ghostemane biography

How trap metal anti-icon Ghostemane became the new king of the misfits

He grew up on Korn and Nine Inch Nails, and has worked with Ross Robinson. Now Ghostemane wants to drag metal into the 2020s

The crowd at 2019’s Lollapalooza festival are primed with a remix of Korn ’s Freak On A Leash , before Eric Whitney runs onstage. Corpsepainted and wearing a dress and fishnets, he starts rapping and jumping in front of a flashing black metal logo that spells out the name of his alter ego: Ghostemane. Before long, a fan is paraded out by an executioner and chained to a stretcher, where he will remain for the duration of the set, getting his face tattooed with their lyrics.

Eric might be at the forefront of what’s been dubbed trap metal, mixing beats and bars with industrial noise and aggressive vocals, but make no mistake – he’s one of us. Blending the sounds of his idol, Trent Reznor , with the aesthetics of Marilyn Manson and a love of hip hop, he’s bringing 90s metal culture into the 2020s, repackaging it for a new generation and blurring its boundaries. He’s supported fellow genre disruptors Code Orange , been mentored by Slipknot ’s Clown , and recorded with legendary producer Ross Robinson . In short, he’s this decade’s king of the misfits.

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“It’s no secret that 90s nu metal stuff is a huge inspiration, because I feel like that’s when music was the Wild Wild West, and all these bands were experimenting and demonstrating their style to the fullest, and there were no real rules,” he explains, while he gets ready for a photoshoot today. He’s wearing pale make-up, so his eyes look “tired and sunken in as usual”, and a suit from a designer friend. “That was the pinnacle of the mixture of rap and rock, so to speak. There was Rage Against The Machine , Korn, Slipknot, you name it. The Golden Age is never gonna happen again, but it doesn’t hurt to show the kids who like my stuff what I came up on.”

Eric’s music education was initially patchy. He was raised in Florida and had what he terms “a bizarre upbringing”. When he was four years old, his father was in a car accident, leading to long-term back injuries that ended his career as a phlebotomist. His mum, who was pregnant with Eric’s brother at the time, became his dad’s full-time carer. With his parents always at home, there was little privacy for Eric, and his dad ruled the roost; he had to get straight A grades or risk his wrath, and there was no access to the internet.

At school, Eric aced tests but struggled with the social aspect. “I didn’t really have a lot of friends because I always found relating to other people to be sort of like this game that I wasn’t good at,” he recalls. “Something where there’s rules and there’s things to say and things you don’t say, and a way you’re supposed to act, and I just couldn’t figure it out. And it got to be really frustrating, and I ended up giving up, especially when I was in high school. I kept to myself most of the time.”

He did find escapism, though. When he was 13, he got into Green Day , NOFX, MxPx, Pennywise and the Warped Tour compilations. Then it was the output of Victory Records and metalcore. “I’d hear screaming in certain songs and think, ‘Damn, I wanna hear more of that stuff!’” At age 14 he picked up a guitar, and soon discovered In Flames via the Tony Hawk’s Underground soundtrack. But he had to be careful; bands with extreme imagery on their CD covers, like Slipknot, were banned by his dad. “Metal was taboo in my house, because it was too heavy,” he explains. “In the back of my mind, I knew one day that I’d fall in love with it truly.”

Eric was 17 when his dad passed away. Both of them had come down with pneumonia and, from what he can glean from family members, his dad took an accidental overdose of pain medication and became unresponsive. For Eric, it was a tumultuous time of conflicting emotions, as he’d lost someone who had been a constant presence in his life, yet a source of oppression. He stopped “giving a shit about making friends so much, and caring more about figuring myself out and cutting loose”, dying his hair and getting tattoos. The first, across his chest, was for his dad: words from a poem he used to read to Eric.

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“It’s about this angel carrying a child, and then he hits a point where he’s coming of age, and he basically tells the child that he has to take it from here. And it always stuck with me, because I felt like until that point where he died, he was sort of… guiding, for lack of a better word… but really just controlling every bit of my life, actually. Once he was gone, I had to grow up, really quick.”

The poem is intended to be positive, but for Eric the meaning was bittersweet. “I didn’t really know how to feel,” he explains. “I obviously missed him to an extent, but I didn’t want him back. I was glad that he wasn’t there anymore. And I wouldn’t change that at all, because if it didn’t happen, I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing now.”

What Eric is doing now is Ghostemane – a project designed to alchemise his diverse influences into something bleeding edge. Forthcoming eighth album Anti-Icon is the culmination of the identity he’s spent the last decade or so working out.

Following his transformation into a teenage alternative kid, Eric found hardcore via his musician cousin from New York, getting into the likes of Cold World, Trapped Under Ice and Turnstile, before connecting with people in his local scene. After leaving school he worked in telephone sales, but by 21 he was also in hardcore band Nemesis and their doom metal side-project, Seven Serpents, as well as being immersed in hip hop, death metal and black metal . While experimenting with solo music, he came up with a song called Ghostemane . The ‘Ghoste’ part came from an inside joke with his friends; due to social anxiety, he would often pull out of plans at the last minute, ghosting them. The other half references the 90s Southern phonk subgenre.

“It came from me being antisocial, basically. I thought it had a nice ring to it, and once I was able to talk more about myself, I had the plan to let it be known how antisocial I was and anxious,” he explains. “Kind of wearing the name as a badge of honour, basically, and not being ashamed of it.”

Early attempts to fuse rap with hardcore in 2014 were not good. “It felt too Frankensteined together, and too done just for the sake of doing it to sound cool, as opposed to making it a true expression,” he admits. But he slowly progressed, even moving to California and becoming part of a collective called Schemaposse with late rapper Lil Peep, until they disbanded in 2017. That year, he released a song called Hades , featuring the line, ‘95 Marilyn with less regard for my actions’ , and it’s not much of a stretch to link new album title ‘ Anti-Icon ’ to Antichrist Superstar . “He’s obviously the godfather,” Eric smiles.

It wasn’t just the way Manson championed the world’s outsiders, exposing American society as the real sickness, but the way he transitioned from journalist to musician, essentially faking it to make it.

“It says in his book that even when he was younger and writing about his band in the local paper, the band didn’t even exist yet. I relate to that on a lot of levels, where you are trying to show somebody that you’re capable of something,” he says. “I took that energy, even before I did music. Some of the best jobs I got were because I said I had done something before, when I hadn’t. I just knew that I could.”

If Manson’s the godfather, then Trent Reznor’s a straight-up God. In 2018’s Ball Gag , Eric quotes Nine Inch Nails ’ hip-grinding dancefloor-filler, Closer , rapping ‘Fuck You Like An Animal’ bumpin’ in the background.’ “He’s my number one icon,” confesses Eric. “I produce and write, and track all of my own stuff, and he obviously does too. He’s one of my biggest inspirations to start doing that and not rely on other people so much.”

But there’s more. After the infamous drug- fuelled pain of Closer ’s parent record, The Downward Spiral , and its follow-up, The Fragile , Trent kicked his habits, got married and settled down, while reaching new creative peaks in his career and garnering mainstream success. “I think Trent Reznor is a huge inspiration, more so than anyone can be. I see myself with a family, obviously, and getting older, and not having any sort of substance abuse problems.”

Trent’s experiences strike a particular chord with Eric, who was addicted to opiates while he was making Anti-Icon . Acoustic album closer Falling Down is his most vulnerable and autobiographical song to date, and was made all the more challenging by the involvement of super-producer Ross Robinson, known for using controversial techniques to push his subjects into their most broken emotional states to get the best take possible.

“He’s really good at making you a headcase,” reveals Eric. “Just amplifying all the good things and all the bad things about yourself simultaneously, to where you have no choice but to give him what he wants. When we first starting tracking, I was feeling really terrible, physically. I was getting clean and going through withdrawals, and he was just getting in my head. I’ve got this guy trying to dig deeper and deeper and deeper, and trying to get me to spill out why I wrote this word instead of this other word. But, it ended up being the greatest recording experience I’ve ever had. I came out a better person.”

It’s because of this respect for music’s heritage and key players, and years spent in a state of self-examination and artistic development, writing songs and recording instruments, that the label ‘trap metal’ rankles with Eric. To him, it’s associated with Soundcloud rappers who get beats from YouTube, or merely scream over a distorted 808. He does, however, see the value in having a new scene like nu metal, to get people hyped about heavy music again. And if it has to be called trap metal? He’ll live with it.

“Regardless of whether I like it or not, it’s a thing that people are gonna say,” he admits. “When I talk to the Slipknot dudes, they tell me the exact same thing. Like, when they came out, and they busted their ass on all this music, people were calling it nu metal, and they were like, ‘What the fuck?!’ And I can see at the time, that would suck. People are gonna say what they’re gonna say I guess, and all that really matters is who’s actually listening.”

Even though Anti-Icon is Ghostemane’s eighth album, and he’s done a slew of side-projects and guest appearances, he’s content with the fact some metallers are only discovering him now. This is the perfect time, he insists. It’s his heaviest record yet, and the first time he feels fully himself. He’s even dropped the black metal logo style; as proud as he is of his influences – today he gushes over a test pressing of Darkthrone’s A Blaze In The Northern Sky , which has pride of place in his LA home studio – he feels established enough to move beyond borrowed signifiers. With another touch of Manson, he talks of how the gap between Eric and Ghostemane has narrowed, resulting in greater authenticity. In other words, what you’re getting is the real deal.

“I think I’ve subconsciously spent the last few years trying to integrate Eric with Ghostemane more to where they’re both the same person, and it doesn’t have to be this thing that I switch back and forth on,” he says. “It’s now become this thing where it’s the same guy.” 

Eleanor was promoted to the role of Editor at Metal Hammer magazine after over seven years with the company, having previously served as Deputy Editor and Features Editor. Prior to joining Metal Hammer, El spent three years as Production Editor at Kerrang! and four years as Production Editor and Deputy Editor at Bizarre. She has also written for the likes of Classic Rock, Prog, Rock Sound and Visit London amongst others, and was a regular presenter on the Metal Hammer Podcast. 

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How Ghostemane is changing the fabric of heavy music

Ghostemane’s pitch-black eighth album ANTI-ICON was a product of the most turbulent time in his life, yet he insists it is the ultimate cathartic realisation of his twisted vision. Kerrang! heads to Prague to find out why it’s taken an immersion in deepest darkness to rediscover the light...

E ric Whitney isn’t often an artist with the spare seconds to step back and take stock. Over the last half-decade, the prolific “trap-metal” trailblazer has pulled himself by his bootstraps from subterranean obscurity to genre-straddling ubiquity off the back of an improbable body of work that comprises eight ‘studio’ albums, 10 EPs, and countless features and collaborations under four different personas, all while relentlessly touring the world and capturing the imaginations of a new breed of heavy music fans. Oh, and he fills any spare time broadening an impressive knowledge on the ancient arts of mysticism, hermeticism and the occult.

“If you’re skipping from interview to interview,” he flashes a knowing grin, “that stuff can get kinda muddy. I have a lot of different passions, and I tend to dive into them super-deep.”

On a sweltering afternoon in Prague, he finds a rare moment to reflect.

Eric is very much in Ghostemane mode today, reclining in the shade of a deserted hotel lobby bar. The vodka orange on our table, presented by an overly-attentive concierge, contrasts sharply with the monochrome figure sitting across it. He regards K! with pointed interest, noting that this is one of his first (and only) “real” interviews. With black hair on pale skin, piercing blue eyes and a webbed sweater the colour of midnight pulled over his wiry, tattooed frame, he could seem downright vampiric.

That is, if he weren’t so full of life.

“I sometimes need to pinch myself and come back to reality,” he says, with an accent far softer than the croaky Southern drawl we know from on record. The Krkonoše mountain range sits in the distance; Eric reveals he rarely travelled before his life in music, and hadn’t witnessed such a geographical sight until he was 25. Being here, then, is not being taken for granted. “When I began the Ghostemane project, I just wanted to be able to pay my bills and travel. Now that’s escalated exponentially to the point where I need to be here. It feels like my career coming full-circle.”

Nor, however, is today being treated like a holiday. That “need” is driven by looming LP ANTI-ICON . Teased by a bizarre clip of an orgy in a morgue on February 18 and confirmed by another of Eric burning a hearse in the desert on 23 July, the record is finally scheduled for October 21. Its themes – to which we will come – are deep and tangled, but its aesthetic is immediate and grotesque. Aside from the aforementioned clips, one widely-seen photo of Ghoste sees him looking like a corpse, adorned with pointed chrome grills, black lipstick and one milky contact lens.

Under normal circumstances, expanding that nightmarish vision would’ve entailed hooking up with Hollywood contacts only a short cab ride from Eric’s Los Angeles home. With the American film industry still mothballed thanks to COVID-19, however, a plan was hatched to undertake the 6,000-mile jaunt to the Czech Republic, where a no-nonsense anti-viral response has allowed them to return to some degree of normalcy.

The necessary production specialists, make-up artists, dancers and effects experts are on stand-by, he enthuses, to enact the “elevated” music video plans worked out for upcoming singles Hydrochloride and Lazaretto.

This potent evolution of aesthetic, Eric explains, is a reflection of his increasingly fucked-up sound, but even more so a rebellion against the scene that spawned him. The SoundCloud rap set, like so many others, has become streetwear-obsessed, with coveted brands like Supreme a sign of real credibility. “To me, it was always so oxymoronic and hypocritical,” he rails. “You come from this culture that’s supposed to say, ‘Fuck the establishment’ – idealistically, it’s the new punk – but then you’re sporting these brands that become things kids are made fun of for when they don’t have them. I’m not going to have a logo on me. I’m going high fashion. I don’t want to look like anybody else.”

So, is that what it means to be an ANTI-ICON?

“I feel like ‘icon’ is one of those terms that just gets thrown around in the internet age,” he replies. “There are no prerequisites anymore. To me, an icon is someone like Alice Cooper , Marilyn Manson or RuPaul. They’re people you’ll recognise from 10 miles away. You know what they look like. You know their voice. You could make an action figure out of them. Nowadays, it feels like the label is thrown on every random YouTuber, TikToker and internet personality.

“If that’s an icon, it’s not what I want to be.”

T his Ghoste story begins, properly, in Lake Worth, Florida: a small town in the Sunshine State’s suburban sprawl, about eight miles south of Palm Beach and 65 north of Miami. Eric’s memories of the place are still darkened by the long shadow of his father.

A phlebotomist who relocated from New York just before Eric was born, Whitney Snr. was injured in a car crash when his son was four years old and thereafter bound to his couch and cane for much of Eric’s youth. Frustrated, perhaps, by his own predicament (and a resultant opioid dependency), he became a controlling force in Eric’s life. The singer’s memories are understandably complicated, but he recalls this “tyrannical, helicopter parent” presence: a “big scary guy with massive hands, jabbing his fingers into my chest and telling me what to do” with incredible vividity.

Growing up in the town’s lower middle-class, Eric’s youth was unremarkable almost by design. Alternative interests were discouraged. The machismo of American football was forced down his throat. Any effort to dress up or act out was swiftly suppressed.

“I was very introverted,” Eric recalls, “very secluded and really didn’t have any friends. I was that kid in school who didn’t have the cool brands. By the time I reached my teenage years, there was this overwhelming urge to be anything that I’m not; to do anything but this; to go anywhere but here; to be around anyone but him .”

“It’s a lot more personal… I’m trying to come to terms with the type of person I am”

His father’s passing, when Eric was 17 years old, triggered an emotional landslide. “It was like shaking up a bottle of soda and opening the cap,” he shares. “I lost my mind.”

Life, however, has a way of dragging you back inside the box. Although earning a hefty annual salary at a business-to-business sales job he’d stumbled into after high school, the claustrophobic office cubicle did not represent the life of which he’d dreamed.

Hardcore punk was his first escape. Playing guitar in HXC outfit Nemesis and drums for sludge-metal collective Seven Serpents forged multi-instrumental skills and friendships that are still integral to his career today. He smiles. “It felt like a home to me.”

Interests in spirituality and Buddhism opened his mind, but it was the discovery of early 20th century Hermetic text The Kybalion (Eric half-subconsciously flicks back his hair to reveal the tattoo of its title across his forehead) that nudged him down a horizon-pushing rabbit hole.

“Although they’re religions, they’re really science-based,” Eric explains. “To me, astrophysics is the ultimate spirituality. If nothing else, it proves that we aren’t at the centre of the universe and there definitely is this bigger thing out there. It was my way of escaping into another realm.”

Getting best friend at the time – and Nemesis frontman – Sam Ogonuwe a job at his company could’ve been disastrous for Eric’s fledgling sales career. In the end, the pair’s endless “dicking around” kick-started another in rap.

Aside from a copy of Dr. Dre’s 1992 masterpiece The Chronic gifted by his father, Eric’s hip-hop exposure had to this point been non-existent. Sam’s collection of “golden age” records were revelatory. The loose-tongued creativity of acts like De La Soul, Hieroglyphics and Outkast captivated him. It was the discovery of the darker rhymes from Memphis overlords Three 6 Mafia and Miami’s Raider Klan (RVIDXR CLVN), however, with which he truly connected.

“I became obsessed,” Eric remembers. “Something I had to come to terms with is that darkness and heaviness I identify with isn’t necessarily synonymous with loudness. It’s a mood.”

Although metal and hardcore offered the energy and catharsis he craved, it was rap that offered unlimited, monomaniacal creative potential. “In a band,” he reasons, “you’re clashing with other people, trying to get your ideas across. In rap, everything is my idea. What I do is what I want to do. What I produce is what I produce. I had full and total control.”

The short-lived iLL BiZ persona (one which Eric recalls with the faintest cringe) offered a way in. The 2014 birth of Ghostemane and 2015 relocation seeking the more receptive Californian scene were the real turning points, however.

So what exactly gave him the push?

“Psychedelics were a huge part of it,” Eric replies with playful honesty. The track Ghostemane (a brooding, cosmic affair, far less rigidly defined than what had come before) saw chemical experimentation manifest musically. “It smacked me in the face: the realisation that this is what I really am. I could go down that road and just let loose.”

U nlike so many lost souls in the City Of Angels, Eric hit the ground running.

Caught up in the content-driven SoundCloud craze, his first years were punctuated by a slew of rapid-fire record releases and carefree collaborations. Industrial darkness and metallic edge were evident from the start, but it was only with 2017’s Hexada and 2018’s N / O / I / S / E that Ghoste really distanced himself from the pack, sounding at times, like a twist-lipped demon from the deep rap underground and, at others, uncannily like Nine Inch Nails .

After its unprecedented two-year gestation, ANTI-ICON marks another profound metamorphosis, with Ghoste drilling down into his psyche while driving towards new creative horizons.

A more complex stylistic blueprint is part of that delay. So, too, is an increased faith in the fanbase (“I used to have to keep up with the Joneses,” Eric admits, “now they’re conditioned to understand it’s worth the wait…”). Mostly, though, it’s a reflection of Eric’s white-knuckle coming to terms with holding onto himself in the jet-set whirlwind. “People think it’s this extravagant thing,” he fixes our eye, “and it is. I’m grateful. But it takes everything I have. It’s something I struggle with to maintain my sanity and not forget who I am.

“I’ve been through so much,” he breathes a loaded sigh. “It’s been the most transformative time in my life.”

“I took all that shit that was in me and projected it outward”

For those paying attention to the breadcrumbs dropped in the interim, the clues were there.

“Anti-music” noise-project GASM writhed with tortuous unease. The thumping electro of SWEARR pulsated with unbound euphoria. The raw black metal of Baader-Meinhof (a frosty part of Eric’s persona kept on a pedestal, away from his other creations) came across cuttingly. Ghostmane-branded 2019 hardcore EP Fear Network was a distillation of struggle, while its dark acoustic counterpart Opium captures the absolute emptiness of an artist’s lowest point.

ANTI-ICON is broader and deeper: a “moving target” far harder to pin down.

Just beneath the surface, Eric’s everyday fascinations fizzle. Near-future dystopian imagery (the obsession with which, Eric informs us, is psychiatrically symptomatic of overbearing parenting) feels discomfortingly 2020. Recurrent wordplay sees the titular Anti-Icon interchanged with that other AI: Artificial Intelligence. A fine line is walked, between open-mindedness and paranoia.

Dig a little deeper, though, and A-I sounds almost like a break-up album. Doubt turns into anger which bleeds through into despair. Tracks like schizo-rap showcase Sacrilege and the loopy Fed Up repeatedly lament ‘ fake love ’. The powerful Hydrochloride smashes its ‘ I DON’T LOVE YOU ANYMORE !’ mantra against a hydraulic industrial backdrop. Eric himself admits it’s “more personal… a lot more literal” than past disaster chronicles. “It’s a break-up letter from me to opiates.”

Addiction blindsided Eric – hard .

“It was something I thought couldn’t hit me,” he admits. “It was something for those guys, those people who have addictive personalities. But I found out that anyone who’s going through any kind of difficult time can be vulnerable. It started off as if it was the answer to everything. Eventually, I didn’t even feel high anymore. It was just something I needed to do to not feel sick.”

Several attempts to break the habit failed. Hitting the bottom came with a flash of clarity, though. Recognising the same behaviours in himself that had claimed his father (‘ I got your disease !’ gasps late-album highlight Calamity), he felt a jolt of disgust and real alarm. Eric frowns at the memory.

Despite his enduring NIN fandom, A-I is not a chronicle of that downward spiral, but of the route crawled back. Even the most morbid imagery is representative of ending the old self and birthing the new. The burning hearse symbolises the ashes of the N / O / I / S / E-era. The morgue-orgy is, er, more perversely abstract…

“In hermeticism,” Eric explains, “the ultimate outcome of the ultimate equation is breaking [base material] down and being able to reform it. The phoenix rises from the ashes. For me, it was about breaking my old self down, killing it, rising from the ruins, and becoming this new person: this healthier mind.”

Toxic substances tend to be accompanied by poisonous people. New forces for good became catalysts for the reaction. He credits his DJ Parv0, who went through similar struggles years before, as a guiding force. Producer and engineer Arthur Rizk was the one who turned up at his home to finish the record and drag him out of a slump. Perhaps most pivotal of all has been fellow musician – and K! magazine cover star – Poppy .

Eric cracks a bashful smile when we mention her name. The couple reportedly first met on the Lock Up stage at last year’s Reading & Leeds festivals and announced their engagement on July 10. Sporting jet-black hair to match her beau’s, she’s here directing this trip’s videos, too.

“She’s amazing,” Eric begins. “As a visual artist, she’s just unmatched. That’s the one area of my career which I was never really able to fully realise myself. It’s a weird feeling putting a piece of myself into her hands like this, and waiting to see how it unfolds. But I’m excited.

“She’s an awesome partner. It’s the opposite of a toxic relationship.”

L ike Poppy, Eric stands at the very cutting-edge: a new breed of performer with the future of heavy music in his hands. As our conversation winds to a close outside the city’s massive Invalidovna building – a centuries-old war dormitory converted, today, into a bustling video set – he ponders that power, potential and deep responsibility.

“Defining rock music these days is kinda like tip-toeing,” he reckons. “I tend to say ‘guitar music’ more often. Is there a lack of danger in modern rock, compared to rap? Sometimes. But the feeling of inauthenticity is more about the lack of intent.

“I think that modern rock – and pop, any kind of mainstream music – is holding back massively. There isn’t one truly sad, or angry song on the radio anymore. I think there should be more intent to actually connect with people: the broken, the lost, the sad, the angry, the psychotic. For me, that’s the biggest difference from the old days.”

Despite that old ethos, ANTI-ICON is very much the sound of here and now. Rap remains a major part of the Ghostemane formula – the alternation between high-pitched yelps, nasal drawl and throaty gurgles suggesting multiple demons trapped in one body – but ANTI-ICON is not simply a rap album. There is something distinctly nu-metal about the combination of quick rhymes and down-tuned guitars on Lazaretto. The dynamic blend of hardcore, oppressive electronics and apparitional ambience on Sacrilege shares much with Underneath -era Code Orange . The thrusting beat of ASMR (Anti-Social Masochistic Rage) evokes the same squalid sex as peak Marilyn Manson. As a consequence, when Ghoste does throw himself into the old-school southern “phonk” sound on Hellrap (the album’s last rhymed verses, four tracks from the end), it lands with no tongue-knotted fatigue, and real conviction.

For Eric, these more shapeshifting sonics – much like the increasingly ghoulish aesthetic – are emblematic, not of a descent into darkness, but of a growing confidence in himself: a mastery of turning festering feelings into something positive. Daringly, even ANTI-ICON’s most desolate moment Melancholic concludes on a hopeful note: ‘ I deserve to be happy, don’t you think ?’

A flash of contentment. “It feels so much better now, like I’ve taken all that shit that was in me and I’m projecting it outwards. I feel like now I can wear it on me without having to keep it inside.”

Eric loathes any kind of evangelism – declaring to hate “LaVeyan Satanism just as much as Christianity” – but it’s a path which he prays peers will follow down. “I hope [any success I have] might entice other artists to maybe push the envelope rather than worrying about what’s going to pop the hardest on TikTok or whatever,” he says. “If they’re from a subculture or from heavy music, maybe they should put [those heavy feelings] first and see where it goes.”

Picking out the artists he considers true peers – Ho99o9 , Author & Punisher, Full Of Hell , Youth Code , 3TEETH – there’s clear admiration for performers willing to brave ridicule by stepping out of the box. Boston hardcore trailblazers Vein (now known as Vein.FM ) get a special mention: “They’re experiencing what it’s like to start experimenting and seeing how people in their scene turn their backs on them. I know what that’s like, too. The fact they keep doing it and going harder on it is amazing to me.”

Ultimately, though, his number one priority will always be his fans.

‘ Don't give a damn about a critic, they don't really get it ,’ declares seething lead single AI. ‘ They don't make a difference, they don't buy the tickets, ah / Only really give a damn about the kids / Live and die for the kids …’

Whether that’s the 15-year old coveting a $300 Supreme hoody who comes to realise self-made attire is “high-art, priceless”, the suffocated suburbanite building courage to skip town, or anyone else needing dragged out of the same cycles of depression, addiction and self-destruction from which Eric himself has emerged, the alchemical lesson is ultimately the same.

“As dark and depressing and nihilistic as this music sounds, it’s actually super-hopeful. Nothing is the death of you. You’re this ever-morphing, ever-changing, ever-expanding thing. Life might feel like it’s crushing you, but all it’s doing is creating the new ingredients for you to recreate yourself as something better. When a supernova explodes, it creates new stars. Energy is eternal. You’ve gotta say, ‘Gimme what you you got!’, take it, make art out of it, and be better for it.

“Then move on to the next thing.”

ANTI-ICON is released on October 21.

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Ghostemane premieres dark, gnarly new video for FED UP

ANTI-ICON lives on as Ghostemane shares a typically striking new video for FED UP…

Ghostemane on what comes next: "It’s only going to get more untamed and unrestrained…"

Eric Whitney discusses the future of Ghostemane, as well as his black-metal side-project Baader-Meinhof.

Ghostemane: “I’m turning myself inside out: taking all the things that I’m feeling and wearing them on my body”

As Kerrang! catch up with heavy music’s biggest names to reflect on the suffocating stasis of 2020, we settle in for the long dark winter with Eric Whitney, who you might know by his trap-metal alter-ego Ghostemane. Here, Eric looks back over a year of personal and professional tribulation and triumph…

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Florida singer/rapper who crafts a nightmarish blend of heavy metal, industrial, hardcore, and hip-hop.

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Eric Whitney (born 15 April 1991),[2] known professionally as Ghostemane is an American artist from Lake Worth, Florida. Growing up in Florida, Whitney was originally…

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Eric Whitney (born 15 April 1991),[2] known professionally as Ghostemane is an American artist from Lake Worth, Florida.

Growing up in Florida, Whitney was originally a guitar player for hardcore and doom metal bands.[3] Whitney moved to Los Angeles, California after starting his career as a rapper eventually finding success in the underground.

Eric Whitney was born 15 April 1991 in Lake Worth, Florida to parents from New York. Whitney grew up in West Palm Beach, Florida. As a teenager, he was in several bands and played the guitar which introduced him to music. He also played football whilst in High School, saying he was practically forced to by his father, who died when Whitney was seventeen.

Whitney was introduced to rap music when he was the guitarist in the hardcore punk band Nemesis and a bandmate introduced him to Memphis rap.

Whitney graduated from university after studying astrophysics and was eventually employed in a position earning $65,000 annually.In 2015, Whitney moved to Los Angeles, California due to his music not thriving in Southern Florida, giving up his employment at the same time. Meeting up with JGRXXN, Whitney joined his collective Schemaposse which included artists such as the now-deceased Lil Peep and Craig Xen.

In April 2016, Schemaposse disbanded leaving Whitney not associated with any group. Whitney eventually began to associate with the popular underground group $uicideboy$ and fellow Florida rapper Pouya. Pouya released the video for “1000 Rounds” with Ghostemane in April 2017.The video quickly went viral and as of May 2018, has nearly 9 million views.

In 2018 Whitney released his 10th album, “N / O / I / S / E” (No One Is Safe from Evil). The album has a very dark and aggressive style and it deals a lot with self-harm, self-mutilation, agoraphobia, and many other issues Ghostemane has dealt with personally. N / O / I / S / E was released by surprise on 10th October 2018, as it was supposed to drop on 17th October of the same year. Read more on Last.fm . User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.

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Ghostemane Biography (Age, Girlfriend & More)

Ghostemane Biography (Age, Height, Weight, Girlfriend, Family, Career & More)

Ghostemane, born Eric Whitney, is an American rapper and singer, best known for his 2018 album ‘N/O/I/S/E.’ He was reared in West Palm Beach, Florida, while being born in Lake Worth, Florida. Since he was a little child, he has been passionate about music. As a youngster, he was a major lover of hardcore punk.

At around the same time, he started learning how to play the guitar. He played the guitar in various bands throughout his adolescence, including “Nemesis” and “Seven Serpents.” One of his bandmates from “Nemesis” introduced him to rap music.

Ghostemane fell in love with Memphis Rap after discovering it. He began working a successful day job after receiving his astrophysics degree. But he quit his job in 2015 to pursue a musical career. Later, he relocated to Los Angeles. He started collaborating with creatives who shared his values in 2016, like Pouya and “Suicideboys.”

The song “1000 Rounds,” which Pouya and Ghostemane collaborated on, became popular and had over 16 million views on YouTube. He released his first album, “N/O/I/S/E,” in 2018, and it quickly rose to underground fame. With a number of mixtapes and EPs, Ghostemane has also gained a great deal of recognition in the underground music community.

Personal Details

Physical appearance, personal life (family, friends, girlfriends, children), early life:.

Eric Whitney, the father of Ghostemane, was born on April 15, 1991 in Lake Worth, Florida. Just one year prior to Eric’s birth, his parents made the move from New York to Florida. His father was a phlebotomist at work. Eric had an older brother. The family relocated to a new home in the Florida neighbourhood of West Palm Beach not long after he was born. Eric has excelled in the classroom ever since he was a young child. He always received excellent grades in school. Additionally, he played football for almost his entire childhood.

Additionally, he was a die-hard music fan. When he was younger, he was a hardcore punk rock fan. Additionally, he developed a passion for music and started going to guitar classics.

He had wanted to be a musician since he was a teenager. But in some way, having a strict father prevented him from working harder to achieve his goals. After the death of his father, this changed. At the time, Eric was 17 years old. He was deeply saddened by his father’s death but also gained a lot of confidence to do whatever he wanted to do in life. His father “forced” him to play football in high school. Eric was afterward “mandated” to enlist in the “US Marines.” Eric’s dreams, however, were elsewhere. He read extensively in the sciences, philosophy, and the occult. Ghostemane had also developed a strong interest in the doom metal musical subgenre by the time he was in his mid-teens.

He attended college to study astrophysics after graduating from high school with a strong GPA. He nevertheless continued to perform with numerous doom metal groups, including “Nemesis” and “Seven Serpents.” Eric began concentrating on generating income after finishing his college education. He began working in a call center. Later, he was hired for a prominent position. He tried to stop listening to music, but he was unable to do so.

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Ghostemane first encountered rap music when he joined the hardcore group “Nemesis” after graduating from high school. Before that, he had listened to alternative rock and punk music made popular by groups like “Green Day” and “Lagwagon.” He started listening to rappers like “Three 6 Mafia” after learning about rap music, and this influenced his future musical endeavors.

For fun, he and the other members of his band, “Nemesis,” recorded a rap song. Rap, however, gave him more creative freedom than rock music, so he became addicted to it. The other members of his band had little interest in rap music. As a result, Ghostemane studied ‘Photoshop’ and video editing in order to produce his own album covers and music videos.

He distributed a number of mixtapes and EPs online. In 2014, he released his debut mixtape, “Blunts n’ Brass Monkey.” Ghostemane went by the stage name “ill Biz” at that time. He released another mixtape that year called “Taboo.” In Florida, Ghostemane published a lot of singles on “SoundCloud” while holding down a day job.

By that point, he had established a small but growing fan base. But he was aware that his hometown lacked any opportunities for the genre of music he was interested in creating. In 2015, he made the bold decision to relocate to Los Angeles.

Ghostemane launched his first EP, “Ghost Tales,” in 2015 and then released other EPs, including “Dogma” and “Kreep.” He also published his first album, “Oogabooga,” in the same year. His music genre was one factor in the enormous underground popularity he had. His songs gained popularity with like-minded listeners because they often touched on gloomy subjects including sadness, occultism, nihilism, and death.

He quit his work and began creating music full-time in 2015 when he felt that his music career was progressing at a respectable rate. He joined the rap group “Schemaposse,” which also comprised the late artist Lil Peep and Craig Xen, shortly after meeting JGRXXN in Los Angeles.

The group “Schemaposse” split up in April 2016. Ghostemane was once again alone himself and had no rap group to support him. Nevertheless, he kept trying and eventually connected with rappers like Pouya and “Suicideboys” and started working with them.

The song “1000 Rounds” by Pouya and Ghostemane was released in April 2017. Soon after its “YouTube” debut, it became viral and had more than a million views. The pair also said that a mixtape they collaborated on will be out in May 2018. In October 2018, Ghostemane and rapper Zubin collaborated on the song “Broken.”

The same year, Ghostemane released his album “N/O/I/S/E,” which notably referenced “Nine Inch Nails” and Marilyn Manson. Numerous tracks from “N/O/I/S/E” were also inspired by “Metallica,” a renowned heavy metal band.

As a result of Ghostemane’s lyrics being so extensively influenced by philosophy and the sciences, many of his ardent followers have been known to study literature on these subjects in order to comprehend every allusion they come across in his songs. He had been dating another artist by the name of Ivy Suicide. However, he accused his partner of domestic abuse in April 2019. She was the target of a restraining order that was also in Ghostamane’s favor.

• He was born in Lake Worth, Florida, on April 15, 1991.
• Eric Whitney is his real name.
• When Whitney was seventeen, his father passed away.
• While he was in high school, he participated in football.
• At the age of 14, he started playing guitar covers of well-known musicians to break into the music business.
• He draws inspiration from Southern rap acts like Outkast and Three 6 Mafia.

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Ghostemane Biography Facts

Ghostemane has been appeared in channels as follow: GHOSTEMANE.

Born 15 April, 1991 (33 years old).

What is the zodiac sign of Ghostemane ? According to the birthday of Ghostemane the astrological sign is Aries .

Career of the Ghostemane started in 2010 .

Ghostemane Wiki

American artist

Eric Whitney , professionally known as Ghostemane or alternatively as Baader-Meinhof, Swearr, Limsa Lominsa or GASM, is an American rapper, singer, and songwriter. Originally growing up in Florida, Ghostemane started out playing in local hardcore punk and doom metal bands. He moved to Los Angeles, California after starting his career as a rapper.

Ghostemane's merging of trap and metal gained him popularity on SoundCloud. In 2018, Ghostemane released his seventh studio album, N/O/I/S/E, which was highly anticipated in the underground music scene due to its heavy influence from industrial and nu metal groups.

Eric Whitney was born on April 15, 1991 in Lake Worth, Florida to parents from New York. Whitney grew up in West Palm Beach, Florida. As a teenager, he was mainly interested in hardcore punk music. He learned to play the guitar and performed in several bands, including Nemesis and Seven Serpents. He also played football while he was in high school, saying he was practically forced to by his father, who died when Whitney was seventeen.

Whitney was introduced to rap music when he was the guitarist in the hardcore punk band Nemesis and a band mate introduced him to Memphis rap.

Prior to his musical career, Whitney worked in several B2B sales positions. In 2015, Whitney moved to Los Angeles, California due to his not musically thriving in Southern Florida. He also gave up his employment. Meeting up with JGRXXN, Whitney joined his collective Schemaposse, which included artists such as Craig Xen and Lil Peep.

In April 2016, after just 1 year with the group, Whitney left Schemaposse. He subsequently released his self-produced album "Blackmage" and his first cinematic music video with his single "John Dee". Whitney eventually began to associate with fellow Florida rapper Pouya. Pouya released the video for "1000 Rounds" with Ghostemane in April 2017. The video quickly went viral and as of August 2020, has over 24 million views.

In 2018, Whitney saw greater success when art collective TRASH GANG created and released their 1930s cartoon edit music video for his song Mercury: Retrograde. The video has since climbed to over 279 million views, making his most well known single.

In October 2018 he teamed up with Zubin to release a track titled Broken. Also in 2018, he released his seventh studio album, N/O/I/S/E, in which many of the songs are influenced by industrial metal, nu metal, Metallica, Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails. In May 2020, he unveiled his latest project, a lo-fi black metal band called Baader-Meinhof, of which he is the sole member . Ghostemane is also the sole producer of his fiancée Poppy's Christmas EP A Very Poppy Christmas released in December 2020.

Lyrically, Ghostemane's themes focus around occultism, depression, nihilism, and death. He started his career as a musician playing guitar in hardcore punk bands, and drums in doom metal bands. He has stated that his biggest influence is black metal band Bathory. He spent most of his teenage years listening to extreme metal bands such as Deicide, Death, Carcass and Mayhem. In terms of rap music, Ghostemane is influenced by Southern rap groups such as Outkast and Three 6 Mafia. He has also gone on to cite Midwest rap group Bone Thugs-N-Harmony as an early influence.

Personal life

In October 2019, Ghostemane began dating musician and YouTuber Poppy. In July 2020, Poppy announced on social media that the two were engaged.

Ghostemane Personal Life

Ghostemane career.

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Age, Biography and Wiki

Ghostemane (Eric Whitney) was born on 15 April, 1991 in Lake Worth, Florida, United States, is an American artist. Discover Ghostemane's Biography, Age, Height, Physical Stats, Dating/Affairs, Family and career updates. Learn How rich is He in this year and how He spends money? Also learn how He earned most of networth at the age of 33 years old?

We recommend you to check the complete list of Famous People born on 15 April. He is a member of famous Artist with the age 33 years old group.

Ghostemane Height, Weight & Measurements

At 33 years old, Ghostemane height not available right now. We will update Ghostemane's Height, weight, Body Measurements, Eye Color, Hair Color, Shoe & Dress size soon as possible.

Dating & Relationship status

He is currently single. He is not dating anyone. We don't have much information about He's past relationship and any previous engaged. According to our Database, He has no children.

Ghostemane Net Worth

His net worth has been growing significantly in 2022-2023. So, how much is Ghostemane worth at the age of 33 years old? Ghostemane’s income source is mostly from being a successful Artist. He is from United States. We have estimated Ghostemane's net worth , money, salary, income, and assets.

Ghostemane Social Network

Ghostemane's merging of rap and metal gained him popularity on SoundCloud. In 2018 Ghostemane released his seventh studio album, N/O/I/S/E, which was highly anticipated in the underground music scene due to its heavy influence from industrial and nu metal groups.

In May 2018, Pouya announced that he had a mixtape with Ghostemane in production.

In October 2018 he teamed up with Zubin to release a track titled Broken. Also in 2018, he released his seventh studio album, N/O/I/S/E, in which many of the songs are influenced by industrial metal, nu metal, Metallica, and even Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails. In May 2020, he unveiled his latest project, a lo-fi black metal band called Baader-Meinhof, of which he is the sole member (credited as Eric Goste).

In April 2016, Schemaposse disbanded leaving Whitney not associated with any group. Whitney eventually began to associate with fellow Florida rapper Pouya. Pouya released the video for "1000 Rounds" with Ghostemane in April 2017. The video quickly went viral and as of May 2020, has nearly 23 million views.

Prior to his musical career, Whitney was earning $65,000 annually in a B2B sales position. In 2015, Whitney moved to Los Angeles, California due to his music not thriving in Southern Florida, giving up his employment at the same time. Meeting up with JGRXXN, Whitney joined his collective Schemaposse which included artists such as Craig Xen and the now-deceased Lil Peep.

Eric Whitney (born April 15, 1991), professionally known as Ghostemane or alternatively as Baader-Meinhof, Swearr, or GASM, is an American rapper, singer, and songwriter. Originally growing up in Florida, Ghostemane started out playing in local hardcore punk and doom metal bands. He moved to Los Angeles, California after starting his career as a rapper.

Eric Whitney was born on April 15, 1991 in Lake Worth, Florida to parents from New York. Whitney grew up in West Palm Beach, Florida. As a teenager, he was mainly interested in hardcore punk music, he learned to play the guitar and performed in several bands, including Nemesis and Seven Serpents. He also played football while he was in high school, saying he was practically forced to by his father, who died when Whitney was seventeen.

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