Diplosophy
If you don’t know Diplo, you know of him. He is the man behind M.I.A.’s classic “Paper Planes”. He co-founded Major Lazer, which released the massively successful “Lean On”. More recently, he produced half of BTS’s long-awaited comeback album, Arirang. In other words, he’s a big deal.
Yet, he comes from virtually nowhere.
Born in Mississippi, growing up in Florida, Diplo (nicknamed after Diplodocus, obviously) ended up settling down in Philadelphia and DJ’ing parties — because he loved music but didn’t know how to perform any instrument. He got good at DJ’ing, then throwing his own parties, eventually graduating to recording mixtapes and selling them out of the trunk of his car. And making enough money to live off of. His first stepping stone towards superstardom.
The next step came with young British/Sri Lankan singer M.I.A.. Having met her and become fascinated with her artistry and general personality (they went on to date for years), he managed to convince her record label to let him produce and album for her. What came out of that was a mixtape: turns out he also didn’t know how to use recording equipment… Eventually, they found their way to the recording studio again, this time to make “Paper Planes”. Which the label then didn’t want to put out, because it overlapped children singing and gunshots. He managed to get radio DJ’s to play the song enough for the label to finally get calls… and history was made. Again.
Another crazy story was the making of “Lean On”, arguably his biggest hit. That song, based on a hook he liked, went through months of iterations, including involvement from then up-and-coming French DJ Snake. Finally, when he felt it was ready, he released it, independently of course. When the track started to pick up steam, he and his Major Lazer bandmate happened to be performing in India. So he booked plane tickets for the track’s vocalist to join them to shoot a music video right then and there. One day to learn the choreography, another to shoot the video. It has almost 4 billion views to date.
The most recent chapter’s in Diplo’s musical history is his taking part in the grand return of BTS, Korea’s biggest band of all time, after years away from the music scene (and in the — literal — army). Their new album, Arirang, released a couple of weeks and having topped most charts since, features 5 songs co-produced by Diplo. Just another day in the proverbial office.
In a recent podcast interview, the man also shares his views on AI. Not surprisingly, his vision is pretty forward looking: in his mind, AI-generated music has become so qualitative, it is a definite tool in the contemporary musician’s toolbox, one that they absolutely should use and misuse to get what they want. To the point of him considering whether there should be actual vocalists on tracks anymore… While I wouldn’t go that far, I fully concur with the notion that AI is the future, including in music.
And also that Diplo is one interesting individual.