The multi-faceted Keith David has become an icon thanks to both on-screen work in projects like The Thing and voice performances in animated series including Gargoyles and Rick & Morty. However, he tells Consequence (in that distinctive gravel), “Although I’ve had several singing performances, there are still people who get surprised that I can sing.”
David laughs as he continues, “It’s like, ‘Oh, I didn’t know he sang,’ That’s all well and good, but my ambition is to do a lot more singing performances — hopefully in projects like this.”
The adult animated musical comedy series Hazbin Hotel, created by Vivienne Medrano, takes place in literal Hell, as an inspired princess of darkness (Erika Henningsen) attempts to start a rehabilitation program for demons that will allow them to go to Heaven. It’s a big premise packed that allows for big characters such as Husk (David), a surly bartender who nonetheless is capable of moments of empathy for his fellow demons. Even if his empathy comes in the form of an original song called “Loser Baby,” which Husk sings to the down-in-the-dumps Angel (Blake Roman) during a low point.
Part of why David wanted to be a part of Hazbin Hotel was that the show reminded him of “Fritz the Cat and all those Ralph Bakshi [series], back in the day before Adult Swim was Adult Swim. Or Top Cat and all those animal cartoons that had animals acting like people, and they were cool and hip. This is a great universe to be a part of.”
But the other “enticing element” for David was getting to not just act, but sing. “It’s one of the reasons I really wanted to do it, and I really dig the music in this thing. Not only is it cross-generational and cross-genre, but it’s new and innovative. Unlike other kinds of musical treatments in animation, this could be a Broadway musical. You could easily see this transferring to a world on stage, and this music would fit right into it.”
“Loser Baby” was written by songwriters Sam Haft and Andrew Underberg, who worked previously with Medrano on her animated web series Helluva Boss. Haft describes Medrano as “an animation auteur — she’s got a very clear vision,” though “Loser Baby” was one of the looser songs in terms of what she was specifically looking for.
In fact, both songs for Episode 4, “Masquerade,” gave the songwriters a lot of creative freedom, the reason being that, as Haft says, “it’s much more of a stand-alone story about Husk and Angel. So we could take a lot more liberties and experiment with stuff and throw stuff at the wall and just doodle around musically and see what stuck.”
Both songs, in addition, are relatively stand-alone in terms of the show’s plotting, as compared to other tunes that are “so tied in with the script that if you listen to them out of context, it might make no sense,” Underberg says. “You could listen to [“Loser Baby”] pretty cold, I think, and you’d get Husk and Angel’s relationship just from the lyrics and the music.”
David was cast after about 30 percent of the songs were written, Haft says. “He was definitely was cast before we did ‘Loser Baby.’ We already had a sense of Husk as a gruff, older gambler/bartender, but Keith is is a known entity. You just hear Keith David and you go, ‘Oh my gosh, he’s going to have all this gravity. He’s going to have all this charm.’ It’s not that you know what you’re getting every time with Keith, but there’s a baseline of this absolutely legendary voice. And he’s been working for so long, doing so many amazing things, that it was very intimidating to write once we knew that it was Keith. Because we were thinking, we gotta live up to him. He needs to come into the room and go, ‘Oh good, I like this one.'”
Fortunately enough, David “really fell in love with the music of the series” when he first heard it. “I just love the groove, you know, especially in ‘Loser Baby’ — it’s got a great groove to it.”
Prior to now, Disney’s The Princess and the Frog was perhaps the most prior prominent example of David’s singing chops, but Haft notes that “Keith has a history of, from time to time, doing cabaret-style performances.” (In fact, David just recently performed a show at The Jazz Corner in Hilton Head, South Carolina.)
Adds Haft, “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — in a different era, he could have been in the Rat Pack. He is just such a natural crooner. I remember watching these videos [of him performing] and being totally blown away, because I already knew he was great, but then to see that there’s this whole other dimension to him as a performer that I wasn’t even that familiar with — it was so cool.”
Hazbin Hotel (Prime Video)
