At the age of 16, Dj Pup Dawg began his journey of becoming a DJ. 25 year later, he still is pursuing his dream of working in radio. When he was asked how his journey was breaking into the industry, he described it as “a struggle but fun”. Growing up in LA, at that moment where everyone was into radio, being a dj, and acting, it made it hard but now he sees why he went through the struggle and it makes him appreciate what he has. Pup Dawg says, "the struggle sometimes makes you go harder and understand how hard it was to get to where you are, that you're not going to give it up or let someone come in and take your spot, you're always going to have that fight ”. Since the inception of his career, he's been working with iHeartRadio. Through this journey, Dj Pup Dawg always felt that people treated him with respect but he gained corporate respect within the last 10 years.
His greatest accomplishment has been being able to travel the world by djing. Dj Pupdawg loves what music does for people, “being able to take them down memory lane”. Dj Pup Dawg has interviewed some of the most prominent people in the entertainment industry, to date. He started with interviewing artists that no one wanted to interview. His first mainstream interviews were with Alicia Keys and 50 Cent, at the BET Awards in the beginning of their peak. Interviewing local artists prepared him to handle artists at a high level. He mentioned interviewing, Wiz Khalifa, Nicki Minaj, Kendrick Lamar and J Cole, being some of his favorite interviews because of the gems they dropped. He is very intentional about building genuine relationships with artists. Treating them like humans and avoiding clickbait and “got you moments” in their interviews has got him far. He mentioned genuinely being fans of these artists, therefore, he respects them in that way.
Dj Pup Dawg is currently managing an artist that goes by “Jesenia”, a Boston based singer. He has been working with her for five years, now. He described her as someone with natural talent and crazy writing skills. He says we can look forward to some great things from her!
He suggests for young creatives to “do it with your heart. You're going to be broke. If you did the math on how long I've been working, I probably still haven't recovered on how much I've put in. You're going to struggle, you're going to get frustrated but you will make the connections, you will make money, you will have fun.”
Check out Dj Pup Dawg's commerical free, 60 minute mixes, below: