Shanin Blake

Submission 192

Overview

Shanin Blake or Sunshine999 is a musician, influencer and OnlyFans model who gained a significant following throughout the 2020s. Blake is known for her hippy, naturalist aesthetic and lyrical content. Throughout 2022 and 2023, some TikTokers have accused Blake of culturally appropriating Black and indigenous culture with her dreadlocks and her manner of singing and rapping, sparking online debates.

Online History

Shanin Blake posted her first song, "Bag of Hammers," to her YouTube^[1] page on April 21st, 2013, garnering over 109,000 views in 10 years (shown below, left). She posted her second video to YouTube^[2] on March 12th, 2014, playing her song "The Game," garnering over 52,000 views in nine years (shown below, right). On January 22nd, 2018, she released her first album, Soul Child, on Spotify.^[3]

On November 19th, 2021, Blake released her second album, lioness, on Spotify.^[4] Blake started posting content to TikTok as early as 2022 under the account @shaninblake888, but it was deleted. She started her new TikTok^[5] account, @shaninblake999, on February 11th, 2022, garnering over 692,000 followers in a year. Some of her earliest and most consistent content on the app shows her singing to her own songs (examples shown below). On June 16th, 2022, Blake released a music video for her song "nature song" on YouTube,^[6] garnering over 227,000 views in a year.

In December 2022, Blake posted a video to TikTok^[10] responding to accusations of cultural appropriation due to her dreadlocks. In the video, she supports the idea that dreadlocks aren't cultural appropriation because many cultures wear them, not just Black and indigenous people. In the video's caption, she also explains that she is part Native American (shown below).

"Energy Vampires" / August 2023 Cultural Appropriation Accusations

On May 22nd, 2023, Blake released the song "Energy Vampires" on Spotify,^[7] garnering over 850,000 views in three months and becoming one of her most popular songs. On July 19th, she posted a lip dub video on TikTok^[8] set to the song, garnering over 15 million views in a month (shown below).

That August, TikTokers began replying to the video to accuse Blake of culturally appropriating Black and indigenous culture for both her dreadlocks and the style of her music. For example, on August 10th, TikToker^[9] @mangolipgloss posted a reaction claiming Blake's "art style" is stolen from Black artists, garnering over 1.6 million views in two weeks (shown below, left). On August 11th, TikToker^[11] @ozcolleo posted a video explaining, in her opinion, what Blake is taking from the Native community, garnering over 156,000 views in two weeks. In the video, she points out the dreamcatcher in Blake's car and the way Blake says a native Hawaiian phrase in the song (shown below, right).

While some criticized Blake, others defended Blake from the criticism. On August 12th, TikToker^[12] @deathmetaldad40 posted a video saying people are bullying her too much, calling her critics "boring" and saying Blake is just a "hippy" and they've always appropriated stuff, garnering over 90,000 views in two weeks (shown below).

Online Presence

Shanin Blake has over 385,000 followers on Instagram, over 690,000 on TikTok and over 259,000 monthly listeners on Spotify. She has been the subject of several interviews and commentary pieces, including an interview with YouTuber^[13]
Dazedgypsy Lauren on December 28th, 2022 (shown below, left) and a commentary video by YouTuber^[14] Dev Limes on August 25th, 2023, garnering over 78,700 views in three days (shown below, right).