“It’s Dave.
AKA Lil Dicky.
You might know me as a professional rapper.
Although I’m certainly much more than that if we ever met in person.”
Before Lil Dicky dropped hits like Freaky Friday, Pillow Talking, Professional Rapper,
Save Dat Money, and Ex Boyfriend “So I think, obviously we’re tryna make
the best music video ever ever, for no money.”
Before he made it on the XXL Freshman class list in 2016.Before collaborating with the
likes of Snoop Dog, Ty Dolla Sign, Fetty Wap, and Rich Homie QuanBefore using YouTube to
build up a legion of fans, called Dickheads, who helped to fund the launch of his career
via Kickstarter
“This is so important to me, it means the world to me.
If you guys could help me out I really think it would change my life completely.
And I think it would really allow me to, honestly, go for my dreams.”North Philadelphia born
and raised in an upper middle class Jewish family, Lil Dicky was set to become just about
anything other than a rapper.
He was a funny kid, who loved entertaining people, but grew up to become an account manager
in an ad agency.
While he worked away in the business world, his creative side kept coming out.
Eventually he realized that his future was going to be in the world of entertainment.
As you can tell from his music videos, he always wanted to break into comedy and acting,
so he started rapping.
He had no idea he would become so skilled, and believed no one could take him seriously
as a hip hop artist.What's going on guys?
My name is Marlon Palmer documenting the life and career of Lil Dicky prior to fame, here
for you on Before They Were Famous and this is an UPDATED video.
If you want to see more rapper bios, I've got a whole Hip Hop playlist for you to check out.
But as always, let me know who you want to document next in the comments down below,
or hit me up on instagram or twitter.
David Andrew Burd was born on March 15, 1988, growing
up in the Elkins Park neighbourhood of Cheltenham Township, just north of Philadelphia population
36 thousand people.
Dave grew up in an upper middle class Jewish family, a creative kid who did well in school.
When he was fourteen years old, he claims to have opened for the R&B group One Twelve
at his overnight camp, and has been rapping ever since.
That might sound like an outlandish story, but around this time, the group had been dropped
by Bad Boy, so it could have happened.
Plus we found this picture of a young Lil Dicky with the group.
In his Reddit AMA video Dave recalls an embarrassing moment from his childhood where he was watching
television on his parents bed wearing nothing but his boxers when his mom walked in, I'll
let him explain.
“And rather than saying, you know, the flap in your underwear is open and your penis is
exposed, she decided to just simply use her hands and close the flap herself.”
David attended Cheltenham High School, a public high school in the Wyncote neighbourhood of Cheltenham.
Although he loved making people laugh, any ambitions he had to be professional performer
would have to take a back seat to his more practical goal of making a good living in
a safe job.
I know that feeling oh too well…
“You know I didn’t grow up thinking I was gonna be a rapper because that seemed
as outlandish as playing in the NBA to some extent, you know what I mean?”
After high school, David moved out to Richmond, Virginia, where he attended the E. Claiborne
Robins School of Business at the University of Richmond.
According to his album cover for Professional Rapper, he studied abroad at the University
of Melbourne in 2008, specialized in Marketing, and graduated Summa Cum Laude, with a 3.93
GPA.
Smart guy.
After graduating, he moved to San Fransisco, and worked in advertising industry as an account
manager.
Now working a stable job at the ad agency, Goodby Silverstein, David's creative side
started to bleed into his work.
He started to present his monthly progress reports in the form of rap videos.
His bosses decided to transfer him into the creative department, where he wrote copy for
ads like NBA's BIG campaign.Working as a creative in the ad world may have been a step closer
to the kind of work David really had a passion for, but it didn't satisfy him.
“Working in the ad agency just simply showed me how possible it was to create content very
easily and cheaply.
We had an in house production wing at my agency.”
He had dreams of writing movies and tv shows, and becoming an actor.
He thought he might be able to become a comedian, and decided that the best root to this would
be through funny rap songs.
Basically, he wanted to be the new Will Smith.
AKA the greatest human being alive.
Yeah, I said it.But there was a bit of a problem.
In order to make it, David knew he would have to use the power the internet.
His parents and girlfriend at the time Molly, pleaded with him not to post anything online,
as it could effect his future prospects in the business world.
He believes that since he put his music out there, he has eliminated 80 percent of the
job prospects he would otherwise be qualified for and lost out on love with Molly because
the two broke up.
Nevertheless, David began working on his debut Mix Tape, So Hard, and decided to use the
name Lil Dicky.
Why'd he pick that name?
“I think soft, I don’t know what the definition of a micro penis is but like right now if
I showed you my soft d*** it’s like one inch.”
“You don’t have to, don’t feel obligated to.”
The complete 17-track piece would drop as a digital download on May 22, 2013, featuring
a pretty impressive line up of producers, including Calvin Harris and Kanye West.
How he managed to line up stars like that, remains a mystery.
“At this point, I’m at a point where my managers can reach out to anybodies managers.
There’s no artist that we can’t at least get in front of in terms of speaking to their
management.”
Prior to launching his mix tape, Lil Dicky started to release his songs on youtube, beginning
with the track Jewish Flow on April 23, 2013.As he released songs from his mixtape on youtube,
he also began dropping music videos, sometimes for songs that didn't even appear on the mixtape,
like the song Lion King, produced by Mazik Beats.That video has gone on to accumulate
nearly 20 million views on youtube, but it would pale in comparison to the music video
for Ex Boyfriend, which received over a million views in under 24 hours, and has gone on to
get over 36 million views at the time of this recording.
While Lil Dicky started doing the rap thing to garner attention as a comedian, and still
has plans of working in TV and movies, he was surprised to find out that he's actually
pretty lit.
After blowing through his life savings, producing thirty-two songs and fifteen music videos,
Lil Dicky had garnered a large following of Dick Heads, but not much money.
And by the way that’s the name of his fanbase not… you know what, never mind.So on November
20th, 2013, Dicky began a month-long crowd funding effort so that he could create his
debut album, new music videos, and tour.
His goal was to raise 70,000 dollars, but he ended up beating that target, raising 113
thousand.
He went on the road for the first time with his Professional Rapper Tour in 2014, and
his debut studio album would finally arrive on July 31st, 2015, and quickly climbed to
number 7 on the US Billboard 200.
“16 songs, 4 interludes, it’s an hour and a half, it’s a journey.
I suggest you like really be in a state of mind to go on this journey before listening
to it, but…”
The music video for his title track, Professional Rapper, would receive more than 81 million
views on youtube.
His next video would bring in even bigger numbers.
At the time of this recording, Save Dat Money featuring Fetty Wap and Richie Homie Quan
has well over 117 million views.
“Rap game, man.
Sometimes you just gotta get on the back of a chopper… and just go hard.”
In 2016, Lil Dicky collaborated with Trinidad James and Mystikal on the track Just a Lil
Thick (She Juicy).
They also appeared together in a Funny or Die Video called Watch Yo Self.
Dicky worked with Kent Jones, Ty Dolla Sign and E-40 for Sit Down.
2016 would also be the year he made it onto the double XL Freshman Class.
His pitch for XXL, released on March 29, addressed the fact that he had attempted but failed
to make the cut the previous year.
“In 2015 you know I think I might not have deserved it yet.
Like I think I was probably a little bit under qualified.
Like if it did work out in 2015 I would have felt like it was a stretch and I really over
achieved.”Lil Dicky was a controversial choice for the Freshman Class list.
He was not only an upper middle class white boy, he also had priorities outside of hip
hop.
Needless to say, some in the hip hop community were not ready to embrace him.
“This whole comedy rap thing, I’m not with it, I’m not for it.
I’m cool right now.
I don’t need another Jewish funny dude in hip hop or rap, we got one.”Still, Lil Dicky
made the list in 2016, and demonstrated his incredible skills in his Freestyle.
It was fire!And he seemed to win Desiigner and Anderson Paak over in their Freshmen Cypher.
To be honest I…
I don’t even know why Desiigner was there…Making it onto the XXL Freshman class was a clear
indication for Lil Dicky that he had really begun to make it as a rapper.
Now one thing I don't know about his come up is whether or not he read up on hip hop
and the music industry to figure out what moves to make...but he seems like the kind
of guy who would.
In June of 2016, Lil Dicky would drop the music video for Molly featuring Brendon Urie,
which would go on to receive over 46 million views at the time of this recording.
In April of 2017, Lil Dicky would appear in a special video by ESPN, revealing some previously
unknown facts about his family background.
“If you know anything about college basketball, then you probably know about the Ball family.
But did you know there’s a 4th Ball?”
“Lil Dicky Ball.
University of Richmond."
The same month Lil Dicky released his most sophisticated music video yet for the song
“Pillow Talking”, which currently ranks as the 49th most expensive music video ever
made.
That music video received over 21 million views in its first 12 months.
It was so successful that Lil Dicky decided to create an entire EP as Brain, called I'm
Brain.
He would also release a Brain Plush toy, which you can actually buy on his website.
At least you used to be able to, it's completely sold out.
His next big single would be Freaky Friday, featuring Chris Brown.
The music video dropped on YouTube on March 15, 2018, and has since gone on to rank up
nearly 50 million views at the time of this recording.
And the rest of the story?
Well, we'll have to wait and see.
This is Before They Were Famous.
My name's Marlon Palmer.
Thanks for watching.
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Give em a watch and let me know who's next in the comments down below, or on Instagram
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