his time last year, Ashton Nicole Casey–better known by her stage name, Ashnikko–was living in London, spending her weekends partying in Spain, and certainly not expecting that soon, her furious, fed-up anthems and spitfire style would catapult her into international alt-pop fame. But along with the pandemic, the lockdowns and the isolation came a sustained burst of online virality that ballooned her cult following into an audience of millions. “It’s been a whirlwind. It’s been a wild, wild year,” she tells me. “But I’m feeling good.” She’s fresh off the release of her fiery first mixtape, Demidevil, a much-anticipated follow-up to the irresistible viral hits that propelled her to cyber-stardom. You might not know her face, but if you’ve been on the internet this year, you’ve probably heard her music: after being the subject of mega-viral TikTok trends, her addictive tracks “STUPID” and “Daisy” have racked up 113 million and 163 million Spotify streams, respectively.
furious delivery and unabashed anger, Ashnikko has created a body of work that makes teenage girls feel like they’re finally on top. No matter who you are, listening to Ashnikko’s anthems makes you feel like you’re one of her man-slaying, boundary-pushing heroines. Her success on TikTok, a lip-syncing app, makes perfect sense. When girls make videos to her songs, her words are literally coming out of their mouths – and who wouldn’t want to be Ashnikko? Aesthetically, Ashnikko is a shapeshifter. The only thing that unifies her many personas, costumes and characters – aside from a head of bright blue hair – is the fact that each of them is startlingly, eye-poppingly unique. From video to video, she’s a CGI’d Y2K Vocaloid, a latex-clad BDSM bumblebee, a sexed-up serial killer, a 40-foot-tall tentacled kraken, a tuxedoed boss jacking off into the camera, and more. Her wildly chaotic creative style might seem random, but her work is defined by the subversion of power. Whether she’s an animated streetfighter, a posse of identical Ashnikko-burglars, or a bluehaired giantess, she always holds all the cards. And this isn’t just onscreen, either. “I have creative collaborators, of course, but I’m the boss,” she laughs. “I’m a micromanager of everything in regards to my image,
HATING POP MUSIC DOESN' T MAKE YOU “ COOL, IT MAKES YOU AN ASSHOLE” “STUPID”, her first TikTok hit, has over two million videos attributed to the sound. Unlike many of the songs that go viral on TikTok, it wasn’t linked to a viral dance or specific trend: instead, the clip of Ashnikko cackling while taunting the stupid boys of the world permeated practically every genre the app had to offer. Cosplayers used the sound to dress up like sexy, uncanny-valley anime characters, makeup gurus played it while transforming into bright-blue demons or crystal-studded moon goddesses, and thousands upon thousands of users used the song to soundtrack their complaints about their shitty, stupid ex-boyfriends. The clip even inspired countless videos of people dying their hair neon to the sound of Ashnikko’s raspy voice moaning Wet! Wet! Wet! Wet! “Daisy” had a similar impact, with hundreds of thousands of girls using the song to pantomime cathartic revenge fantasies about curb-stomping abusers and making terrible men pay. While both songs have been used countless times and in countless ways, one theme unites everything they inspired: the girls in those videos all look and feel really fucking good. With her eye-popping, candy-coloured persona,
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which is a lot of work, but I don’t trust anyone else to do it.” Her carefully crafted persona has a wry, tongue-in-cheek humour that undercuts her every move. It would be easy for 100 million streams to go to anyone’s head, but what sticks out the most when talking to Ashnikko is her dogged dedication to not taking her fame, or herself, too seriously. “Everybody shits,” she says matter-of-factly, shrugging off a question about her burgeoning role-model status. “Everyone is flawed, and I’m no exception. It’s important to me that my music doesn’t come across as preachy.” Her online persona reflects this anti-elitist mentality as she maintains an irreverent digital presence. She posts skits on her YouTube channel, shitposting on Twitter (“pooping is honestly the best part of my day I swear to god,” reads one particularly iconic tweet), and putting out Instagram posts to her 900k followers that read like Snapchats from your weirdest, funniest friend. Ashnikko is relentlessly self-aware. “I’m never gonna sit here and be like, ‘I’m trying to inspire the masses,’” she drawls, her eye roll palpable. “I feel like a lot of artists sit atop a perfect flawless pedestal, which is an impossible standard. It’s not very healthy for anyone, to send out that these people are perfect.” She’s on a one-woman mission to not give a shit what anyone thinks of her.