Interview: David D’Angelo ignites an earth-replenishing rebellion

Even Captain Planet can’t save us. “The world’s 7.6 billion people represent just 0.01% of all living things, according to the study. Yet since the dawn of civilisation, humanity has caused the loss of 83% of all wild mammals and half of plants, while livestock kept by humans abounds,” reported The Guardian in 2018. To say the world is in a bad way is an understatement. In chasing dollar signs, or simply trying to get by in a consumer-driven society, we’ve all lost sight of what matters: if we don’t have an earth, we don’t have humanity to any degree.

Out of San Francisco, electronic soundscaper David D’Angelo‘s call-to-arms “Priceless Commodity,” featuring acidic, urgent lyrics from Mayday (Mark Edwards), is as direct as you can possibly get. “Yeah yeah, conserve all that chatter / Rather turn up, trapped in these drum patterns / Rather burn one, until we all ashes,” Mayday’s words cut until you bleed, until you hear, shoving your face in gravel of what is left. It’ll never go away even if you pretend it is. He continues, “Sip on the syrup, move like molasses / These fossils we fueling, might have us all crashing / Shocking, we cling to something, that just seems so static.”

D’Angelo’s dripping production mirrors the very nature of water, the most basic form of replenishment, and the visual, directed by D’Angelo and Shay Stifelman, doesn’t skimp on literal imagery. Aggressive lyrics grind against trippy production, an arrangement initially built with a woodblock sound on a Roland June G workstation. D’Angelo “then manipulated and designed [it] into the sound of the main instrument,” he writes to B-Sides & Badlands over email.

Bass followed, penetrating the mix with “something really grungy but still subby,” he says. “With the drums, I played around with a few different styles, because the tempo is an odd one, and meant I could go a few different ways with the drums. Once I added in the hi hats with that triplet, fast moving feel over the main pattern, the tone changed and fit a certain pocket I was looking for.”

The two minute and seven-second mark marks a considerable shift, calling upon distinctive west coast hip-hop ⏤ specifically, D’Angelo was inspired by work of Kendrick Lamar and Terrace Martin. “The main chords came first, some jazzy [vocals] that I played with a brass synth, then the bass line to accentuate how the chords punch in, and finally the gritty synth lead to cut above everything and close the whole statement out,” he concludes of his process.

As you can see, D’Angelo shoves his hands into the nitty-gritty, eyeing specific details that eventually merge together into a colossal whole. And boy, does “Priceless Commodity” back a punch ⏤ but it’s more like a throat crush, stomach stab, or a roundhouse kick to the back of the head. That all boils down to the sheer complexity of such musical fluidity and lyrical attacks. “We were going for more aggressive delivery and triplet cadences, almost parodying ‘turn up’ rap styles that typically speak on less mindful, arguably materialistic topics, while actually speaking on the subject of our natural world and the importance of it,” he says. “I have also heard an interesting description through anonymous feedback, that the beat sounds like water droplets and that MayDays’ rapping sounds like sparks of fire. A dichotomy appears to be present in multiple ways, some of which were not deliberate.”

D’Angelo stands knee-deep in water. A keyboard floats in front of him. Ripples sweeping in delicate, but profound, circles, and it becomes clear he is not about to back down. There is a command to his stance, arms dangling and hands curled behind him, and his gaze deceives him: it’s sharp, merciless, and carries with it a primal determination. If we don’t wake up now, we’ll never do so.

Below, D’Angelo walks us through his own journey in understanding the importance of conservation, music, art, and more, as well as gives crucial tips on leading a more environmental-friendly existence.

How did you come to work with Mayday?

MayDay is an artist from my hometown of Durham, North Carolina. Although we grew up in the same city, we just met a few years ago at an open mic at The Pinhook in downtown Durham. I played some beats, and we connected after, just networking and vibing! We stayed in contact, loosely, but then in early 2019, when I was back home living in North Carolina, we started connecting more and realized we shared similar values and enjoyed each other’s approach to music. We began creating music more actively in Spring 2019. I approached Mark with the concept for [this] track, and he immediately was inspired by the beat and the thematic content of water scarcity and alarm over our increasing environmental destruction. From there, we just kept the creative energy going. MayDay spent a lot of time crafting these lyrics to match the tone of the record, as well as current events. It was a fun process, and I am seriously thankful for the energy he put into this record; the level of intention behind each word is noted.

Conceptually, what was the process in nailing down what you wanted the video to be?

This video was certainly an interesting journey. It was filmed on opposite sides of the country, over the span of almost three years. In fact, there is a whole other finished version of this video before MayDay and I collaborated on this track, back when it was solely an instrumental. The older footage is all of the scenes in the rocky, desert scenery, and the hills east of Downtown LA. That was shot by a videographer named Alex Martinez, in the summer of 2017. I was in North Hollywood for a music conference, and over the span of the weekend I was there, a lot of things happened synchronistically. I met all the actors and actresses in the video that weekend.

What came first, and what motivated me to take the steps to make this video happen in the first place, was research on global water scarcity and a fascination with the Salton Sea; a disappearing body of water in California that was never supposed to exist in its location in the first place. I wanted to tell a story about water, and what might happen if it were to disappear. Fast forward to 2019 and starting to work with MayDay to tell this story more concretely, I knew I had to take the visuals further. I had already done an edit of these visuals from 2017 with a good friend and seriously talented Photographer/Videographer/Creative Director named Shay Stifelman. Once MayDay and I had a finished recording on the existing instrumental, Shay worked with us directing and filming a separate narrative with MayDay rapping in the middle of a creek in our local North Carolina woods. Shay then combined these two different narratives in two different locations into one clip.

When did you wake up, so to speak, to the dire state of nature?

A pivotal time in my life for expanding my understanding and knowledge of climate change, as well as internalizing the extreme level of environmental degradation currently going on, was in 2015/2016, while attending college at Loyola University New Orleans. Along with my time in New Orleans, I spent five months in New Zealand in 2016 while on a direct exchange. Living and learning in the wondrous city of New Orleans, a city already experiencing the impacts of climate change firsthand, really started opening my eyes to the state of the world around me with a new lens. My time in New Zealand reinforced my innate love of nature and appreciation for the beauty of this Earth. I came back to the states with a renewed sense of purpose for aligning my music career and personal life with environmental stewardship.

Do you find it difficult to juggle being mindful of how your life impacts the Earth and living (meaning, did/have you had to make big changes in your lifestyle)?

Yes, it is naturally very difficult because our daily life can have a huge impact one way or another, and almost everything we do uses energy and resources, no matter how careful we are. There are some actions and lifestyles that do have a lower carbon footprint, and that does usually mean some restriction to certain activities, or at least a more disciplined approach to consumption of commodities. I struggle between thinking I am living a green lifestyle and then understanding that every time I get on a plane that action has a huge impact. The thing is, sometimes we really have to travel, but then on other occasions it may be for leisure. I have been in both situations, and I do love to travel.

I hope to see as much of this world as I am able to as there is so much beauty everywhere, so much to explore. Now, I am thinking of how I might be able to travel more but in a less carbon intensive way. When it comes to daily travel, I have a bike and am able to use this as my main form of transportation when living in a city, such as New Orleans or currently San Francisco, where I do not have a car. This is one habit that doesn’t even feel like a big change because I enjoy biking, but there are so many specific steps we can take that all add up. It’s still a challenge for me to put them all into practice.

In your personal life, has it been difficult to impart on friends/family on the importance of taking care of Earth?

I feel blessed to have grown up in a family where time in nature was treated as important. My mother encouraged my love of nature and helped foster it, and my father supported spending time in nature, as well. That being said, there is still a difference between enjoying spending time in nature and understanding the severity of the climate crisis, or other specific environmental issues. There have still been plenty of times where I haven’t seen eye to eye with friends or acquaintances in regards to the importance of taking care of the Earth. Thankfully, the majority of the people that come into my life, and that I surround myself with, have a similar sense of appreciation for the natural world and a desire to make a positive impact.

Growing up exposed to classical and Peruvian music, how does that now inform how you approach your work?

Even before I was born, I was already exposed to music. My mother is a piano and flute teacher, and she often played classical music in the house and in the car. She started teaching me piano when I was seven years old, and those lessons built my piano and music foundation, until when I was about 11 or 12, at which point I started to teach myself and focus more on creating songs and improvising. My father also loves music and would also play music from Peru in the house, especially when I was younger. One of the main styles he would play is “Música criolla,” which is traditional music of Peru that exhibits influences from European, African, and Andean music. The Afro Peruvian rhythms are seriously captivating and unique, and many of the melodies are dramatic and hauntingly beautiful. I love so many styles of music. I feel as though the exposure to many different styles of music at a young age likely influenced my appreciation for music and gave me a unique palette of creative influence.

How does “Priceless Commodity” fit into the scope and musicality of your new EP?

This track is almost a bridge between my debut EP ‘Born in Paradise,’ and my upcoming EP ‘In My Own World,’ which is still very much morphing as I write this. The intention behind this project is to share my own outlook on the world, through music. I am hoping to relate to others with the fact that everyone is unique and has their own relationship with the world as they see it, as well as the fact that everyone can feel isolated, or like they are in their own world at times ⏤ especially now more than ever.

I also intend to convey the importance of collective well being and healing. My sense of feeling like I am in my own world incorporates disbelief at how some people are treating this world, as well the joy I feel being alone in nature and feeling connected to a larger life force. “Priceless Commodity” will be sonically different from a lot of the other records on [the new EP], but that’s ok. I want that. I don’t want to stick to just one genre or style. However, I aim to have a sound that is cohesive as my own, while still being varied in genre.

Even on the most basic level, what lifestyle changes do you hope more people make going forward – as it impacts the earth?

To start, we can all benefit by more education and personal research on the scope of our current environmental situation. Hopefully, a deeper understanding and awareness will elicit more emotion and fuel a passion for making personal changes, as well as engaging in activism for the longer term battle. The thing is, as a collective global society we already need to be beyond the point of awareness and be engaging in actions that benefit our future, especially on a societal and governmental level.

We also need to keep pressuring large corporations and lawmakers to change their practices, because at the end of the day, that is where the lion’s share of the power and control is held. That being said, people unified to make changes have had revolutionary impacts throughout history, and so we must still work with persistence and tenacity. That is really all we can do when so many things are still out of our control.

Here are some key daily habits to keep in mind that are in our control, at least to the best of our ability:

• If you can cut out meat and still survive, do it. Animal agriculture is incredibly resource intensive, not to mention all the animal rights issues. A plant based diet really does have measurable impacts on the environment.
• If you are traveling somewhere, and you don’t need to drive to get there, don’t.
• Compost food scraps ! Set up a compost system if you don’t live somewhere with a municipal compost system (which is still very few places, unfortunately).
• Less frequent washer/dryer action, as well as improving home energy/electrical usage.
• Try your best to avoid single use plastics and get some reusable food containers! Even though plastic use is actually going up, not down (which is alarming and plastic pollution is a whole other discussion), you can still try to reduce the amount of plastic you personally consume. I am not perfectly plastic free, but I am working to limit unnecessary plastic purchases myself. It is not easy.
• We do face many challenges when it comes to how we as people impact the earth. We are in a pivotal time in history, and I hope that we can all stay unified and connected with the common goal of preserving our home for future generations.

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