96 on Getting Here
Photography by Ilhaan Dahir, 2019
When 96 moved back to Toronto, he was uncertain about what was going to happen next. After a decade-long stint in Calgary, he was moving back to the city to reconnect with old friends and finally pursue music in the way that he wanted to. But nothing felt certain. He was moving into his friend (and producer) Cy’s apartment on Church and Dundas, who he knew from his time in Calgary. Still, he was anxious. Nothing felt permanent. Nothing felt sure. He wasn’t even 100% certain what was going to happen with the music. On the day he moved in, he saw a makeshift studio set up in the apartment. “When I saw that” he says, smiling. “It was the first time I felt like yeah, things are gonna be okay, you know”.
By the time I meet 96, born Ibrahim Ahmed, he’s already standing on 2 solid EP releases. Since he dropped GOIN96HOST, the 23-year old has been pushing his music and his pen almost nonstop. Recorded at a studio in Calgary, the 7-track project is 96’s introduction to the world. The lyrics take the listener on a journey through codeine nights (‘2018’), being away from home, growing into adulthood (21), and fighting against vulnerability or trusting anyone close. There are moments on the project where his more sincere emotions seem to be bubbling at the surface. Those moments fight, on almost every track, with what feels like a desire to be read as hard and working through the pain.
Sonically, its’s a project heavily influenced by those who came before, namely House of Balloons era Abel and nostalgic RnB. Lonely Nights in Toronto, one of the leading tracks, sounds like a late night drive on the 401. As we’re talking about the track, 96 laughs “wanna hear a funny story?”. He starts to tell me about how he initially tried to get the track off the ground, past just his peers and immediate fanbase. “I actually DM’ed NBA player Brandon Jennings. He’s cool, he’s a like a music dude, like he just fucks with good music.” In an Instagram DM, 96 sent the former Milwaukee Bucks player a link to his track, which helped it pick up speed.
In making GOIN96HOST, he spent a lot of time inside, dealing with himself. “I was always out of site on that project, introverted, smoking a lot” he tells me. Anxiety and a desire to remain behind the curtain, until recently, have played a huge part in his development as an artist and a writer. That kind of introspection is palpable on songs like ‘U THINK’ and ‘4:15’. On a tape which is the product of a lot of late nights, the lyrics about women, working hard, being uncertain all feel like a moment in 96’s head.
It’s that yard-studio in his current apartment that helped bring 96 to the point where he is now. When I meet up with him in St Clair West, he’s kind and quiet, but not at all standoffish. On the couch inside a coffee shop, we get to talking about how we ended up where we are in this moment. I ask him where he grew up. “I was born in Toronto” he explains. “Grew up in Regent with my family and then I moved to East Calgary for high school”. Regent Park in the early 2000s had a much different imprint in Toronto than it does now. Government has painted the neighbourhood as a ‘failed public housing experiment’, while media has largely focused on the gentrification of the neighbourhood that displaced many old residents, affected access to public housing and changed the face of Regent Park. 96’s childhood memories of the neighbourhood float between the crime that was present, and the vibrant community that existed between local residents. When we get to talking about schooling, he zeroes in on one facet: the afterschool programmes. “They really got me into writing and music over there” he explains. “Those programmes really started me off getting into jazz, Duke Ellington, poetry. All that”.
The move from the heart of Toronto to East Calgary was uncomfortable, to say the least. As community conflict in Regent seemed to be on the uptick in the mid-2000s, 96’s parents decided to move him and his 6 siblings out of Toronto and into East Calgary. Moving to the cities more industrial ends, was a big culture shock to the artist. The lack of community and things to do after school made a distinct impact on his ability to get comfortable. It was during his time in Calgary that the most recent uptick in gun violence in Toronto took place. In June of 2018, Toronto lost Regent-raised rapper Smoke Dawg, who grew up in the neighbourhood alongside 96 as childhood friends.
When he graduated from high school, he wasn’t sure where he was going to go. “I wasn’t into doing the higher education thing” he explains. “I was fearful of student loans and getting caught up in the system.” While he tried to figure it out, his manager and friend Smurf helped him get started pushing his pen and making music. When Calgary felt to small, he made the decision to move back to the city he first called home.
GOIN96HOST 2 feels like the natural follow-up to the first drop. In the interim between the two albums, 96 had lost childhood friends to violence, had a major lung surgery and broke up with his girl. The new project puts a different side of 96 on display, where he opens up and talks about what it feels like to love and to lose. “On the first album, I really was like…I didn’t wanna sound soft” he says, leaning back into the couch. “But on this album, I really wanted to be more vulnerable”. ‘Comedowns’, the opening track was written on the comedown from a Indica high. On the dark intro track, 96 sings “there ain’t much out here for me, girl/unless you got something to show me girl”.
“The new project puts a different side of 96 on display, where he opens up and talks about what it feels like to love and to lose.”
At the same time, the lyrical cadences and soundscape in the music is reminiscent of back when Toronto first started making waves in the music industry. The samples (like Tamia’s ‘So Into You’ and SVW’s ‘Use Your Heart’) make the music feel nostalgic, caught somewhere between the best parts of 1991 and 2010. On both ‘Time’ and ‘brand nu benz’ (which follow each other), the project gets deeper and feels more introspective. On ‘brand nu benz’, 96 sings “can’t stop now cause I’m in too deep/these feelings when you’re around me/tried to tell you girl but I couldn’t/you got everything that I want in a woman”. Tracks like ‘Wifey’ (the lead single) are more upbeat, but keep the same transient, sleepy summer vibe as many of his other songs. In keeping with the early-2000s feel, the album is peppered with skits and voice overs: weaving the project together like a story.
When new artists make it big, the media likes to talk about the overnight success that people on the internet are afforded. The popular narrative is that you can put a song up online and it’ll get streamed into the Hot100 immediately. For every one artist that gets that opportunity, there are thousands of others still grinding to be heard. 96 is still at the stage where the grind is important. For most of the recording process of GOIN96HOST 2, he worked at West Jet, 6 days a week most weeks. Still, he’s working a job that keeps him on call for longer than anyone who needs to work at their craft would like. “Sometimes I don’t even know what day it is” he says. “I work like every day, they kind of all become one.”
The growth between where 96 started and where he is now can be heard in the music. He’s been performing more, playing at showcases in the city, Boston and Calgary. At his last performance at The Shop in Parkdale, 96 performed his most confident set yet. Packed tightly inside the small space, the audience watched as he took the stage and performed three of his songs, from each section of his musical journey. As one of a handful of line-ups on the stage, 96 had 15 minutes to make a crowd of first-time listeners appreciate him. At the end of the performance, in different parts of the crowd, people drummed for an encore on the countertops.
When he talks about music, he seems infinitely more relaxed than when he talks about any other subject. We talk about his song Time, and how it’s firmly positioned in the top 5 on my apple music most listened to. There’s something about Toronto wintertime that makes RnB (and a song like ‘Time’) feel different in this city. Smooth samples, soft vocals and lyrics about wanting to be close are the special soundtrack to the city this time of the year. On the way out, 96 asks me if I’ve ever noticed how music coming out of Toronto always seems to fit the season.
You can follow 96 here.
