Despite the pressure of helping raise his two younger brothers and having a father who was in and out of jail, 9lokkNine has already managed to achieve more than what most would dream of. For better or worse, his childhood made clear that he had a habit of making himself the center of attention. Thus, it might not come as a surprise that after looking up to the likes of Lil Wayne, T-Pain, and Rick Ross, he started rapping at the age of nine, on GarageBand. His passion struggled to reach the center of his life as he experienced his first run-ins with the law. At only ten years old, he found himself in jail for shooting a BB gun at a neighborhood security officer. This would seem to be the start of his long-running alleged criminal career, with charges escalating before he even reached adulthood. After another arrest later in his teen years, 9lokkNine, remembers telling his mother that he was going to achieve stardom after he was released.
Whether it was manifestation or a self-fulfilling prophecy, the young rapper ended up in the studio every day after his release. He became prolific, to the point where he garnered the attention of Hip-Hop media giant, Say Cheese. Upon Say Cheese promoting his work, 9lokkNine rocketed to new heights of stardom, with him being surprised by his own swift success. In 2018, 9lokkNine made his strongest impression on the rap scene yet, with the release of “10 Percent,” a meditation on the interpolation of his rap career and experience with the criminal justice system. The clever audacity in the song’s lyricism and its irresistible pop-trap beat prefaced a flurry of press coverage that would only be enhanced by 9lokkNine singing to Cash Money and Republic Records. From there, he would move on to provide a widely-enjoyed feature on YNW Melly’s “223’s”, and the release of his hit 2019 mixtape, Mind of Destruction.
