wdyd - what do you do?

artist spotlight - 9lives

what are they doing?

what is attributing to 9lives’ recent buzz?

1. Building Community

Meaningful relationships are deep-rooted in 9lives’ brand. Whether it’s showing a different side to himself in content and interviews or responding to fans’ comments, 9lives makes it a priority to build real, authentic relationships.

This can be seen with his Discord, boasting nearly 2,500 members. Discord is known as one of the premiere platforms to build community. Within it, you can find channels for live-stream movie nights with fans, exclusive music snippets, fan-only streams, and more. This all deepens his relationships with fans, something more than a fan-parasocial relationship.

Additionally, you can find 9lives streaming him making beats on Twitch, another platform that creates loyal fanbases.

2. Thoughtful Collaborations

Being a producer has helped leverage 9lives’ career as an artist to new heights, getting him into rooms that it may be more difficult to get into if he were only an artist.

Some of his notable collaborators are:

• Odetari

• Kanii

• Skaiwater

• midwxst

• Lil Nas X

• Trippie Redd

• Bear1Boss

• Lumi Athena

3. Content

From participating in trends, duetting with other creators and fans, previewing music, or just showing a day in his life, 9lives exemplifies the idea of creating content at scale, which ultimately goes back into building community. Be sure to check out his TikTok.

4. Major Fortnite Placement

On January 30th, Fortnite, the über-popular videogame amongst gen-z, released the official in-game dance for his viral hit “Go (Xtayalive2)” with Kanii. The song picked up a popular dance that became a popular dance on TikTok, leading to Fortnite picking up the song for their game.

community highlights

wdyd playlist

tiktok interview

@trwlsh

I ran into @9lives in NYC… #whatdoyoudoforaliving #9lives #musician

tyler’s take