I go back to things that are nostalgic for me - Michael Jackson, the Beatles, Britney Spears, Stevie Wonder.

Gus Dapperton

Categorized in : Me Go Back Wonder

I tend not to get too excited and surprised about things.

about get things excited

Every new experience will trigger melodies in my head.

head new will experience

For me, I have trouble working with people just because I sort of have trust issues when it comes to creative endeavors.

me trust creative people

I love the bowl cut. I had it when I was younger, and I decided to go back to it. It seems to fit me.

back go me love

I wear high water pants, always, so you can see my socks - I always wear white socks.

wear you white water

If there is going to be visuals for a song, I want them to be equally as good or better than the song.

better good want song

At some point, I kind of went through this weird existential crisis in high school where I was just really depressed.

weird high high-school school

At first, I was a pretty horrific singer, and then I got a little better.

singer pretty first better

I think my voice isn't that easy to digest.

i-think think voice easy

Some people ask me what instruments I play, but usually I'll just say I'm more of a producer or a composer or songwriter - those are my strongest suits: arranging and composing.

some-people me suits people

When I perform, I wear white Capezio dance shoes. It's more of a superstition, but I only wear them when I perform and when I dance.

wear shoes dance white

I came up with a lot of characters when I was growing up that were just creative outlets, and then, at one point, I came across Gus Dapperton in the back of my head when I was making music.

back growing-up music creative

I went to school for audio engineering, and I was around a lot of sound engineers over the summers in New York, so I'm pretty comfortable in engineering my own stuff.

new my-own sound school

When I first started making music, I was pretty drawn to hip-hop beats wrapped together with super-good lyrics. The most important thing in that is wordplay, so that stayed with me when I started writing songs.

me music important together

A lot of artists have a super-specific musical hero they definitely try to hone in on. I'm basically inspired by everyone. I don't have one particular artist who I'm super-obsessed with.

everyone try artist hero

I'm not really sure what I look for when I'm picking out clothes.

sure out look clothes

I spend a lot of money on shoes and barely any on clothes.

spend clothes shoes money

I grew up producing hip-hop music, actually. I was producing for my friends, who were all rappers in upstate New York, where I'm from. But in the eighth grade, we had this songwriting contest in our school, and I got really excited about it and actually won. After that, I just kept making music forever.

new friends music school

I went through this kind of existential crisis. I was going through a breakup; I tore my ACL and my meniscus and had to have surgery, so I was out of school for a few months. Then my computer crashed, which was, like, my whole life. So when I came out of it, I started making music that, I think, was the most true to me.

me music life school

I would say that my music is surreal, it's inspired by dreams, and it's inspired by heartbreak.

say dreams heartbreak music