By Maria Katrina Segui
Los Angeles-based producer and internet sensation Yung Bae is spearheading the future funk scene at 27 — one vaporwave hit at a time.
Born as Dallas Cotton, the record producer sat down for a virtual junket on Thursday and spilled his lifelong dream as a musician and his thoughts on social media’s impact on today’s music industry.
In 2020, Yung Bae’s single “Bad Boy” featuring bbno$ and Billy Marchiafava, went viral on the video-sharing platform, Tiktok,
with over 2 billion impressions and inspired hundreds of dance craze all over the Internet. The young talent gushed about the song’s vast social media recognition.
“When ‘Bad Boy’ blew up, it was crazy to me at first too because it was just a song I made on my couch. I remember making the track very quick,” he told Manila Standard Entertainment.
“It’s the craziest, coolest thing ever to see. It's like, ‘Hey, there's my song on the radio and on a cat and dog video,’ I'm just so happy and thankful,” he added.
Yung Bae also weighs in on how the internet plays a huge role in extending an artist’s audience reach following his social media success.
“It's kinda cool now to see just how different music promotion is, you know? It's not even ‘word of mouth’ anymore. It's cool how almost all socials now are what you really need [to promote music]. It's also like a blessing and a curse.
But it's really cool because you can look at some of these people, especially that we’re in lockdown, it gives them the opportunity
to have these huge spikes in their careers from home. Everybody is like, ‘Oh I couldn't have done this before.’ So I love watching that kind of progression,” he shared.
With nearly 70 million Spotify streams under his belt and a handful of collaborations with major artists such as Wiz Khalifa and 88Rising, Yung Bae is still hoping to pursue his dream of working with his musical influences like the Doobie Brothers, Kenny Loggins, and Michael Mcdonald.
“I’d love to work with these original disco acts. Those actual funk people from the ‘70s and ‘80s,” he said.
On Aug. 6, Yung Bae made his stellar return with another disco masterpiece with the Olympic-themed record, “Silver and Gold,” which featured the soulful vocals of Sam Fischer and Pink Sweat$. He also proudly presents the buzzworthy single as ‘all made from scratch,’ as there were no samples used in producing the track.
The Portland-born producer leads the rise of the future funk genre, which uses nostalgic elements of disco, funk, and Japanese music, and is associated with the aesthetics of ‘90s anime and popular culture.