The Dude

Hip-Hop is saturated with artists who rhyme about things that they've never experienced. That seems to be the type of rapper the media spoon-feds the masses, but Dude is a totally different species of emcee. At first sight, the 23 year-old white rapper could be mistaken as a skateboarder because he regularly sports Hoodies with a pair of Dickies, and of course, his blonde ponytail. He sticks out because of his look, but he also stands out because of his smooth and powerful delivery, which isn’t something the regular fan would suspect. The Dude is actually a dynamic up-and-coming face.
The reality is he didn’t live in the ghetto or have a rough childhood. Dude (born David Phillips) grew up in the small town of St. Joseph’s, Michigan and had a normal childhood, but when his dad lost his job in 2001, the family was in a financial crisis. They were forced to leave the “small town” life and relocate to Orlando, Florida, where there were more opportunities waiting. For Dude, the move was overwhelming. “It was a crazy culture shock. It’s not like I was blind to the rest of the world or shielded from it, but it wasn’t like I was around it all the time. Just living in St. Joe’s there was almost like a Pleasantville type thing, but coming down here to Orlando was amazing, size wise,” Dude explains. “Going from midwest to South is cool. I see similarities, but the south is a whole different thing too.”
It took a while for Dude to adjust to the southern way of life, so it’s understandable that he was quiet his sophomore year at Olympia High School. Although he laid low for a while, he tried to get some deejaying gigs for school functions. After numerous rejections however, he decided it was time to stop spinning records and try something else. “I wasn’t very talkative, but I went and talked to Student Council about deejaying some dances and they said they would get in touch with me. A month before hand, they were like, ‘We forgot to tell you, we have somebody.’ It went back and forth like that for a while and I said, ‘Forget’,” he says. “I think that’s what prompted me to make music. So I got rid of some of my deejay equipment, got some recording equipment and went from there.”
At first, Dude was trying his hand at production in his spare time, but it wasn’t until his senior year when he began rapping with his buddies. Actually, it happened by accident. One day, he and his friends were supposed to be shooting hoops and like usual, they would spit rhymes on their drive. However, when all the basketball courts were taken, Dude came up with an idea to entertain his boys. “We were looking for a spot to play basketball, but nothing was open. I had just bought some recording equipment because I wanted to try something else other than deejaying,” he explains. “So I told my boys, come over here and we can play with this stuff,’ and we just like freestyle on some instrumentals. We were doing some freestyle sessions and everything we said was wack, but it was fun for us.”
Dude continued perfecting his mic skills by writing verses all the time and recording his music whenever he had a chance, however, he yearned to perform in front of a live audience. So after getting his high school diploma in 2004, he attended the University of Central Florida (UCF) and looked for opportunities to showcase his skills. Eventually, he made his debut at a talent show sponsored by his college. “I was like one of the last acts up there. So I’m ready to go on stage and I’m dressed in some little white shoes with some short white shorts down to my knee and a plaid button down shirt. I guess it was the type of thing I felt like wearing,” the Dude recalls. “So I got up there, did this one song and I couldn’t get on beat. I couldn’t hear the speakers. I felt like shit because this was the first performance I ever done ever. But when the second song came on, people heard it and I don’t know what happened, but I unbuttoned my shirt and threw it down. Everybody got up and started vibing. It was a great feeling right there and I was like, ‘Man, I got to do more of this’.”
Although several students positively responded to his wordplay, his classmate, Vincent, was equally as impressed with his skills. Vincent knew the hip-hop scene in Orlando and helped the Dude advance his career by setting up a meeting with local imprint Theme Muzik. “We went to Cici’s pizza and I never been in anything business wise,” Dude says of the meeting. So we head to the meeting, and I told them (Theme Muzik) I wanted to make some music and I wanna make a living off of this.”
Since joining Theme Muzik in early 2005, Dude has kept busy by recording/producing tracks and even putting out his mixtape debut The First Impression. The disc is filled with songs where Dude (along with some friends) use his deep swagger to capture the ears and soul of all listeners on emotional tracks like “Don’t What” and “D.U.D.E.” Then again, Dude kee