When asked by ONE37pm's Sean Millea who his idol was growing up, Platinum recording artist Lil Duke pivoted from the likely premise of the question, referencing how his upbringing shaped the way he viewed the world; an outlook that was different than most.
"We knew about big rappers, but we didn't idolize them. Our idols were in the hood, the people who were able to make it out."
As known by now, video creator Jason Morena is a filmmaker for Gary Vaynerchuk and has been spearheading the creation of Pilot episodes for ONE37pm.
On the inaugural episode of For the Record, ONE37pm chopped it up with Lil Duke, getting an inside look at him grinding in the studio, and thus, what goes into the production of his work and where he draws some of his inspiration from.
Seeing Lil Duke going through the recording process for one of his upcoming songs is pretty cool. The rapper records each verse individually and listens to the playback from the previous one to transition into the next part of the song. You can really see how a rapper can get into their flow with this type of recording structure, and it was super dope to witness it behind the scenes.
In this industry, it's all about what you have coming up and less about what you did in the past. Lil Duke is cognizant of this, and while admitting he doesn't need his next project to be perfect, he wants to make something that people will like.