SONNY (f.k.a. HateSonny) has emerged at the forefront of Chicago’s underground hip-hop scene as a prolific and unstoppable force to be reckoned with. After quietly dropping hundreds of singles online, all it took was one viral TikTok to spark a meteoric rise—forcing him to seize the moment with a flurry of mixtapes, albums, and at least one compilation that have refused to let the hype around him die down.
As a teenager, SONNY became fast friends with fellow rapper NombreKari and was still in high school when he joined the collective Kari had founded: HL, which had started as a dance group but had expanded to accommodate the aspirations of its members, be they artists or producers. It also created a tightly knit community amongst SONNY and his friends that allowed them to support each other in ways that went beyond their shared love and pursuit of art. Another source of reinforcement—both as a kid and as an adult—has been his grandma.
“The most important person to me within the scheme of my life as a person especially my artistry would have to be my grandmother,” SONNY explained via email. “When I first started working on the last project I would go to her crib once a week to play piano with her trying to learn music theory and approach music differently as a whole. She used to teach music a long time ago and had a lot of knowledge to give so I really wanted to learn what I could from her in that time and I hold those moments really close to me.”
A few years before he met Kari, SONNY had started amassing a large collection of songs online, putting out hundreds of tracks into the digital ether. His first mixtape arrived in 2020 as Golden Child, an 11-track showcase of his suave swagger and the energizing cuts of rolling bass he syncs them to. The sludgy beat of “MOVE 2” includes an appearance from the lushly-voiced Dreamer Isioma—he returned the favor with a feature on Isioma’s Sensitive EP and SONNY has since opened for them as well.
“Kill Bill,” one of the mixtape’s ferocious downtempo bangers, resurfaced a year later on TikTok. The only problem was the viral version, an unofficial sped-up remix of the track that contorted its original sound. After a brief scrambling, SONNY sent out a new edit titled “Kill Bill (Fast)” that earned over a million streams on its first day. The success of the new version put him in touch with numerous labels. Still, he decided to remain unsigned, keeping to self-releasing instead, and he worked with Fashionably Early to distribute a self-titled compilation that arrived in 2022.
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In the last two years, SONNY has dropped the two most consequential albums of his rise so far with A.G.N.B. (2023) and ‘Til Death Do We Ball (2024). Released within a little over a year of each other, they comprise the very best of what he has to offer—yet it’s the latter that stands out as a kind of reintroduction. With bars as slick as the samples he throws them over, he processes grief with a fierce outflow of life-affirming introspection, sly humor, and razor-sharp honesty as he invites friends old and new (NombreKari and Dreamer Isioma return) to partake in the start of a new chapter of his career.
“While I was working on this last project I was navigating a lot of grief and wanted to find a way to express all the different emotions I was feeling while not making it sad in nature,” SONNY shared. “I think I said the phrase til death do we ball one day to like find light in the idea of people passing on given that a lot of folks in my life that passed away have been super adamant about not wanting people to be super sad or anything after they’re gon, and instead carry their energy forward. so I wanted to say in short that life isn’t promised and while we here fuck it we ball type thing. It was also like me shedding skin in a way because I know what kind of music I want to make going forward and wanted to ease my listeners into what’s to come in the future.”
Not one to slow down, SONNY told us he’s got a few projects cooking, expressing excitement and a renewed commitment to honing his craft with every new release. Given just how much he’s already blown up, it’s safe to say he plans to make his next moment in the spotlight one he’s orchestrated for himself and not left up to chance—and that moment doesn’t feel very far off. If you should find yourself in Chicago next month, get yourself a ticket to End of Summer Fest at Chop Shop where he’ll be taking the stage with several raw talents and fellow artists cutting their teeth in their hometown.
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Words: Steven Ward
Visit SONNY on his Instagram to stay updated on new releases and tour announcements.
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