Dustin-Prestige

10 New Houston Rappers to Watch Out For
BY SHEA SERRANO | MAY 9, 2013 | 2:00 PM | PERMALINK
4 OF 11



Dustin Prestige
Twitter: @dustinprestige

Pros: He might've accidentally invented a subgenre of rap (most aptly described as "Plaid Rap," were we to guess).

Cons: He doesn't have the backing of anyone terribly important yet.

Essential Listening: Plaid

Dustin-Prestige is a "rapper," but it hardly ever feels accurate to describe him solely as that. On Plaid, his most recent tape (among the best underground releases of 2012), he plays the role of rapper, shoegaze indie rocker, pop star and, somehow, reggae singer.

While that sort of one man variety show generally alludes to an artist that hasn't yet found what he's best at, Prestige seems to traverse different genres with a natural ease, confidence, and ability. His flow is an unfettered stream of cool, regardless of what he decides to do, and he wields it without care for boundaries. - Complex.com

This is Dustin-Prestige, and below is the video for his song "I Am Legend."
Recently the Houston Press announced the categories for this year's Houston Press Music Awards, among them was the inaugural Best Music Video category. [More info on all that soon, but remember nominations close at midnight tomorrow -- ed.] And now all of those things have intersected.

Prestige has been covered here before, most recently securing the temporary Best Mixtape of the Year Thus Far title with Plaid, an ambitious outing that did its very best to make classifying it as "a rap project" only a half-truth.
Within Plaid's narrative, "I Am Legend" served as the dark point, a purposeful examination of a somber, detached human that, at its most imposing, managed to take itself endearingly seriously. It's brooding and it's more brooding and then it's a little intimidating.

Still, I don't think anybody could've anticipated how darkly it skewed in visualizing itself.

No commentary is more effective than you actually watching it. More importantly though, it's impossible to talk about it with someone who hasn't seen it without upending some of its punch, so do that.

And then go here to nominate it for an award. - Houston Press

#TheEverything: Dustin-Prestige is good for any number of reasons. He’s tall and he’s cool looking (more important than maybe most people realize), he can rap and he can sing, and he’s comfortable alongside everything from indie rock to reggae. But Dustin-Prestige is great for one reason: He did all of those things on his most recent tape, Plaid, and he never sounded corny or unnecessary or contrived. Boldly creative, LeBron Jamesian. - MTV

Dustin-Prestige enlists the help of H-Town crooner Jack Freeman for the very dope “Everyday” produced by Chris Rockaway. This another track off Dustin’s Plaid LP, which is scheduled to drop next month. - KevinNottingham.com

Dustin Prestige – I AM LEGEND - AllHipHop

As most of you already know, when I’m not talking shit on your favorite rapper I’m pulling time at the side gig. Being that I mainly do cover art, I get a lot of inquiries about the projects I’m working on getting love at 2DBZ. While most don’t hold weight, this Houston emcee caught my attention. Gearing up for the release of his Plaid project, DP has dropped a couple things that I hadn’t know about until now. Up top, a video for Army Of Me. Down bottom, three solo cuts to help you get an idea of what he’s trying to say..
- 2 Dope Boyz

We are proud to premier the new free mixtape from our good friend Dustin-Prestige. Plaid shows the enormous musical growth from DP since we first posted his music years ago. Do NOT sleep! - Get Right Music

Guess Who? Dustin-Prestige is a newcomer to OnSMASH hailing out of Houston and this is what landed him. Allow him to introduce himself with this new cut “Guess Who?” and its a fire introduction. The song is the first single off the Houston emcee’s Plaid LP, which is coming soon. Looks like Prestige is winning because he is making his rounds around the net and has a lot of peoples ears right now. Let’s see where he goes from here. - OnSMASH

Ooooo, now I like this. Dustin-Prestige smooths it out with the funky composition “Catalina Wine Mixer.” And since I loooooooooooves me some Wine, I can see myself playing this under the influence. Not a huge of the chorus, but the Jazz like ambiance infused those drums is the perfect combination. Give praise to Chris Rockaway for the live instrumentation. - Lowkey

Anyways, I was on twitter earlier and saw a couple tweets from the homie B.Dot of Rap Radar and my potna Killer Mike. Both of them we're cosigning an artist named Dustin Prestige. Prior to today, I'd never heard of dude, but seeing two dudes I talk to frequently and have musical opinions that I respect (sometimes, haha) I had to see what was up. On top of that, he's from Mo'City, Texas...home of one of my favorite rappers.

I'm not gonna lie, when I clicked on Dustin's twitter page, he got me interested instantly and it had nothing to do with the music. It was that trill ass logo that he has. Anyone that knows me knows that I'm a 'Lo Life and seeing how dude identifies himself with a Polo man toting an AK, I was sure I was gonna like at least some of what he was talking about.

Well, after hitting him up, Dustin was kind enough to email me some of his music and his EP that I will be sharing with you - Maurice Garland

We suspect the goal of every music writer is to be able to answer "Who are you listening to?" with a response that makes people go "Who?", thus making you smarter than them. It's why we were so amped when we heard newcomer Dustin Prestige's first full-length mixtape, Houston Presto, which he released a little less than two weeks ago. (Prestige is a 25-year-old Missouri City rapper that we mentioned very briefly in an article several months ago after we stumbled across his EP completely by accident.)
The most curiously affecting thing about the new tape is that it consists entirely of samples from various Houston legends (and Paul Wall). Sampling Houston artists isn't necessarily groundbreaking work in and of itself, but Prestige managed to pull off what feels to be more a thought-out approach - similar to the way that Wale sampled Seinfeld on last year's Mixtape About Nothing. (It also makes us eager to see what Prestige will do for his official LP, dropping later this year.)
We dialed up Prestige and he agreed to pass along five MP3s from Presto, as well as explain exactly what he was hoping to accomplish. He'll take over from here.


"Return Of The Screw" (Original: "Just A Dog," Big Moe): "This is one of the dopest songs to come from Big Moe. This was also one of the most recognizable songs I heard from all the way in Baton Rouge while in college. The hook itself was classic. Plus, I really wanted a lot of the songs on the mixtape to be over tracks from the late hometown legends that people from other areas might never have had the chance to hear."


"Polo's & AK's Flow" (Original: "High Powered," Scarface feat. Papa Rue): "The first time I heard this song, I played it all day on repeat. Face has always been one of my favorite MC from the South - next to Bun B - so I had to really go at it. I did this one as just a straight-through rhyme. No ad-libs, overdubs or anything."


"Wannabe's" (Original: "Wanna Be A Baller" Lil' Troy ft. Yungstar and Fat Pat): "I don't care what part of America you're from, chances are you know this song... or at least the chorus. Though most of Yungstar's verse is hard to make out, it still jams. I wrote this about the endless droves of local MCs who still seem to try and follow the impressions of the previous generations of rhymers, partly contributing to why Houston still has the stigma of being all about blades and syrup.
"Though I am from the suburban area of Mo. City and spent a great deal of time and money pursuing an education, I am not ashamed and will always let my music be an honest reflection of me as a person... not a wannabe baller. I even got one such stereotypical MC (Young Dummy) to speak over the end of the track."


"Beltway 8 Tale" feat. Montey (Original: "I'sa Playa," Pimp-C feat. Z-Ro): "This song is about being involved with someone who stays on the opposite side of the Beltway. Usually, trying to carry on or even starting a relationship can be taxing. Not to mention having to do this with a 45-minute drive time between the two of you. Being from the Southside of Houston, I can attest to once being crazy about a young lady who just so happened to stay near Humble.


"Feature From Pimp" (Original: "One Day You're Here," UGK): This is a true story of my planning and attempt to do a song with my favorite group of all time, UGK. Shortly before graduating from college, I began to put things in motion to pursue my rap habit as more than a hobby. The only bad thing is Pimp C passed the semester before I was able to do so.
I still got a chance to meet Bun B at this year's SXSW, and even passed him a copy of my first project The Prestige EP. While it wasn't the opportunity I hoped for, he was still really cool and didn't make me feel stupid for approaching him, as many entertainers have the tendency to do. This along with an original classic about life and death only seemed appropriate. - Houston Press

Normally, I’m not a fan huge fan of the south too too much. Nothing against the south, it’s just not really my style. You can probably tell by the mixtapes that get posted on here. But, Dustin has a new and very unique and fresh sound. I can’t really describe it, but the music sounds simple and very very listenable. I put it on earlier and just let it play. Typically, I would have skipped through a few tracks, but I haven’t done that on this tape. A truly good tape or album, in my opinion, is when you put it on and then you suddenly find yourself almost done with it and you didn’t really notice that you listened to that much of it. That’s what this mixtape did for me. Check out the tape from Dustin Prestige. If any Houston people on the site have some more info on him, please feel free to leave it in the comments. Thanks. Always a free mixtape download over here. Home of the free hip hop mixtape downloads. Tracklist and downloads below. Get Right… - Jesse Janson

Here is the guy that got the RapRadar co-sign when YN and I appeared on Angela Yee’s Shade 45 morning show Tuesday. His name is Dustin Prestige and he’s from Houston, TX. As most people know, I’m a tough critic. But not even my player-hating ass could front on homeboy’s music. Click the stream to see what the fuss is about. - B.Dot Rap Radar

Dustin Prestige
The Kelly and Jessie EP (Self-released, 2011)
Dustin Prestige, an unintentionally enigmatic Missouri City MC, is an almost cautionary tale: Seemingly over the course of a single weekend, he went from nobodydom to near underground stardom two years ago, then turtled himself away shortly after when he became uncomfortable with the exposure and how it began to affect his music (See: Houston Presto Vol. 2).

Since then, he's popped up sporadically on this single or that feature, most impressively on hasHBrown's Forgive Me Not tape, but has mostly kept to himself. Now, at the tender age of 28, he is prepping the release of his first proper LP, The Prestigious, with a three-part EP series called The Saved By The Bell Drama, As Told By Dustin Prestige.

The first segment, The Kelly and Jessie EP, was just released and is now available on iTunes. The remaining two, To Lisa, With Love and Black Zach Morris, will be available before June 27.
Kelly and Jessie is springy and wiry and ambitious and generally indicative of the talent that had everybody clamoring for more Prestige when he first popped.

Y'allmustaforgotability: 94 percent

Read what Y'allmustaforgotability means.

Best Song on the Album: "Army Of Me"

Though nearly a category stolen by album opener "2 Girls, 1 Presto," a Britpop/rock track that ends with Prestige trying to persuade Kelly and Jessie into participating in a threesome*, "Army Of Me" is the album's best song, emotive, original and intriguing. It is grimy and chunky and possessed of a mouthful of teeth. Also: It's a rap song only in the loosest terms. There are bloody drums and bleeding guitars and a bloodied Prestige, him crowing over and over again, "I'm a one man army, I'm a one man army."

The last minute and a half of the song consists of a bunch of you-broke-my-heart-themed Saved By The Bell sound bites. It's not as masturbatory as Kanye's album cut of "Runaway," but it's closer to that than not.

*There's no way this doesn't happen. Kelly always seemed to be maniacally sexual, though that might have been just how we saw it, and we all saw what Jessie did in Showgirls, or, as it's also called: The Greatest Cinematic Achievement In History.

Most Astute Line on the Album: "A style only mamas can love; I'm a T-Mac."

We'd be very surprised to learn that there was anybody on the planet that loves T-Mac that isn't his mother. Man, poor guy. Wait, is he still alive?
?Most Interesting Argument To Have With Yourself After Listening to the Album: Is Saved by the Bell the most fundamental kid sitcom of the '80s-babies generation? It has to at least be close, right?
Remember the episode where Screech got struck by lightning and could temporarily see the future? Remember the one Zach kissed Lisa? The one where Slater was going to be shipped off to Hawaii? The one where the whole group started a band? The I'm So Excited, I'm So Scared episode? The one with Belding's brother? The one...


Obscure Fact You Can Pawn Off As Your Own To Make Yourself Sound Insightful:

This entire EP was produced by rising local personality Chris Rockaway. The second one, the aforementioned To Lisa, With Love will be almost entirely produced by the impressive Cy Fyre. The third, Black Zach Morris, will be produced by soulful sir Jett I. Masstyr.

Why that's important to know: Three different producers for three different tapes from the same rapper within the same project is just about the closest anyone is ever going to get to designing a rap-based controlled experiment. It's a set of circumstances that transforms the infuriating, unnecessary Who's The Better Producer Among The Three? into an actual hypothesis.

For music nerds, this is an overwhelmingly interesting situation. - Shea Serrano