You wouldn’t know it by the way he’s been rapidly releasing projects, but ChiefDVB has been waiting on this one. Earlier this year, the local rapper finally delivered his sixth record, Save the Roach, an 11-track opus showcasing Chiefy at the height of his craft and at the center of his dream.
“It’s kind of been a looming thing in my life for the past seven years or something, the Save the Roach concept,” says the artist born Daniel Van Billiard. “I finally then started picking my favorite songs that I’ve ever made that I haven’t released, and usually I don’t do that when I’m making projects.”
The Save the Roach title originally started as a joke between ChiefDVB and his friends. But it’s since become a meaningful metaphor for preserving his passion for hip-hop and for whatever “gets you the highest.”
“People just give up what they love so easy,” he says. “And it’s like, I get it. There’s life, jobs, all that, but that’s really what’s gonna save you.”
That love for music has led the emcee down some divinely interesting paths. While perfecting his audio engineering skills, he struck up a friendship with Pat Hundley, a Grammy Award-winning engineer of the Studio at the Palms, where stars like Celine Dion, Rihanna and Elton John have recorded. Together, they lent their expertise to Lady Gaga’s 2024 album, Harlequin.
“That was honestly an incredible experience. I’ve been working with Pat for multiple years now. He’s kind of been my mentor,” ChiefDVB says. “We did the Lady Gaga thing for three weeks during her residency. She would come in the morning, sing her ass off all day and go wreck the residency and sing all night. The album’s freaking dope. There were a lot of parts to it but it was sick.”
On Save the Roach, ChiefDVB applies that experience, delivering his best mix to his most meaningful project yet. At first listen, it’s a mosaic of moods, with Chief flexing his pen on the free-flowing boom-bap of “Amber Grey” and the sax-tinged melodies of “Monica,” featuring local R&B singer B. Rose.
“When I’m not writing or rapping, I just want to be involved in great records in general. I can’t sing like B. Rose, but I can help her and still be a part of the record and not have to be the record,” he says. “That also gets me juiced because I can’t play instruments like that, but if I can record saxophone in here and it sounds freaking awesome, hell yeah. Music is a super emotion.”
There’s a considerable amount of synergy and soul on Save the Roach, thanks in part to Chief bringing local producers DJ Finyl and Trade Voorhees among others into the studio, along with longtime collaborators likeWave MMLZ. He seasons the album with those contributions, creating a palatable experience for every kind of listener.
“I always think about it as not easy to perform this album because it’s not really the hype album. That’s why I had to add the ‘Creekside Crowdsurf’ song. I needed at least one of them,” he says. “And ‘Fishbowlz’ was transformed into a whole song that was on a YouTube beat that was weird, and then I had Trade remake drums, I had Jose Orozco play keys and I made [local R&B singer] Onmywave sing. That one means a lot.”
The wordsmith recently took Save the Roach on a small tour to Europe. But he uses every chance he gets to throw credit back to his hometown. The album is rife with references to Las Vegas, which Chief says has been his way of recognizing the city as the incomparable entertainment capital that it is.
ChiefDVB linktr.ee/chiefdvb
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