Get to Know the Kits AI Community Voices: Black Dave

Kits AI recently launched our new Kits Earn program, an opportunity for vocalists and artists to make passive income by adding an AI model of their voice to our “Community Voices” library. In our series of interviews to get to know the artists behind the models, we caught up with Black Dave to learn about his project and what excites him as an artist.

If you haven’t already checked his music out, give it a listen here.

An Interview with Black Dave

What kind of music do you make?

I create anime influenced rap music with hints of hardcore and metal. Trap beats, rapping, screaming, loud guitars, all that.

What are your musical inspirations, and how have you crafted your style over the years?

I came up playing in punk, hardcore and nu metal bands in the 2000s. I was a regular MySpace kid going to shows in my city and Warped Tour every year. Around the blog era in the Tumblr rap era, I got really into rap music and phased out of playing in bands and started producing. Around that time, Travis Scott’s Owl Pharaoh mixtape was just coming out, the first A$AP Rocky tape was really influential to me, Childish Gambino was newly releasing, as well as Odd Future. Kilo Kish was a big influence. There was a big movement around left of center Black artists really coming to the forefront, kind of leading into what we know as alternative rap and alt-R&B.

Have you noticed that your voice works really well in certain contexts? Are there areas that you haven’t explored yourself that you’d be excited to see music-makers explore with your voice?

I think my voice works really well when it comes to rapping across a spectrum of loudness. I think it handles a regular speaking voice well but if you decide to yell, it catches that energy effectively. I think what would be fun to hear is my voice across a variety of genres, not just rap. It's common for people to see my voice model as a “rap” voice but it's got range to it.

Do you have any tips for other artists, both for improving your skills and navigating music as a career?

Everyone I’m inspired by charted their own path and leaned heavily into what they loved. I think wearing that on your sleeve is key. I’m a firm believer in a daily practice, so if you’re able to write a single verse a day, or make a single beat a day, or do just one activity toward your career each day, you’ll suddenly be much better and much further along than you realized. Small steps matter, so keep taking them. Helps you stay ready so you don’t gotta get ready.

What’s exciting to you about getting involved in Kits Earn?

What’s most exciting about this to me is just being a part of the journey into the new frontier, feeling like I’m contributing a bit toward it. Trained voice models being used isn’t necessarily a new thing, but the democratization of that is, and I think that looking for ways to compensate the voices in the model is important. Excited to see how things develop and how not only artists use them but how the humans behind the voices become involved in these processes.