Rising teenage melodic hip hop superstar The Kid Laroi has released his latest hit film clip, the Khaled Rohaim & Omer Fedi produced song “So Done” overnight on influential tastemaker Lyrical Lemonade’s YouTube channel, amassing hundreds of thousands of views in just hours.
This is not the first time Laroi has appeared on a Chicagoan Cole Bennett directed film clip on Lyrical Lemonade, with Laroi scoring three extremely valuable placements via strong A&R work from his label’s Lil Bibby & G Money (also from Chicago).
The now 17-year old Columbia Records (Sony Music) and Grade A Productions (Lil Bibby etc.) artist seemingly burst onto the in 2018, somewhat surprisingly being placed as a top 5 finalist for the national high school artist competition in his native Australia as well as releasing his cleverly titled EP 14 With a Dream the day before his fifteenth birthday. Similarly to Australian rapper Iggy Azalea, Laroi is a highly polarizing figure domestically in his home Australia, also amassing a legion of teenage fans favoring his melodic vibes over lyrical ability while alienating many more in his dismissiveness of local hip hop in Australia – see below.
With Laroi’s family heavily involved in the music industry behind the scenes, both his father (music producer/sound engineer superstar Nick Howard, who has worked with Nelly, Fat Joe, Common, Fabolous, Joe Budden amongst dozens more) and mother (model manager and music executive Sloane Howard) were able to help him successfully navigate the music industry at a young age in a highly planned, targetted manner. Born in Sydney before moving out to Broken Hill in regional New South Wales as a very young kid, The Kid Laroi moved to South Australia as a pre-teenager and boarded at the ultra-exclusive private catholic school Sacred Heart Parish College in the wealthy inner western suburbs of Adelaide where his uncle lived nearby. It was while he was in Adelaide were Laroi first began experimenting with music, originally developing a local buzz in Adelaide entirely through the help of his former promoter, recording engineer, video producer, songwriter, manager, producer DJ Marcus Jr fka DJ Lady Killa ( @marcus_jrr ) in 2015/2016 when Laroi was only 12-years old, forming the duo “Dream$Team”. Through Marcus and his parent managers, he was able to meet and rap to touring artists including YG, Tyga, Sony Music music executives, and more across Adelaide and Sydney in 2016. Watch The Kid Laroi rapping about guns and drugs as a 12/13-year old in the Dream$Team era below in 2015/2016 and early 2017 to get a taste of how he came up in suburban Australia.
The Kid Laroi eventually moved back to Sydney in early 2017 to further pursue an international career in music well beyond the borders of Australia with his mother, now as a solo artist leaving an unknowing Marcus Jr in the dark after all his hard work. Laroi enrolled in the exclusive boutique Australian Performing Arts Grammar School (APGS) in inner Sydney along with his younger brother – a smooth transition to winning his national lucrative High School artist competition. At the same time, Laroi linked up just temporarily with commercial DJ/emerging manager DJ Ziggy of ART Management Group (who also hosted a radio show for Sony Music) and secured early placements on international shows in Australia including with eventual labelmate Juice Wrld (RIP). Since moving to LA, The Kid Laroi has collaborated with the likes of fellow Grade A Productions labelmate Juice Wrld (RIP), Polo G, Tokyo’s Revenge, Internet Money, some of the Lil’s (Tecca, Tjay, Mosey) amongst others of the current new wave. A well-executed plan by talented music industry parents, Laroi is likely to continue to deliver hits on major platforms in the near future through his melodic, chorus heavy take on hip hop that is popular at the moment. Watch the below videos for further background.
