David Andrew Burd, better known by his rap name Lil Dicky, co-created, writes and stars in the FX series Dave, which is partly based on his own life. His transition from viral meme to bona fide rapper to TV star capable of attracting cameos from Brad Pitt, Drake and Rachel McAdams is either an anomaly or a sign of the uniquely transferable skills seen in today's rap music. Whatever the case, Burd has established himself as an artist who takes his work seriously, jokes and all.
Burd sees his new album, death — also the title of the project his fictional character is working on in the show — as an opportunity to show how much he's grown as an artist since his last work came out eight years ago. “I passed out Professional Rapper, and I really like the ideas and where my head was at, but a lot of it, I hear it now and I think it's kind of not good,” he tells Zoom. “If Jay-Z had never heard of me, and he was like, 'Who's Lil Dicky?' and it goes to Spotify and it goes to Professional Rapper, I would honestly say “Jay, no, don't!” Because it's just not a representation of where I've grown as an artist.”
Actors' and writers' strikes last year freed up Byrd to work on his music, which usually takes a backseat to his work as a central force in writing, directing and acting. Dave. “When you hear any of the stuff on the show, you're hearing my Pro Tools demos,” he says. “It's not mixed, it's not finished. What happened during the strike was that I got a chance to finish this material — to mix it and master it and put the post-production finishing touches on it all. It was such an incredible feeling to be able, for the first time in over five years, to focus on music.”
When Lil Dicky first burst onto the scene in 2013, thanks to a viral music video for his song “Ex-Boyfriend,” he joined the pantheon of born-on-the-Internet funnyman-rappers whose schtick seemed to mock rather than embrace rap culture But it quickly turned out to be more than a ruse. Over the course of two studio albums, two mixtapes, an EP, and several singles and features, he's built a fan base through the same drive and determination you see on Dave. He still has the crude sense of humor you'd expect from a rapper named Lil Dicky, but there's something real underneath the jokes. This means he has paid his dues. Now, says Burd, the goal of going viral is a concern of the past.
“I got into it trying to get noticed for being funny, and every music video I did was like, 'How can I go viral for being funny?' And “maybe I can get a TV show one day,” he admits. “Then I got all that. It's very rewarding for me to be in a place now musically where I can invest so much into a song and a video and an idea that's just my favorite kind of music and my favorite kind of music video, and not something that's designed to be an explosive, funny hit that can garner a hundred million views.”
Byrd says he designed this project in a way that his fans Dave could relate to it as much as the casual listener who has never seen the show. This is partly due to the new territory it allows his music to explore. “I don't think before this moment, there are even songs with me singing. I haven't even put out a song about the song. I feel like I've been singing for eight years, but no one knows. And indeed the style of the beats. It's more present with where I am and my taste level.”
Production continues death ranging from trap sounds to ballads with a pop-punk slant. Lyrically, Burd is nimble in the balance between rapping as a joke and rapping with jokes. “Harrison Ave” has a nostalgic feel, harkening back to Burd's adolescence in the early internet age, filled with AIM messages to a teenage girl. Death it's more compelling in those storytelling moments. As in the series, Burd has a knack for clear-eyed self-reflection that connects to something more universal. “In terms of people who grew up when I grew up and the way I grew up, I don't know that there's a better rap song,” he says. “Almost all the things that happened in this song are literally true. I literally went to a dance thinking I was going with a girl and her date showed up. I was the 33rd person there. The older guys at Macaroni Grill told the waiter it was my birthday. To make matters worse, at Macaroni Grill they literally make you stand at the table and wave a napkin. It's really all true.”
This story goes into the second episode of its final season Dave, when Burd's character returns to his hometown to shoot a music video. “It's one of the best episodes of the series in my opinion,” he says. “You'd think I wrote the song for the episode, but I really wrote the episode for the song, and I wrote the song from my heart.”
This is a familiar theme in Burd's work. While the white comedian-rapper genre is a uniquely cursed subset of American culture, Lil Dicky manages to sidestep obvious first impressions by presenting something that's honest at its core. “I think with both of those things, whether it's music or writing, I really went into both spaces without any experience, but I guess I'm just a natural writer,” he says. “I don't think differently when I'm writing a script or when I'm writing a song. They require completely different skill sets, but I let my instincts rule in every situation.”
For now, he says, those instincts are focused more on music than anything else. While Dave ended Season Three on an ambiguous note, it's unclear when or if fans can expect a fourth season. “We're still figuring everything out,” he says. “And the true reality is that I'm not kidding when I say that I've fallen back in love with music to the point where it's like I have the same obsessive hunger that I had at the beginning of my career. Because of the show, I went in one foot in, one foot out, and now that I've gotten a taste of what it's like to have both feet in the music, I'm really attached to the beginning now and focusing on the music. The only reason the show exists is because I had this music career.”
from our partners at https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/lil-dicky-interview-new-album-penith-1234954293/