Premiere: DP Drops "The Burial" Video and Explains the Concepts Behind His New Menacing Visuals

Directed by Matt Westrich.

Not Available Lead
Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

Not Available Lead

DP stormed onto the rap scene in 2014 when he dropped "Jabar" which features a bouncy beat and psychotic lyrics where he raps about how he's going to choke your grandmother for playing with his money. One year later, he released a 10-track tape, Designer Casket. His sound is dark, maniacal, and slightly paranoid, and it's all over some of the best beats in the business courtesy of Brooklyn Taylor, Sir Yogaflame, Caleb Stone, Ducko McFli, CurtisHeron, and HNIC. So it makes sense that his all-time favorite movie is Taxi Driver; DP really is the rap game's Travis Bickle.

Today, we're premiering the video for "The Burial," Designer Casket's intro, and sets the tone from jump with its piercing strings, thumping bass, and claustrophobic bars. The video was filmed at YouTube Studios in Manhattan's Chelsea Market, and features DP rapping while he's slowly lowered into a grave. As he descends to eternal life, his friends drop drugs, bullets, and guns until his casket floats into space like the monolith in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.

In 2016, he's looking to follow up his latest project with something totally different and introduce the world to his Brain Dead Music collective. We recently kicked it with DP and talked about his new video, Designer Casket, and how he'd want to be buried himself.

It seems like you came out of nowhere. How did you start off?
We’ve [DP, Brooklyn Taylor, and Sir Yogaflame] been making music since senior year of high school, for real. After SXSW in 2014, I just came back a little inspired and recorded “Jabar,” “Glass Casket,” and “Glitch” the same night a couple days later. We just built the project around those. “Jabar” was the first track we threw up and that shit went stupid.

Do you think street rap is making a comeback?
I honestly couldn’t even tell you because I don’t listen to that shit. The only street rap I listen to is trap shit. I listen to 21 Savage and shit like that. I’m not rapping from the kingpin level, I’m rapping from low-level street. I’m being authentic. I never cared about being on the radio or anything. I was just focused on making great bodies of work, good projects.

Let's talk about the video for “The Burial.”
It’s a sick concept. They had me in a suit and everything. It’s basically a simulation of my burial. They had homies dropping various items like Newports, Backwoods, and bullets in my casket. Bury me with a pint of Actavis,bury me with two of my bitches, mummify they asses. I wanna be mummified. That’s how we going out.

What’s a designer casket?
It reaches far beyond like Louis Vuitton or that shit. The music’s going to last way longer than I’m going to live. When I’m dead, this is the last thing you’re going to see of me. My music is the casket; the CD, that’s me inside that muthafucka. It’s the legacy you leave. 100 years from now, they’ll dig the casket up, it’s going to be polished still, and you’re going to see my mummy. I might be a little crusty. The pint of the Act is still gonna be there.

The project is inspired by the movie Taxi Driver. At the end of “The Burial,” there’s a little skit from Travis Bickle, Robert De Niro’s character, speaking about his self-loathing and loneliness. That needed to be the intro. I needed to come in with that. When [Brooklyn Taylor] sent me the beat (I think I might have been there when he made the beat), I was like, “Bro, keep on building that shit. This sounds like some intro shit, some funeral shit.”

Are you already working on another project yet?
Yeah, we’ve been working. I actually got tracks from more than a year ago that I’m going to put up on the project. It’s a whole new concept. I’m still going to talk that shit, but it’s coming from a little different standpoint, probably not as dark. More aggressive than anything.

Latest in Music