Born and raised in the capital city, Dusty Hunter Dial, aka DhD (or Young Hippy), is the youngest rap artist in South Carolina that is making a name for himself. Since the age of 12, DhD found writing rap lyrics as an outlet – his first script being a remix to Jay Z’s “Run This Town” featuring Rihanna and Kanye West. Six years later, the young emcee has released an impressive 10 mixtapes: High Volume, Fvckn Hippy, The Collective, High Volume 2, INFAMOUS, Forest Drive, Locus of Control (with Marko Hurtt and DLB), High Volume 3 Part One, and 5 Reasons Why (with Marko Hurtt). Adding to his repertoire is his first album The Dusty Dial Tone produced completely by DLB. On November 10, 2015 his second, self-produced album: Monophobia will be released.
Monophobia means: “the fear of being alone”. In this album, DhD attempts to capture the emotions of: pain, loneliness, longing, and growing maturity through the sounds of the instrumentals and the depth of the lyrics. When asked how this project will stand out among the competition, he notes, “It isn’t a matter of ‘how’ – more so of why. Most people claiming to be artists don’t paint a picture that captures their image and puts into a perspective for their audience. I put my person experiences into a universal concept.”
DhD self-describes his music and lyrics as: “thought-provoking”, “trippy”, “lucid”, and “Kanye.” His audience is predominately composed of “trippy-hippies”, but aside from them is a large, random mix of: scene kids, thugs, geeks, and grandmas. He adds, “Really anybody that’s been far behind in one place and has gotten way ahead to another will enjoy, if not, relate to my music.”
On a local scale, DhD is inspired by the people in his label, Adelfi Music Group: Matt Sandifer, Armani OD, and Marko Hurtt, and also his uncle Gabe, who’s had 20 years of DJing experience and owns Salsa Cabana Night Club in Forest Acres. As far as in-studio mentors, DhD acknowledges DJ Sqibble and A Town at Quantum Beats and Fat Rat Da Czar at the Boom Room. On the nation-wide industry scale, he’s inspired by: Kanye West, Yeezus, and Kanye West. RiFF RaFF is pretty cool, too. In the next year, DhD anticipates to work alongside: Caskey, Diplo, Jah-Son, and Mod Sun. He’s also working on finishing at Midland’s Audio Institute.
DhD’s motto is “I have a different point of view on what is possible to do; so what is possible for me may be impossible for you.” When asked what flaws he noticed in the local industry, he said, “There are too many copycats who are too worried on imitating an image rather than reflecting the image inside of them. I don’t work with a lot of people because of this. I really wish people brought out their true colors in their music. I think the level of originality in the city would rise to new heights if people really worked on it.”
Follow DhD on Twitter: DhDope; Instagram: DhDank; and ‘Like’ him on Facebook: DhD.
Disclaimer: Marko Hurtt is founder of Adelfi Music Group, home to DhD and has worked with DhD on tracks in the past as noted in the article.Â
