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At a roller rink in South Jersey last Thanksgiving, the DJ played the first five seconds of “Munch.” That was all the time it took to know that Ice Spice was going to take over the world.
The hi-hats and that menacing bass line crept across the maple rotunda floor. Grrah. Deafening screams. Then, everyone in the rink demanded in unison, “Stop playin' with 'em, Riot.” A group of teenagers made a beeline off the hardwood toward their friends in the open-air food court while the DJ ran the track back, teasing them by lengthening the intro, buying them time to rip off their skates to get sturdy. Finally, the beat dropped, and a mosh pit formed near the rink’s arcade as they screamed the first line at the top of their lungs, smiles bathed in neon: “You thought I was feeling you? That n**** a munch.” The DJ played the entire one minute and 44 second record. I turned and watched as almost every person in the rink sang along; the young crowd reciting every single bar and ad-lib, my mom chanting more of the chorus than I’d expect her to know.
Ice Spice told us she’d “be lit by the end of the summer,” and still, her ascent to global superstardom has felt like a thunderbolt, a jolt to pop culture backed by the explosive sound of New York drill. The subgenre’s 808 slides might as well have served as a warning sound: Ice Spice got next, and she’s not letting go of it.
Throughout our conversations, I meet both Isis and Ice Spice. Overall, the young woman who embodies both personalities is a slow burn. Sweet and somewhat quiet, she warms up little by little. Her sharp wit and candor disarm me — before I know it, I am pulled entirely into her orbit. This balancing act of vulnerability and calm self-assurance defines her allure. She’s the down-to-earth, charmingly unserious girl from the Bronx one minute, and the aspirational, unattainable superstar the next.
The Bronx Baddie exudes sensual poise. She is the It girl, the queen of self-affirmations and manifesting, a bastion of aplomb. Injecting a matter-of-fact confidence into her discography (a.k.a. spreading the baddie gospel) might project her as godlike, but she’s not a mythological creature; she’s a 23-year-old embracing the surreality of being a “young, lit, rap b*tch.”
“That's fun. My job is being a rapper,” says Ice Spice. “Like, what the f*ck? That's mad lit.”
By now, the genesis of Ice Spice is somewhat well-known. Isis Gaston, 23, hails from the Bronx. She took her stage name from the Finsta account she made when she was a teen, which was inspired by a childhood nickname. She attended a private Catholic school in Yonkers and majored in communications at SUNY Purchase, where she played volleyball (back row) and met her future producing partner RIOTUSA, affectionately known as Riot. She’d eventually drop out of college in her sophomore year.
Ice began making music in 2021. She was still new to TikTok when she posted her “Buss It” Challenge entry early that year; nonetheless, it quickly went viral, and she capitalized on having new eyes on her by going straight for the ears. In spring 2022, she kept her foot on the gas. Most notably, she appeared on tastemaker and radio personality GabeP’s YouTube show On the Radar; her OTR freestyle went viral next, then came “Munch,” in August. Forty-three million YouTube views, three billion TikTok engagements, a Drake cosign, and nearly 87 million Spotify streams later, “Munch” dominated the final month of summer — and all of Q4. Ice signed a deal with 10K Projects and Capitol Records in the fall, released her surprise debut EP Like..? at the top of 2023, and the rest is history she’s excited to keep making.
“I'm most proud of staying grounded so far, because I've already been through so many things that I know a lot of people would've lost their f*cking minds,” Ice Spice tells Teen Vogue of her transition to fame in less than a year. “The whole lifestyle change is super drastic, especially coming from where I come from, not coming from sh*t and not having a lot growing up, to now — it's the complete opposite…. Even though it's a positive change, it's still a change.”
Before she became the rhetorical philosopher of Gen Z, she was just Isis, the eldest daughter of five who wrote poetry and loved Forrest Gump. She wrote her first poem in the first grade; she calls the poem “stupid,” but her mom kept it, safely tucked away in a big cooler where she stores Ice’s grade school memorabilia.
As a little girl she never knew “for certain” what she wanted to be when she grew up, but she does recall “always” feeling pulled toward acting. “I love movies,” says Ice. “I always wanted to be a part of that, whether it was [starring in] or helping direct it.” She wanted to attend a high school that focused on film or performing arts, but that idea was quickly vetoed by her mom. “I wasn't allowed to, for some reason," Ice says. "I was mad salty about that for years.”
She is aware that the dominos had to fall the way they did for her to reach the level of success she has now as a rapper, and she’s grateful. But still… “I remember for a long time I was so tight," she says. "I was like, I could have been the biggest director out of New York. The f*ck?”
Though she didn’t turn out to be the next Spike Lee, Ice and her team are maintaining her momentum as a recording artist with cool, strategic diligence. Ice’s signature ginger 'fro has become instantly recognizable. Her look from the “Munch” video became a popular Halloween costume (fellow rapper Lil Nas X’s notorious transformation into Ice for the holiday went viral). Fans can’t get enough of her, as they imagine a future collab with Starbucks (an “Ice Spice latte” would be genius), campaign for her to be the next face of Old Spice, and urge Quaker Oats to put her in a commercial (“I'm thick 'cause I be eatin' oats,” she raps in one of the most beloved bars from her song “Princess Diana”).
“I think it's such a huge compliment,” says Ice. “It's so flattering. I can just be talking with people and they'll be like, ‘You should collab with that brand’ — and it's, like, the most random sh*t. I think it's cool that so many people can see that versatility for me and my brand.”
The star power and name recognition are already in place, so if Ice did want to cross over into acting, it’s almost guaranteed that she could. And she probably will. Just not right now. “I'm focused on making more music because I truly love being an artist,” she says. “I love making songs that I'm super proud of. I love when I finish a song and I'm like, ‘Okay, we got one.’ Like, this sh*t is fire.”
Ice Spice and Riot “got one” and a few more: Her viral single “In Ha Mood” off of Like..? recently broke 100 million streams on Spotify; her February collab with British It girl PinkPantheress, “Boy’s a Liar Pt. 2,” reached the number three spot on the Billboard Hot 100; and only two months later, Ice snagged her dream collab with the Queen of Rap herself, Nicki Minaj, who also seems to have crowned the young star as her heir. (According to Billboard, their “Princess Diana” remix peaked at number four on the Hot 100 and became the first-ever all-female joint record to hit number one on the rap charts.)
The renaissance of New York rap is in full swing — despite the systemic forces that have tried to extinguish up-and-coming voices in the city, particularly within the last decade — as is the second golden age of female rap. Ice Spice arrives in the heart of it all, a student of Minaj, like most female lyricists who grew up in the 2010s, and a student of the Cardi B school of authentic branding and social media savvy. Ice’s mainstream breakthrough came at breakneck speed, making her the first New York rapper to have such a takeoff since the late Pop Smoke, and the first female rapper from the city to do so since Cardi, her fellow Bronx native.
Ice has been touted as one of the few members of the new guard of female rap whose music has “unisex” appeal. If we go by the lyrics only, the universality of Ice’s music is a bit surprising: She raps from a niche perspective that is quintessentially New York and wholly feminine. But the juxtaposition of her ultra-femme persona and the vicious sound of Bronx drill is immediately intriguing, and perhaps creates a level playing field, an open entry point for a motley crew of listeners.
When asked why she thinks she has such widespread appeal, and who her music is for, Ice points to her diverse audience. “I wouldn't say girls, specifically, because the gays love me and I love the gays,” says Ice, who is openly bisexual. “I'm just making [music] that I like, honestly…. Everybody could really vibe to the beats. The beats is the most important thing. The beats be hard, n****s be wanting to hear that too. So I feel like everything else complements it.”
By “everything else,” Ice might be referring to the undefeated trifecta of superstar qualities she possesses: charisma, determination, and, well, hotness. “I'm shocked that everybody be f*cking with me and sh*t,” she says with a laugh, a little perplexed.
Bafflement about her fame aside, Ice knew it was inevitable. “I really don’t see it happening no other way,” she says. In every universe, every alternate timeline, Ice Spice is a star.
At the time of our interviews, Ice is in the throes of finishing up the deluxe version of her debut EP. The new edition will feature “a couple more singles” that she recorded in April and May: “Not too many," she says, "but enough that the fans will be fed for the summer.”
Having come from the studio the night before, she says, “I love them…. Both of the songs that I've made so far to add on to the deluxe are different.” She describes one track as “giving more of a poetic vibe, more of a little story, more in my bag,” and another as the next potential “baddie, popping my sh*t, feeling myself” anthem. “I'm enjoying my little mixtape era this summer, adding more life to Like..? I don't know about y’all — I'm going to be playing that this summer.”
When Ice first ventured into music in 2021, she didn't envision making an album. She was more focused on pushing out singles and getting familiar with the act of recording. “Recording’s hard,” she says. “People think that sh*t is easy.” (Lately, she’s listening to artists like Rosalía and Kali Uchis to relax and soothe her mind before getting in the booth.) Now, two years later, Ice wonders if it might be time. “I really want to have a full album that I could just play all day,” she says. “I love bodies of work.”
Listening back to her earliest musical efforts, Ice can hear her progress as a songwriter. “When I wrote ‘Bully,’ I was actually writing it,” Ice says of her debut single. “I was playing the beat and I was trying to write with a pen and paper.” Now she prefers to freestyle, spitting off the dome, quickly jotting down her lyrics or recording them on her phone. “I don't be trying to be the most lyrical and sh*t, but I could entertain. That's the whole point. You want music to be fun, sh*t that you want to repeat, and sh*t that makes you laugh — at least for me. Like, sh*t that just makes you feel good.”
A week before we meet, a video of Ice on Jerome Avenue in the Bronx goes viral. She’s standing through the sunroof of a Suburban, waving and blowing kisses to a ravenous crowd of hundreds. Fans throw bloodcurdling screams and I love yous at her like roses. She was in town, on her old stomping grounds, to shoot an Apple Music interview. “I had to say hi to them," Ice says. "I felt bad just getting in the car. I couldn't just drive away like that. I had to say hi real quick.” She is, after all, the people’s princess.
Ice’s relationships with her fans are some of her most cherished connections. “They are the biggest part of my career. Without my fans, I wouldn't be here,” she says. “They are the first priority when it comes to anything, honestly.”
Her loyal fanbase is called the Spice Cabinet, and fans are individually referred to as Munchkins. (“I was rooting for Spice Cadets,” admits Ice. “They was like, ‘No, girl.’ I was like, ‘Please,’ and they just wasn't having it. So those are both not my first choice.”) She says she feels the most loved “when people defend me against hate.”
Ice Spice’s rise has captivated everyone. But for each follower who watches her ascent with moony eyes, there’s at least one who eagerly awaits or actively wishes for her free fall. Although she beat the one-hit wonder allegations with flying colors, she says those comments “motivated” her more than they upset her: “I just wanted to prove so many people wrong, so I popped out another one.” She feels she still has a lot to prove — not to anyone watching from the cheap seats, but to herself.
Her petite five-foot-three inch frame carries several heavyweight titles that have evolved in rank. First she was “the female face of Bronx drill.” Most recently she’s been dubbed “the princess of rap.” This claim, not even a full year into her mainstream success, has led to speculation on how much of her rise has been earned through her skills as an artist and how much has been handed to her due to colorism.
Colorism is especially pervasive in rap, where women with lighter complexions have long been perceived as the beauty standard. The social capital that comes with this desirability looks like validation, popularity, and opportunity. Many have asserted that Ice would never have gotten this far in her career if she weren’t light-skinned. With each new milestone she ticks off, you’ll find folks tagging other female rappers of darker complexions in her comments section, championing their talent and arguing that they deserve Ice’s level of success more than she does.
“I have seen those opinions,” says Ice. “I feel like that's not something personal to me. I feel like that's been the conversation for generations and forever, since the beginning of time.” It’s undeniable that light-skinned women in entertainment benefit from colorism. However, in their efforts to demean Ice, commenters unintentionally negate the success of her dark-skinned peers, detracting from their career journeys and diminishing their stardom. One of the artists most frequently brought up as a pawn in this debate is Flo Milli. In what seemed to be an intentional nod to the haters, Ice brought Flo Milli out as one of her special guests at Hot 97’s Summer Jam in early June. “I try not to feed into negativity because I also see that when people are trying to make that point, it's not out of a good place,” she explains. “[They end up putting] somebody else down.”
The frequent efforts to sink Ice’s morale are rarely successful, she says. She’s from, arguably, the most gully borough of New York City, and her spirit is tough. She “blocks” out most rumors and misconceptions she reads about herself — and tries her best not to read them at all. “I'm a human being, so anything hurtful could potentially hurt my feelings. Potentially,” she says with a laugh. “If I do read the comments and see something negative, I'll leave. I'm not torturing myself.”
Ice considers even her biggest haters as her fans, though, and uses this lens to help her avoid typing paragraphs back to faceless trolls. “A lot of the time I know what they're going to say, because the public is mad predictable…. I expect them to just be on my d*ck, to be picking at dumb sh*t. Like, they didn’t need to bring that up.”
In a world full of people who might move weird, Ice prides herself on “moving smart.” Like a true New Yorker, her head is always on swivel. To protect herself, she’s constantly thinking three steps ahead. No posting in real time. Travel with security everywhere. Pray (“a lot”). However, the negativity sometimes makes its way beyond her phone screen. “My social security number got leaked,” Ice reveals. “It’s locked now. It sucks for everybody, because when I want to use it now, I gotta go and ask mad different people.” Other frustrating leaks include pictures of her from “before the fame,” such as high school yearbook photos and candid shots from her youth. “It’s weird, because I was a minor in everything. In everything that be going viral, I was literally a kid,” she points out. “Imagine seeing pictures of you as a kid, pictures that you forgot existed — you’re basically seeing it for the first time yourself, too, and you're a kid.”
She makes a face and gestures to the cropped hoodie and low-rise cargo pants she’s wearing: she’d like to go outside like this, "but if I do that, it looks like I'm asking for attention.” Even after privacy breaches and frenzied fan encounters that could have quickly turned violent, it’s fascinating that Ice seems more concerned with the public’s perception of her than with her own safety in public. That concern also breeds self-censorship. No more sh*t posting or stream of consciousness tweets, though her old tweets have actually made fans love her more. “Sometimes I wake up and I be about to tweet sh*t or post... and then I'm like, Nah, I'm bugging. It's like a million people that's about to see this,” she says. “Is it worth it to say this? I don't be wanting my words to get misconstrued. N****s be quick to cancel you. I'm not trying to deal with that right now. Maybe later,” she jokes.
Deconstructing the mythology of Ice Spice means understanding who is underneath the persona. When the cameras are down, the mic turned off, Isis is pretty shy. “I can be very outgoing too, depending on who I'm with and what my setting's like,” says the social chameleon. “I’ve been that way my whole life. Shy, and then not shy.”
“When I'm watching myself back on TV and stuff, I feel like I'm watching as Isis and I'm just watching Ice Spice like everybody else,” she explains, adding that she’s Ice Spice’s biggest critic and biggest “supporter all in one.”
Isis loves to travel. She wants to visit the Dominican Republic again, where her mother’s from. She’s a self-proclaimed “sleepy-ass girl” and a “people magnet.” Her best friends would describe her as “bossy” and “mad funny.” She’s a Capricorn, which makes her tunnel-vision mission to become indelible seem preternatural. She’s a homebody and a couch potato who loves to watch TV, color, paint, and play on her Nintendo Switch.
In efforts to preserve Isis as the spotlight on Ice Spice intensifies, she has kept her circle tight, sticking “with the same people I knew before fame.” Her four younger siblings don’t treat her any different now that she’s a megastar, which keeps her humble and grounded. “I love them down… to them, I ain’t sh*t,” she says with a laugh. “I don't think I made [many] new friends after being famous like that yet, to be honest…. I got trust issues. You know, Bronx sh*t.”
She doesn’t rule out making new friends, but tries to avoid overthinking on the sincerity of her relationships. The paranoia of celebrity is something she’s mindful of — as well as the horror stories of other young stars who have had meteoric rises. “I be seeing some people and certain sh*t they have to go through and I be like, Oh, nah, I hope I don't gotta go through none of that,” says Isis. “The world will really try to eat you up and spit you back out, so I just try to stay peaceful, grounded, positive, gorgeous, and safe.”
Ice doesn’t like talking openly about her plans for world domination. It’s less about the element of surprise and more about her own protection: “I feel like evil eye exists, so I don't really want to say what I'm going to do until it's done,” she says. But she entertains me for a while, teasing the big year she has ahead. Dozens of “great opportunities” have come her way — and she’s said yes to “just enough” of them. “I have some really cool things planned. This is probably the most exciting year I've ever lived.”
These plans, which will expertly showcase her versatility as an artist and introduce her to wider audiences, include another collaboration with Minaj, this time for the Barbie movie soundtrack. There's a packed festival circuit that will take her to London, Miami, Finland and Australia. And there's also the internet-breaking Taylor Swift collaboration that, at the time of our interviews, hadn’t yet been announced.
Ice can “definitely” see herself winning a Grammy in the coming years, and other awards. She thinks her own headlining tour “would be fun.” Eventually, she wants to found her own brand, though she won’t tell me what type. “I don’t want to spoil any ideas,” she says, smiling. In 10 years, she can see herself becoming a mom, but she isn’t trying to think too hard about the future. The nimbus of anticipation and expectation that dances around her has such tangible energy, you could get lost in it.
“I do want to evolve as a person and an artist,” she says. “But I'm just trying to live in now and not focus so hard on 10 years from now, because I'm going to have to focus on that 10 years from now anyway. I'd rather just have fun and be lit.” To hold herself accountable, she lets herself plan only a few months ahead at a time, doing the “typical behind-the-scenes sh*t” in the present. “I’m putting more work in, more hours…. practicing, rehearsals, recording, working on my craft.”
Last month, Ice attended the Met Gala for the first time. On the carpet, she revealed that her look was pulled together “last minute.” “I ended up finding out that I was going to go [and be] styled by Balmain… the weekend of the Met Gala,” she recalls. She was critiqued online for the eleventh-hour energy of her gown, not unlike when she was critiqued for lackluster stage presence the first few times she was brought onstage by fellow New York rappers Toosii and Fivio Foreign. There are those who believe she’s taking big leaps of fame too fast, which could result in her flame burning too bright, too soon.
“I don't think anybody is ever fully prepared for fame,” Ice says in her own defense. “There's no book on how to do it. I feel like everybody could just learn as they go, like most people do in their careers. A lot of people be trying to compare me to people that's way older than me or people that been in this sh*t way longer than me.”
There is also no blueprint for the kind of star she wants to be, Ice notes, and no star whose success she’d like to emulate. “I feel like I know who I am. I'm really that b*tch, and I tell myself that all the time because I learned that I have to.… I got to know who I am because everybody else gon’ try to tell me who I am. So I got to know first.”
While the world waits with bated breath to see whether Ice Spice’s moment is just that, a fleeting brush with fame, she is focused on blocking out the noise, putting in the work, and cementing the legacy of “being that b*tch” that many doubt she will create. I ask if she feels prepared for the journey ahead. “No,” she laughs. “But I’m mentally preparing as I go... like, okay, soon things are going to get crazier. I'm excited.”
In hopes of lessening the pressure, I tell her that the people already consider her an icon. “Well, I mean, sh*t,” she says with an eyebrow raise and a mischievous grin. “If that's what they think, thanks.”
Photo Credits
Photographer: Chinazam Ojukwu
Photo Assistant: Emmanuel Porquin
Photo Assistant: Ryan Rodriguez
Photo Assistant: Cameron Duncan
Photo Assistant: Gabby Morris
Digital Tech: Max Mikulecky
Film Lab: picturehouse + thesmalldarkroom
Retouching: Ink Retouch
Producer: Leah Mara
Production Assistant: Tao Antrim
Stylist: Roberto Johnson at Saint Luke Artists
Creative Consultant: Marissa Pelly
Stylist Assistant: Jody Bain
Tailor: Cassady Rose at Stitched Tailors Agency
Hair Stylist: Dijah
Makeup Artist: Karina Milan
Manicurist: Angie Aguirre
Prop Stylist: Selena Liu
Prop Assistant: Tri Tran
Prop Assistant: Colin Favre
Art & Design Director: Emily Zirimis
Designer: Liz Coulbourn
Associate Entertainment Director: Eugene Shevertalov
Senior Fashion Editor: Tchesmeni Leonard
Fashion Editor: Kat Thomas
Assistant Fashion Editor: Tascha Berkowitz
Editorial Credits
Executive Editor: Dani Kwateng
Interim Features Director: Alyssa Hardy
Senior Culture Editor: P. Claire Dodson
Copy Editor: Dawn Rebecky
Audience Development Director: Chantal Waldholz
Senior Social Media Manager: Honestine Fraser
Social Media Manager: Jillian Selzer
Writer: Kaitlyn McNab
Video Credits
“Firsts” Director: Jameer Pond
Producer: Madison Coffey
Associate Producer: Rafael Vasquez
Editor: Melissa Lawrenz
DP: Alfonso
Cam Op: Cara Lehman
Audio: Rehanna Chandan
Gaffer: David Alexander
PA: Rowmel Findley
Senior Director, Programming: Mi-Anne Chan
Senior Manager, Creative Dev: Logan Tsugita
BTS Director: Catherine Mhloyi
