Indie Pop Artist Gus Dapperton Taps Into ’90s Style and Sound

Name: Gus Dapperton

Age: 21

Hometown: Warwick, New York

Currently Lives: With his parents in Long Branch, New Jersey, where he can focus on making music.

Claim to Fame: Dapperton is a musician, songwriter, producer and designer known for his youthful, ’90s-inflected videos. “I’m very interested in writing songs that go with a visual,” he said. Dapperton’s style, marked by a bowl cut, pearl earrings and oversized vintage clothes, is inspired by “the colors I wore and my hair” when he was a child, he said. His sound is likewise homegrown. “Almost everything I record is analog, meaning I use a lot of live instruments,” he said. If a sound is too perfect, he filters it through an amplifier or radio to give it texture.

Big Break: Dapperton started releasing music on SoundCloud and YouTube in 2015, and found a following last summer with “I’m Just Snacking,” a song about kindred spirits who aren’t together but should be. “I had a tight community of people in New York who always listened to my music, and that was all it was,” he said. “I would get like 100 people to come out — friends, family and a couple of listeners — and that’s what it was like for a long time.” He credits his growing fan base to lucky timing. “Nowadays, everything’s just a little bit reminiscent of the ’90s.”

Latest Project: In June, Dapperton wrapped an 80-show tour across North America and Europe. While touring, he was asked to write a song for Netflix’s “13 Reasons Why.” “I wrote a demo in the car and just recorded it on my phone,” he said. “I had some downtime in a hotel room and I recorded it for real with my USB interface. I mixed and mastered it on my MacBook speakers, and they really liked it.” The song, “Of Lacking Spectacle,” was featured in the 10th episode.

Next Thing: Following his 2017 EP, “Yellow and Such,” Dapperton is working on his first full-length album, which he plans to release next year. He is also working on a children’s book. “My friend Kenzo Repola is a really amazing artist,” he said. “I thought his paintings were perfect for a children’s book, so I wrote one and he illustrated the whole thing.”

Self-Taught Sound: Dapperton enrolled in Drexel University’s music program, but school wasn’t for him. He prefers to learn on his own. “I couldn’t tell you what a note is — I can’t read music — but I can play the stuff if I hear it. I guess I like to learn by doing.”