Butte hip-hop artist 2 Dolla Will is on a mission to shock, and he appears to be succeeding.

To listen to 2 Dolla’s music is to dive headfirst into a confounding torrent of pop culture references; peculiar samples of obscure doo-wop, “Feliz Navidad,” and country radio chatter; paeans to potent cannabis; sexual boasts; and proud but not exactly flattering depictions of Butte. 

The only thing more audacious than 2 Dolla’s raunchy, reference-rich music is the staggering rate at which he makes it. At age 25, he has already uploaded more than 50 albums to the digital music hosting platform Bandcamp, from the lush, country-inflected “RED BUTTE REDEMPTION” to the Jay-Z-referencing “THE BUTTEPRINT” and the jazzier “Butte Chips.” 

This holiday season proved especially fruitful for 2 Dolla fans. In December he released the bombastic full-length “I SOLD METH TO TAYLOR SWIFT,” as well as a shorter holiday-themed project and a handful of singles, including the diss track “YOU PROBABLY WATCH PODCASTS.” His next album arrives in February.

2 Dolla (he declined to share his given name) collaborates with a rotating cast of producers and fellow MCs. While his crew, the Blicky Boyz, all live in Butte, his tracks feature guest verses and beats produced by artists across the country.

Read on as the enigmatic rapper waxes insightful on the nature of shock value, his creative process, critics and more.

MTFP: You rep Butte pretty hard. What’s your relationship with the city like?

2 Dolla Will: I moved here when I was 7 or 8. I was in Florida before. Butte is a crazy place. It’s like the Tim Burton version of Montana.

Half the people are just walking around drunk all hours of the day. There’s obviously a bunch of meth and all that. It seems like a haunted place.

MTFP: If someone comes to visit you in Butte, where do you take them? 

2 Dolla Will: Honestly, they’re not missing much [laughs]. My favorite restaurants, pretty much all of them have closed down. Metals Bank, that’s one—go eat in the vault.

MTFP: Do your collaborators live in Butte?

The main people that I work with are in Butte. [Producer] jdmasters, we have been friends since high school. We’ve been making music together probably at least once a week. Sometimes we’ll come out with three or four [tracks] in one day. And then Yung Regis is another one. And Lil Curbstomp, who’s the third member of the Blicky Boys.

MTFP: You release so much music. What does your writing process look like?

2 Dolla Will: It really depends. Lately I haven’t been doing as much, but in 2021, I released an ungodly amount of projects. I put out 21 projects in 2021.

That’s when I first started getting beats from [producer] Iceberg Theory, too. Every time I’d send him a song back, he’d send me back three more beats. I just became addicted to that. I wanted to hear what he would send me next. 

So I’d get up … make a quick one.

MTFP: A full track?

2 Dolla Will: Yeah. It’s like my warm-up.

I would be still writing when I was at work. I was a general manager of Butte’s Jimmy John’s. I’d go on my lunch break and finish that song. After my shift, I’d come back and probably do two or three more [tracks].

And then maybe jdmasters would hit me up and be like, “Hey, let’s do something.” So I’ll go up there and do another two.

I don’t find it hard to do them quickly. After I come up with a good first couple lines, it goes pretty naturally. I don’t usually go back and rewrite stuff. I’ll usually just lay it down and then — unless it sounds like crap — that’s just the final version.

MTFP: Do all of those tracks make it onto a record?

2 Dolla Will: I don’t like to do albums longer than 15 or 16 songs. Usually I’ll have too many songs and I’ll start cutting them off, and then I’ll have another half an album. So then I’ll find a new batch of beats that fits with those and make another album.

You’ll have the main album that’s like the really, really good one. And then you’ll have another one that’s for the people that can’t get enough.

Like “Susan,” the one I just put out with jdmasters. All those songs were actually made in 2021 when we were working on “Elaine Benes.”

It’s not the polished final product that “Elaine Benes” is — it’s like the booster pack if you need more “Elaine.”

MTFP: You’ve got a track where you rap “If Gianforte can bodyslam a reporter’s face and still control the state / how the [expletive] is anything I say in poor taste?” I’d like to unpack that one.

2 Dolla Will: It’s crazy. That dude did that and was not really affected by it at all. But then for me, we got banned from a place in Bozeman just because of the anti-cop [lyrics] we have. How does that work? This dude can bodyslam a reporter, but I can’t say anything about cops in a rap. 

I really like to push the envelope and cause controversy in my own way. If he can do that, I’m just gonna say whatever I want.

MTFP: You rap about weed a lot. How do you think legalization is going?

2 Dolla Will: I think it’s awful, to be honest. They’re blowing the prices up. These corporate-type people are making all the money.

MTFP: I love the recorded voice in some of your tracks that says “Go back to Bozeman.” Who is that? 

2 Dolla Will: That’s Jeff Steitzer. He is the actual voice in [the video game] Halo. “Double kill,” “triple kill,” all the crosstalk. We paid him to say a bunch of Butte stuff.

MTFP: What do you think about Bozeman?

2 Dolla Will: I’m not a fan. It’s like Butte’s evil twin. They’re the people that get offended by the stuff I say, you know what I mean? 

MTFP: You talked about the shock value of your music earlier. What do you hope someone takes away from your music?

2 Dolla Will: Honestly, I just hope people hear it and say, “There is no way this guy just said that.” And then go back and listen to it again and be like, “This is actually really dope.” It’s a similar reaction to when I first heard Action Bronson or Big L.

I think people get misconstrued that something shocking has to be violent or messed up in some sort of way. But in reality, shock value can be me rapping insane “Seinfeld” references or saying that Michael Bay’s “Transformers” is the real “Citizen Kane.”

That’s just as much shock value as anything else I’ll say. 

MTFP: What’s your North Star, your goal with your music in the future?

2 Dolla Will: I want to take this as far as I possibly can. I want the Blicky Boys to be Wu-Tang. I want to shock everyone. I want people to be like, “Oh, 2 Dolla Will is ruining the children.”

MTFP: Anything you want to add before we wrap up?

2 Dolla Will: This is Butte.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

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