When Damian Lillard finishes his daily chores for the Portland Trail Blazers, he will spend most of his downtime inside the NBA bubble working on his other passion: music.
The All-Star owner turned part of his suite at Walt Disney World Resorts into a mini recording studio. The league built a social bubble to resume the NBA season and protect COVID-19’s 22 participating teams while at the resort, which features various activities like walking trails, a bowling alley, and a lake for fishing or boating. His team will seek a playoff spot at Disney’s Wide World of Sports complex.
But under his rap character Dame DOLLA, Lillard hopes to focus his attention on laying courts when he’s not busy with basketball. He strives to make his rap character as well-known as his professional basketball identity, such as Emmy-winning actor Donald Glover, who won multiple Grammys under his alter ego, Childish Gambino.
“That is the point I want to get to,” he said. “I admire him for how he’s established himself in two different lanes. People respect him in each lane. That’s my goal.”
Lillard’s room is equipped with a microphone placed on a stand, headphones, a laptop with recording software and an audio interface to control everything. She said the thick carpet in her room should help sound quality.
He said the setup is “simple”, but that it’s good enough to create music in a room where it can be isolated.
“I saw people who said there would be complaints that he was recording music, but I don’t have speakers. Everything is in the headphones,” he said. “I’m hitting out loud, but not screaming at full speed. No one is going to hear me hitting.”
Lillard has earned respect in the hip-hop world as a socially conscious lyricist like Dame DOLLA, which stands for Different Levels on which the Lord allows. She has recorded songs with some of the biggest names in the music industry, including Lil Wayne, 2 Chainz, and Jamie Foxx. She also performed with Wayne during the NBA All-Star weekend earlier this year.
Last month, Lillard released “Goat Spirit” with Raphael Saadiq and the powerful “Blacklist,” a song that addresses police brutality against unarmed blacks. It’s a song he felt compelled to release after George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis police custody on May 25.
Once the NBA season restarts, Lillard will have the words “How many more?” sewn on your jersey. He said that he does not consider himself an activist, but that he wants to express his feelings about the good and negative issues that affect his community.
That’s what also prompted Lillard to release his new song and music video “Home Team” on Friday. The song pays tribute to his family and closest friends whom he financially helped start his business journey.
“They do all of these things and those are the things that I’m investing in to make my people deeper and stronger,” Lillard said of his friends who have become a businessman, chef, maintenance staff and even a farmer. . “It is not an entourage of people who hang out with me, because I am an NBA player. It is my strong circle.”
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