![]() ![]() ![]() He blows out the candle and cuts the cake. (This is unlike the green Xanax cake that Pump used to mark his reaching one million Instagram followers.) All the adults in the room think this is very funny, but there are very few teenagers around to laugh. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t eat.Ī few minutes or maybe an hour later-time dilates a bit when everyone at the table is trying to Instagram one diner-that same wait staff brings out a white cake with a single candle on top, and the room breaks into “Happy Birthday.” By the time the cake is set down in front of Pump, it’s clear that it’s meant to look like a Xanax. His dreads keep falling into his line of sight. Various handlers march Pump around the room for handshakes and muttered hellos. He comes with a modest entourage (including the excellent Los Angeles rapper Desto Dubb, who likely has at least a decade on the guest of honor), wearing a blue cardigan with tiger faces all over it, open wide enough to show the Gucci logo tattooed on his sternum. It’s empty for now.Ī wait staff materializes and works quickly, doling out lemon-pepper wings and mashed potatoes and prime rib. In the middle of that second table is a throne, upholstered in white embossed leather and with gold framing. A slightly taller, much more regal table is placed perpendicularly at our table’s head. A giant, wooden banquet table has been hauled into the bar area seated around the table are publicists, marketing partners, and a pair of kids who look as if they’ve won a fan contest. Because he’s still a minor, Pump’s record label, Tha Lights Global (with planning help from his major label distributor Warner Bros.), has rented out Ace of Diamonds the way you might rent out a bowling alley or a McDonald’s PlayPlace. The occasion is Lil Pump’s 17th birthday. He’s willing to tell us as many times as he needs to, but it works because he can make even the simplest reiterations sound compelling.In the dimly lit bar area of Ace of Diamonds, a strip club in West Hollywood-not to be confused with the considerably more famous King of Diamonds, the strip club in Miami that gave us Blac Chyna-a bartender, nearly naked from the waist down, mutters a mantra to herself, preparing. Lil Pump lives an opulent life, and he wants us to know it. ![]() Pump’s 2020 braggadocious single, “Life Like Me,” found him exploring a more mature sound, capped off by a deepened voice, but staying in the topical realms he’s accustomed to. ![]() In 2018, Pump collaborated with hip-hop visionary Kanye West on the lustful single “I Love It,” which was driven by a funky bassline that differed sonically from Pump’s usual blown-out production choices. The next year, Pump would release his proper debut album, also named after himself the project housed Pump’s breakthrough song, “Gucci Gang,” an ominously constructed track that sounds darker than its gleefully wealth-focused subject matter. Pump’s self-titled 2016 single, produced by Smokepurpp, saw the rapper freestyling and ad-libbing over a simple, lo-fi beat. Together, the pair helped push the punk-inspired SoundCloud rap scene from underground to mainstream. Born Gazzy Garcia in Miami in 2000, the MC got kicked out of school in 10th grade for fighting, and turned to making music with fellow Floridian Smokepurpp. Lil Pump knows how to get the world’s attention: repetitive boasting of the highest order. ![]()
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