Daily Discovery is a feature that will highlight a new or recently discovered artist that we’re excited about. See the rest of our Daily Discoveries here.
QUAD is 18-year-old Quadry Winters, and he currently works at AutoZone in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. “I’m on the verge of being fired,” he says, “because I daydream about album concepts, rhymes, and why they booed Outkast all day.”
Baton Rouge has a history of rap talent, but there’s a lack of youthful voices. “We all grew up on Boosie,” Quad says, “and Kevin Gates hasn’t been a freshman to us since ’07. It’s a city needing a new champion.”
But QUAD is an unlikely candidate for the new champion. He doesn’t sound like the other local artists, he hasn’t performed yet, he doesn’t have a Facebook page, and he’s currently “wasting away in a community college” while pursuing a business degree. But his goals involve more than AutoZone and a degree. “The goal is to live off my creativity, and rap is just the beginning. I’d like to direct films and produce also. I want to do festivals. I want to do SXSW and Boiler Room.”
Day-to-day living may still be taking up his time, but he’s been taking steps toward his real goals. His first project is Dopè, an album’s worth of material that shows potential, passion, and ambition that probably doesn’t come across to his AutoZone bosses.
“Dopè is kinda my first real project,” he says. “I locked myself in my room during fall semester and listened to Lorde, Nas, and Kanye all day, wrote music, and scoured the web for beats while moms badgered me about college.”
Check out standouts “2 Lbs of Sad” and “The Vibe (High),” and check out the entire project here.
