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Set Da Trend

About

“All of this is for a reason,” proclaims 18-year-old rapper Set Da Trend. The South Bronx native credits his dedication and work ethic to a year where he went from recording his first song to making multiple videos with millions of views. Newly signed to RECORDS/Columbia, Set Da Trend lives up to his name with the recently-released video single “Get Home.” The song meshes a drill delivery with a classic Faith Evans sample for something that spans generations and moods. “People tell me I’m an old soul,” shares a student of the greats. For the visual, achieving over half a million views in its first few weeks, Set parks a McLaren in the projects and treats his success as a homecoming. After breakout collaborations with close friends Kay Flock and Dougie B, Set Da Trend paves his own lane with a unique style and a fierce drive to win.

“When I was younger, everything was cool, calm, and collected,” Set says of life around the Bronx’s 187th Street. “As people started getting older, they started doing what they wanted to do.” Some friends gravitated towards the streets; others pursued music. For Set Da Trend, it was both. “I used to be a dumb kid just gettin’ booked for trying to get some money,” he admits. As robbery charges mounted against the teen, he seemed destined for trouble. “Then I realized I had a way out through rapping. I felt like I had a gift when I made my first song,” he notes of a melodic track that he has kept in the vault. Just as Set discovered his purpose, his personal life suffered. At 17, the rapper lost his father to diabetes. “My dad showed me how to be a man,” he recalls. Set felt even more compelled to help provide for his family, who are of Dominican and Trinidadian heritage. However, this time, he insisted on making money through his voice.

In 2021, Set Da Trend made an impact, collaborating with Kay Flock on the single “Whisper” and appearing in videos like Dougie B’s “EOS” and C Blu’s “No Ozone.” “I was around Kay and Dougs a lot,” he says of childhood friends. “They used to bring me around label meetings, all that. It created visibility and showed me what’s right and wrong.” It also taught the ambitious artist to be bold and deliberate. “I don’t want to sound like everybody else; I want to sound like myself. So I just kept listening to my music and tried to fix my voice to sound different than everybody else.” That mantra helped inspire the artist’s name, something he selected after his first recording sessions. Freestyling in the studio before writing down his lyrics, Set Da Trend speaks straight from the heart. “Get Home” repurposes vocals and music from Faith Evans’ 1995 hit “Soon As I Get Home,” but Set makes it his own by venting his current reality. “My best friend just passed away,” he reveals. “The beat was perfect for me and the situation I’m going through.” In paying tribute, he created something that has many facets, evident in the video.

Although Set Da Trend has been a part of several huge Drill records, he plans to diversify. “I see myself as an artist. Drill is for right now; I can really take it to a different level, which I’m planning to do,” he asserts. “Everything takes time, step by step. I’m just waiting for the next step, and then we’re off, for real.” Set’s next single is “2 Slimmed Out,” featuring FR33 Bandit. “That right there, it’s about to be a movie,” he promises. “That one’s a freestyle—straight from my heart.”

At home, Set Da Trend is raising a son and treating a niece as his own. When not honing his craft in the studio, he’s being a father, playing video games, and corresponding with fans. “This is new to us,” he says of a journey from music hopeful to becoming a priority on a major label. “This is all so unexpected, but I’m thankful for everything. It’s about to be a ‘Setty Summer.'”