Ashton Casey, better known by her stage name Ashnikko, was born on February 19, 1996 in Oak Ridge, North Carolina.
The London-based rapper, singer and songwriter is known for her rebellious and daring songs with themes of sexuality and female empowerment. Influenced by the likes of feminist musicians like M.I.A., Björk, and Nicki Minaj, Ashnikko fuses hip-hop with a punky electro-pop sound that is native to the English capital.
Due to her upbringing in the ultra-conservative North Carolina, Ashnikko’s early musical diet consisted exclusively of country music and some occasional Slipknot records.
Ashnikko spent most of her teen years in eastern Europe after her parents moved to Estonia and then Latvia when she was only thirteen.
A very liberal and creative teen in nature, Ashnikko spent her days doodling and slowly making her first steps toward her imminent career as a rapper who doesn’t necessarily mince her words.
She supposedly wrote a diss track about one of her classmates over Lil Kim’s “Black Friday” beat.
Upon reaching adulthood, Ashnikko finally managed to break free of her conservative chains and began a new life in London where she enjoyed a wild party life and where she continued to pursue her creative notions through music.
On the 31st of July in 2016 she uploaded her first song “KROKODIL” to SoundCloud.
Since then, Ashnikko has released two EPs, Hi, It’s Me and Unlikeable, along with a collaborative EP Sass Pancakes with Raf Riley.
After having successfully figured out her unique style by the time Sass Pancakes dropped, Ashnikko first explored the topic of female empowerment on her second EP Unlikeable and continued to stand up for women in and out of the industry on her third EP Hi, It’s Me.
In an interview with 1883 Magazine, she said:
I got bullied a lot because I did music. It’s quite a patriarchal society there, a lot of men were offended by my presence. […] Doing something different is uncomfortable, regardless what you do differently – you always get hated especially as a woman. But regardless, its always more rewarding to be yourself.
Her song “STUPID” featuring Atlanta-based rapper Yung Baby Tate garnered massive popularity on the lip-syncing app Tik Tok months after its initial release, having accumulated over two million posts by the end of October 2019. The viral song marked her first entry on Billboard, peaking at #25 on the Billboard Hot 100 Bubbling Under Charts.
