Yeah.

It's all band stuff. When you tour, you tour the band. Yeah. Do you feel like there are expectations for your music because of your race? Oh, yes, bro. Steve Lacey with it. I mean, when I first came up on like the TikTok scene, music scene, people thought I was white. People still don't know my ethnicity.

I had no face videos. I had nobody do my real name back then. And then when I did the first music video, everybody was so surprised because my voice did not match my face. And it was the coolest thing ever just to kind of see the contrast and me winning people over because of that too and how it inspired so many other kids to do the same thing. And I just love seeing the kind of... empowerment that it brings for other kids too. How do you feel the pressure of having to follow up songs that you write on your phone

when now that you see the sort of industry pressure of, you know, you have two songs over a billion streams. Yeah. They did with four tracks on your phone. Yeah. You know, it's like, do you feel the pressure to repeat that success and how do you do that? You know what for a minute I did right now in the headspace time? I don't feel it at all, but I remember 2023 was really tough because the stuff that was going

viral in 2022 wasn't going viral anymore. And it started to turn more mainstream with the way that TikTok was working on the algorithm changes and the constant kind of growth in people are growing out of things every single day. People are growing into things and going out of things every single day. And then I went on tour with Sizzar. And that didn't change my whole thing. I started making R&B music after that. I started going to the studio every single day.

I started using the recording budget. I never touched because I was using my phone. I was starting to go to the studio and I was like, yo, what am I doing? I had to kind of take so many steps forward and so many steps back to kind of just find myself again because I saw 32 scissors shows back to back to back. And I was just taking so many notes. And I was trying to textbook replicate that in the male version. I was like, how do I become the guy version of scissors?

But then I sat down with her and she was just talking to me about my own music and what she loved about it. And what she loved by my music was everything that I hated it. about my music because I thought that it didn't sound a certain way. I wasn't reaching a certain bar. But she was like, yeah, I love how Ron is. Like, you're so awesome. Like, you're so authentic to yourself. You just need to be you. Be you. And I was like, wait, hold on. Maybe I do need to be me. And that kind of clicked for me. I instantly, after I got off that tour, I thanked her. I was like, yo, you're awesome. Thank you so much for this. And then I instantly went back to Houston. Went back to Houston. Got back on my phone. And I got back to the roots.

And that's really what kind of changed my whole perspective was me going back to the roots of everything, man. So the I mean it's it's so hard to explain when you're like like you said it's a writing podcast and you know some people like you know Tehran is maybe one of the best writers in the world you know it's like that guy's doing like 10 songs in a day yeah it's just freestyle songs and then there's the I feel like I can freestyle a song uh and and then I and then I I just spend the next eight hours trying to edit that into something that makes sense. Mm-hmm. And you just keep moving on to the next song.

Yes. Because it don't got to make sense sometimes for me. I feel like my OG music, seeing how the music industry works and seeing how I started working with Ryan Tudder a lot. And his big thing is through lines and how the verses connect to the hooks and the hooks connect to the bridge and the bridge connects to the outro. And it was such a different thing for me because when I write songs, I don't think about things making, it's kind of just like I throw words out there and it makes its own. The song essentially

makes itself. So when I see people like Ryan Tudder and Joel Little and big producers like that kind of work so hard on how the song is structured, almost like they're building a like a sculpture and looking at it from really up close, I look at songs from so far back that it's just about the feeling for me. Some of my hooks don't even make sense to what I'm talking about in the bridge or what I'm talking about in. the verse, but it has a common theme. I think the themes of the songs are more important than what the lyrics are saying. And it's about how it makes you feel, to be honest.

It's also really different being an artist versus a songwriter. Like, if you're, you know, Jackson Pollack and these guys who are more, I mean, granted, that there's thought in the, you know, the structure of his paintings, but it's not the same thing as like, you know, pointillism and realism and all that stuff. Like, you can, the art that is you, that the music you make that's art, like, I couldn't pitch that. If I wrote your song, which I couldn't, and I went and I pitched it to anybody else, it wouldn't work. Yeah, man. But because it's so authentically you, it's really specific to you.

And if you came into most rooms in L.A., they're going to try to make that sculpture make sense. Exactly, bro. I couldn't even imagine taking romantic homicide to one of them, bro. There's no laughter. Like, I think about it like paintings. It's like you go to a traditional art museum and it's like, that's a face. Everybody sees that as a face. A hundred percent of humanity sees that as a face.

Go to an abstract art or like some kind of unique kind of gallery and you tell 15 people to try to find a face in that. Only two people are going to see it. So it's like, I make like music for the people that can see the face, to be honest. Yeah, that's incredible. And again, is it, I mean, I guess I should ask, is it easy for you? Yeah, it's pretty easy, bro. I'm not going to lie.

I was making songs on the car on the way over here, bro, because I got band lab on standby every single second of the day. But, yeah, I never overthinking. I used to never overthink the Fortnite thing. I didn't overthink the playing video games. I never overthought how I'm going to make my parents support. my hobbies. I never thought about it. It was just like, this is the way it is and this is how I'm going to adapt to it. It's all about the adaptation to the situation rather than, you know,

taking things for granted or spending too much time lingering on one thought or overthinking a process. It's like I don't search for formulas, people, especially what you just said, too, about trying to one up the success I had with two songs. It's like, me and my team, we went back after the songs blew up and we was just working on the catalog I already had. Like, I wasn't even focused on dropping a song. I didn't drop a song after a romantic homicide for seven months. I was like starving my fans, but feeding them with music already had out. So we were working, romantic homicire were working here with me, but we also went back and made music videos for Dirty Secrets, made music videos for this, made visualizers for that,

made anime music videos for this and things like that. So we kind of went back and promoted the old music as new music and people didn't bat an eye. So it was kind of crazy. How did you meet Darkroom? Man, who emailed me? I remember I was in Houston and... Who did you mean first, Danny? Who's your person at Darkroom?

I think I met Justin first. I pulled up to L.A. when my parents, and my parents came to every single meeting with me. Good parents. Put up to Justin Lou Blin's house. Everything was Billy themed. I was so geeked. I was like, oh my God, he has a Billy Irish. But yeah, we sat down, talked about the music, Justin Elaine, and kind of just went through the whole rigumaroo of, we can do this and we're a label.

We can do this. Shake hands. But there was something different about it. Justin felt like he was holding back so much in that meeting. And I could tell by looking his eye that he wanted to say more. So I talked to my parents. He was like, Justin asked my parents if he can come to Houston. I was like, oh, you want to fly all the way out there, my bro?

And he was like, yeah, I want to come. So he came to Houston with this gigantic binder of like a three-year plan of everything that he wanted to do. And he titled the Artist Development. Mind you, I don't know nothing about this. So I see Artist Development. I'm like, okay, what does that mean? And there was expanding on the gaming side, telling my story how I came from YouTube.

How I started making montages, how I make everything on the phone. Like this whole really eclectic, introspective kind of his thought process on how it would go. And it was so different than all the other meetings I took because there was no, we're going to make you a star, we're going to do this for you, want to make all your dreams control. Because I didn't have many dreams. Like I played Fortnite and I'm homeschool. What dreams do I have?

I'm trying to make music to blow my Fortnite up. But it was just so different from that. And then at that point, I was like, oh, I know what I want to do. What are your dreams now? Dude, that's a good question. I'm so bad at goal setting. That's one of the flaws I have is I can't set a goal because then I just, I have such a hyper fixation on it.

But I think one of my dreams now is to make the best music I possibly can every time I make a song, make more music to inspire, inspire more people, make more people feel things, make more people understand their own feelings. I get so many DMs every day about people saying my music saved them and all the cliche things. But it's really not cliche because it really matters. fans matter and the people that listen to the music matter. And that makes the music matter much, much more, especially when there's so many years that kind of depend on this kind of stuff in their daily lives to get through it.

You come up at the perfect time, right? Like, Fortnite is right when you start doing video streaming. Like, you have this ability to then record on your phone and no one else. Like, it's just the timing is incredible. But there's a sea of people who are, like your younger brother, are 17 years old. What do you tell a 17-year-old now who wants to be David when they grow up? How did they do it? I mean, what I tell my brother is there is no way to do that.

It's kind of like, if you would have asked me this question in like the 90s, I would have been like, this is the steps you take. I'm going to put this all on the PowerPoint presentation, and this is how you do it, word for word bar for bar but the internet moves so fast and i'm like an internet kid for a night call duty youtube videos music that everything everything moves so fast and it's impossible to replicate something that happened last week yesterday because people are on to a whole other thing today so it's like what i what i tell my brother is be anti-viral like when he's making music his biggest inspiration is playbord cardi and like opium and kank cars and all that i'm like if you want to do that style

put a Ken Carson verse over a folk type beat. Play guitar this way and then rap over it. Dominic Fike is a really good example of that because he just takes things that are mainstream and on mainstreams now. And it's so cool. Like his process is amazing. But that's why I tell my brother, like,

make music that nobody wants to hear and they end up wanting to hear it anyways because nobody else is doing it. So it's kind of my spiel. You're only, I mean, you're not even 20 years old yet. Hey, I got 20 more days. Oh, there you go. We got to.

Wait, wait. So, when's your birthday? March 28th. Nice. Yeah, a couple weeks. Nice. I'm April 8th. Hey.

Aries. Oh, boy, I would give you a handset, but we're too far. You know, then. Done. Okay. You know, there's, you'll be in this business, I presumably for a long time. Do you feel like this is the thing? At 19, like people, some people are in college or,

right now who are like switching majors and doing a million other things. What are your goals outside of music? That's a good question. I want to direct, I want to act. I was in, I had a really big film phase back in like eighth, ninth grade. I was watching a lot of corridor crew on YouTube. Shout out to corridor crew. Like VFX work in CGI and getting behind the camera, cinematography tutorials.

I was saving up for a... crazy, expensive camera at the time too. So film is a really big part of my outside of music hobbies. I want to get into an interest. Writing books. I still want to write a manga. The kind of aesthetic that I have for my project in the past two project is I have this alter ego named the Tommy, which means pain is Japanese and I'm heavily inspired by like anime and stuff like that. But that character that's in the music videos I make now was actually an idea that I had years, years before music even started when I was writing my first comic book. And it was this detective that would solve his own crime.

So he was the good guy by day. And then at night he'd kind of transform into this alter ego and then commit crimes he'd solved the morning of. So I brought that idea into music. I kind of want to expand on that and write mangas again and comic books and a whole bunch of different stuff, man. I'm just excited. Yeah, it's incredible, man.

I mean, it's going to be really fun to watch. When you have, you have, you know, these hits that you've now already created. And you already said it's really easy for you. Do you think of yourself as a rock star? I want to be a rock star. I don't think I am one yet. I kind of need more rock songs to be a rock star. I'm making a lot of rock right now, too.

Rock star. Yeah. Or pop star, whatever. You know what I mean? Pop star. I don't even know. I wouldn't put the star at two yet. I think we're club.

I'm not that. How often do you get recognized when you're in public? A fair amount. A fair amount. I've been getting recognized in Houston more than anything, to be honest. But yeah, it's a fair amount. How do you like living in LA? It's cool.

For work, it's cool out here. But I enjoy the peace and quiet of Houston. But when I'm on the grind mode, like 2025, like I like being here. Like there's so much to work on and connect and network and do stuff out here for sure. All right. We're going to go to a next segment. I'm going to just list five things. All right.

Just tell me what comes out of the top of your head. All right. All right. Four night. Me. I am Fortnite. Damn. That's a great.

That was not the response of that. You were going to say, okay, cool. Queens. Ooh. Taste of the Caribbean. Great ice cream spot. They give you five scoops there. Taste of the Caribbean ice cream spot, Queens.

Ban Lab. Ooh. Romance of Comasai. I mean, dude, you have a three times platinum song recorded on your phone. That's nuts. And the other, and, you know, here with me is also on your phone, right? And that's five times platinum. That's only so far.

Do you have, like, do you have all the plaques up in your? I get into my mom. Yeah, I don't keep any of my plaques. I give them all to my family in Houston. They put them up in their house. All right, your dad. Law firm, lawyer, law. He is the law.

He is the law. Your mom? Ooh, chef. She cooks crazy. Really? Yeah, because she's from Grenada. She's from this island called Grenada. We've got all these foods out there that, like, you wouldn't find anywhere else.

It's so good. Oh, man. Why isn't she here right now? Man, she's taking care of the... She has a farm in Texas. So she'd be taking care of, like, animals and stuff. She's growing crops and whatnot. She got a whole garden out there.

Yeah. Are your parents proud of you? I would say, yeah. They tell me that it's fair. I'm out. Yeah, they're proud of me. Is your brother and your sister? Are they proud of it? Oh, overly. Absolutely. Like, yeah, my brother, I remember I bought my brother all this studio equipment. Like, he is on better equipment than me, bro. I'm on BandLab. He has,

like, a Norman U-87, crazy interface, crazy computer, three MacBooks. Like, I decked them out, bro. Yeah, I went crazy. When you record songs now, right, what's the percentage that's, It's on bandlab versus that you're doing in a studio like here? Maybe 80, 20. 20 studio 80 band lab. I mean, I went to London for two weeks to record a majority of the project and then I came back to Houston and record the other half of my phone.

But I found my sake taking songs from London and re-recording them on bandlab. So, yeah, 80, 20. Do you like co-writing? I do like co-writing. When it comes to production, I took three of my friends with me. me out to London, Jack Hanlonback, Lucho, Scott Zane, those are my goats, my best friends. And we just spent the whole two weeks every day from dust till dawn, just writing, writing, writing, writing, right and writing, right, and writing, and writing, instrumental, playing instruments,

da-da-da-da-da-da. Learning everything. I do love code writing. When it's the right people. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. But you kind of never know until you try it. Right, yeah.

You know? It's all, like, random, strange. Yeah, I mean, because I'm at this place now where I hate doing sessions, bro. Like, people are like, oh, you should get in the room with it. room with this person, I'd be like, no, send me your open verse. Because I just hate, because there's so many people that I just don't connect with. And then I just find myself sitting in a corner like this waiting for it to be over. And I hate that because I love music so much. And if I'm in a place where I'm waiting for the session to be over so I can go home and

make other stuff, bro, it's the worst feeling in the world when you have such a passion for the craft, bro. Yeah, you're in a unique place, man, because the real advice is what as I gave you. And, you know, we have writers who, and producers who produce and write for other artists at a super high

level. What will really make them happy is the music they do. Yeah, yeah. When they're alone. And like to keep your head down, not look at L.A., but just keep your head down and look at

your computer, your phone or whatever it is. But like, that's your safe place to just be the, to be an actual artist. To be creative. And not try to be like the pop star, not put the pop star before the artistry. Yeah.

And it's like, LA's a New York, I mean, anywhere that's on the internet is like not healthy for that. But there's a world where a major label finds someone like you and says, we're not going to do anything,

but we're going to help you build everything outside of the music because you have the music on lock. But it takes a certain label to do that because otherwise you're like, well, we got to hedge our bets and we know if we put David with this producer, that producer, then we've got like, you know, it changes the algorithm on there for them.

You know? It's hard to be unconditionally supportive of an artist, especially one that's young, especially one that's doing like, you know, who's admittedly doing stuff on the phone, that must freak out 90% of like,

not just, you know, not just your team just, that's what I'm saying, like almost strikes fear in the hearts of like all these people who need to have a studio to make music. Yeah, it's kind of crazy.

I mean, so many people are using band lab now. It's kind of becoming the thing. Like going to Westlake used to be the thing. Like, Band Lab is the thing now. Where do you get all your beats from so that you don't have doing a bunch of music over other people's stuff? Nowadays, I'm much more involved in a production process. I go to the studio and make the beats and take everything home and make beat packs.

When I'm abroad on tour, so I like that I got beat packs made from people I really rock with and people that know what I want. That's the biggest thing for me. When people know and are like in my head and know what I'm looking for is like the best feeling because they've kind of given me the groundwork for the song already. Yeah. Well, dude, thank you so much for doing this. I mean, this is your first time on this podcast. And if you've seen this, like we have people on two or three times. Can't imagine in three years, seven years, 15 years.

Like, your career is going to be wild. It's like you've done some amazing work already. Yeah, man, I know I said in the beginning, like, it's hard not to be, like, proud of somebody who's, who did the thing without the system. Yeah. You earned it, like, the hard way. And you're sitting right here with, like, in the same seat of legend sit in.

Because, like, man, you've earned it. Yeah, that's awesome. Congrats. Thank you, so much. Hope you enjoyed this episode. It was produced by me and Joe London, in association with mega house music group. If you like this episode, go give us a rating at wherever you listen to your podcast.

And make sure to follow us at And The Writer is on all your socials. We'll see you next week.