Meet Davey Legend: The Gen Z Artist Turning Digital Burnout Into Sonic Gold
After relocating from Redding, CA, to Los Angeles, Davey Legend has carved out a space for himself as one of Gen Z’s most intriguing and emotionally honest artists. As a digital native raised on the internet, Davey’s relationship with the post-Web 2.0 world is anything but straightforward. Like many of his peers, his life is deeply entangled with memes, social media, and the ever-present tension between digital identities and real-world connections. That tension pulses at the heart of his music, where sincerity, fragility, humor, and joy collide. Whether he’s crafting raw emotional landscapes or slipping into absurdity with his self-described “bing bong boing” sound, Davey’s work is a reflection of someone navigating the blurry borders between the online and offline worlds.
Davey’s latest single, “Subliminal,” was born from a time when everything in his life seemed to unravel. Written during a period of depression and creative block, the song captures the numbness he struggled to articulate—a feeling of being cut off from his own emotions, with everything buried “several floors down.” Drawing inspiration from artists like Eden, Twenty One Pilots, Imogen Heap, and Björk, Davey blends hyperpop, emo, and hip-hop elements into a sound that’s as eclectic as his influences. His music is populated by vivid, original characters that embody his inner conflicts, transforming personal struggles into cathartic sonic worlds.
As he gears up to release his upcoming album, “Headroom,” Davey is leaning into contrasts: blending raw, acoustic textures with digital production, pairing humor with heartbreak, and finding a voice that’s both intimate and expansive. His next single, “Bang!,” drops this summer, adding to a growing body of work that invites listeners into his evolving universe. In this interview, Davey opens up about the complicated dance between his online and offline selves, the characters that animate his music, and the creative process behind songs like “Subliminal.”
You’re a Gen Z digital native—How do you think growing up immersed in digital culture has shaped your art and worldview?
Digital culture has shaped almost everything about who I am, both personally and artistically. I was homeschooled, so most of my exposure to pop culture came through the internet and social media.
The digital influence directly impacts how I create. I work in stark contrasts: fully digital production tools with minimal analog gear, yet I often incorporate raw, untreated real-world elements.
This is a major theme on my upcoming album, “Headroom,” expected to be released in late fall 2025. I constantly record everyday ambient sounds — like a loud coffee shop, an empty hangar, a thunderstorm, or a quiet moment with a partner on a hike. I use these recordings as sonic backdrops to build immersive environments within the music. Even vocals or guitar lines are sometimes recorded directly on voice memos, giving the songs a textured, imperfect feel that makes them more human.
You’ve mentioned your relationship with the post-Web 2.0 world is complicated. What’s the biggest tension you feel between your online identity and your offline self?
Being someone who has grown up on social media — I’ve had my Instagram account since 2013, when I was 13 — I’ve grappled with a sense of split identity for most of my life. There’s the curated version of myself online, and then there’s the unfiltered version in real life.
Until I really started pushing my music, this duality never felt negative or strange — just two ways of being. But once I began building a fanbase, I developed a serious case of impostor syndrome. Everything in my music career was going well online, but my physical self was struggling to keep up.
I’d get recognized in my town at the grocery store and hear things like, “You’re so inspiring,” or “Your music means so much to me,” but I couldn’t believe it. For the first time, it felt like my internet self wasn’t me anymore — it was someone else entirely, and my real self was just being dragged along for the ride.
After about a year of intense writer’s block, depression, and therapy, I finally came to terms with that split identity. I stopped resisting it and started finding ways to bring the two versions of myself back together. During this time period I wrote my song “Goliath,” which mirrored my mental state throughout this season of my life.
Your music is full of characters you’ve created—what’s the story behind some of these characters, and how do they help you process personal struggles?
Every season or crisis I’ve gone through in my life feels like its own little movie or character arc. The characters in my music are definitely me, but they represent more than just one specific emotion. They embody an entire situation or chapter of my life, including the opposition and the other people involved.
For example, in “somebody,” the character doesn’t only reflect my thoughts and feelings, like “I wish you were mine” or “I hate seeing you with someone else.” It also captures the person I’m speaking to, their emotions, and even the perspective of the person they might be with. The resulting character is super conflicted — almost manic — as it takes on every emotion from all sides of the situation.
That’s genuinely how I look back at different chapters of my life. It all feels like one chaotic, emotional jumble — a mix of what I felt, who I loved, and everything we were going through together.
“Subliminal” feels like a raw emotional snapshot. Can you walk us through the moment or series of moments that inspired it?
“Subliminal” was the first song I wrote in more than a year after falling into a deep depression. I had intense writer’s block, and every time I sat down to make music, it felt overwhelmingly negative. Life had no color, and music had no emotion. Everything was just noise.
I had so much emotion bottled up inside me, but it felt trapped behind a wall. No matter how badly I wanted to access it, to actually feel something, nothing worked. That’s exactly what “Subliminal” is about. I wrote a song about not being able to feel anything at all.
And I know this sounds cliché, but as I was writing it, I started to feel again. It was like I finally released everything I’d been holding inside. The whole thing came together really fast — most of my finished songs come to life in about three or four hours. It was definitely a chaotic little musical therapy session for me.
You pull influence from a diverse range of artists like Eden, Imogen Heap, Björk, and 21 Pilots. What draws you to these artists, and how do you see their influence showing up in your work?
Imogen Heap is probably my favorite right now, but I’d also include a broader group of solo female artists, such as Clairo and Kate Bush. There’s something incredible about how they use their vocals in production — the overall sonic texture is just unreal. Imogen, in particular, uses her voice in such experimental and layered ways, and that inspires me deeply. Hayley Williams of Paramore gives me that same feeling in her solo work. I’d also include Kate Bush, Clairo, girl in red, and so many others.
Twenty One Pilots were my biggest inspiration growing up — I was a die-hard fan. The mysteriousness and edginess of their songs, and the way they use imagery, are probably the things I pull from the most. My song “Bang!” is heavily influenced and almost my homage to Tyler Joseph from Twenty One Pilots and their style. I also love how obscure and “against the rules of writing pop songs” their lyrics can be. I still find myself fighting to keep some of my more niche or abstract lyrics intact.
Your style—“bing bong boing” music—is such a unique descriptor. What does that phrase mean to you, and how would you explain your sound to someone hearing it for the first time?
“Bing bong boing music” really started as a joke, but it’s definitely purposeful. Alongside all the heavy, chaotic emotions I feel all the time — and all the dark, edgy, mysterious stuff in the world — I like the contrast of throwing in something totally silly or stupid.
It honestly reflects how I act in real life. I hate showing when I’m feeling down or depressed, and I really hate being the one to bring down the mood. So when I’m going through it, that’s usually when I’m cracking the most jokes and being the goofiest. It helps me cope and reminds me that life doesn’t have to be that serious.
If I had to describe my sound to someone, I’d say it’s Midwest emo guitar riffs and chord voicings mixed with Post Malone drums and Imogen Heap-style vocal layering. For a less music-nerdy explanation: think about the moment you were born, then multiply it by two. That’s what my music feels like.
What’s next for Davey Legend—musically, emotionally, or even in the worlds you’re creating?
Dropping my album, “headroom,” is my whole life right now. I have some really cool singles coming out prior to the album drop in fall. “bang!” being the next one coming at the beginning of this summer https://daveylegend.ffm.to/bang. I’m focused on releasing these songs and playing as many shows as I can, as well as connecting with my audience and the people that listen to my music. I really can’t wait to become friends with everyone who listens and connects to the way I’ve felt and the way the music makes me feel.
In terms of where my music is headed, lately I’ve been creating work that blends raw, Bon Iver–style folk with house-inspired, Fred again... type production. I’m definitely in an in-between, experimental phase, and I really like existing in those stark contrasts of sound.
I think that’s where a lot of the gold — and genuinely new ideas — come from: the spaces where things aren’t supposed to go together.