"Smoke Sumn Radio": A Conversation with Ghostboyrj

Interview by Imani Dominique Busby and Enri Martinez

Photography by Jojo Ojofeitimi (@jojoojofeitimi) and Pushpa Saha (@_pushpa.s_)

Ghostboyrj is a boundary-pushing artist, producer, and label head whose musical journey began at just 12 years old. Now the founder of Ghost Town Records (GTR), a collective focused on empowering creatives and building community, Ghostboyrj’s relentless work ethic propels him forward. Whether he's on stage, behind the boards, or organizing the next wave of releases for his artists, he’s making waves in Toronto’s music scene. We spoke with him ahead of his performance at Summer’s Haüs.

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your introduction to making music?

My introduction to music started when I was 12 years old. I used to play in junior and senior band. Within that, I played upright bass, electric bass, and tuba, up until grade 10. That same year, I made my transition into production and emceeing. This was back in 2015. I was still 15 at the time, definitely tired of doing live instrumental music, and I invested in myself as an artist.

In an era where we're so used to doing music without knowing theory, how do you feel the band experience helped you in the production and the emceeing? Did you find it to be an easy transition, or how did you approach it?

I think it was an easy transition because, personally, I wasn’t accustomed to a lot of theory in my practice. I learned how to play all instruments by ear. Same thing with music and production. I think it definitely gave me a lot of inspiration because it showed me what I didn’t want to do. And I think that was just because of the strict boundaries within which I needed to practice.

How do you feel about playing Summer’s Haüs today?

I think it’s going to be fire. It'll be the first time I'm performing Smoke Sumn Radio with THE 6TH LETTER. It'll also be my first time performing State of Mind since my tour in New York. A lot of dope music, some unreleased stuff at the end of my set. It's incredible. A lot of dope shit.

What inspires you in life and in music? What are your inspirations?

In life, my main inspiration is definitely liberation—the aspect of feeling free, being able to do what I want to do. I think within that, it allows me to wear many hats: being a producer, being an artist, being a label head—whatever it is, whatever needs to get done, I’ll do it, because it’s just part of the grind, part of the hustle.

You recently released What’s Up. Is there anything you can share about the creative process behind it or how all of that came to be?

Funny that y’all touched on that. I run a collective called Ghost Town Records—GTR. GTR was developed in 2020 with the main goal of being able to spread awareness for the artists, producers, or creatives on the roster, as well as give resources in order to actually make a lot of these things that we’re doing happen. And What’s Up is the first single off of that compilation. So we’re going to be running singles all the way up until October 31st.

The process through which that happens, since we have nine producers, we get all the beats together. We have weekly studio sessions. So every single Wednesday, we’ve been in the studio for the past year and a half now. And a lot of what's rolling out is the culmination of those sessions. Artists can come through, collaborators can come through. It’s a melting pot of a lot of different artists from around the city. It gives us the space to continue doing what we like to do, and at a high level. I think GTR is a really good example of that.

Yeah, that’s incredible. Congratulations. How has it been for you managing being more on the industry, the label side, but also being an artist yourself?

I think it’s dope. I think there’s probably... I’m not even going to say probably, there isn’t somebody that’s doing as much. And I think that’s just because, when it comes to administration, a lot of that background comes from me being in multiple music business programs like Manifesto, being mentored by Kwame, or Soundstock Academy, Rough Draft from Unity, or also doing Business Administration – Marketing at Seneca, as well as... I forget the program I did at Guelph-Humber. Oh, Media Studies. Too much. Too many things.

That's amazing. Kudos to you for everything that you're doing for yourself and also for other artists. If there's one song that a listener could hear from your catalog, what would you recommend?

Damn. I would say... because personally, I would like to say my next song. But if we’re talking about something that’s out right now, Context is a good listen. That one is actually a real story that I went through. Second song on my set, so look out for that.

That's so cool. Thank you for speaking with us!

Thank you for making the time to ask me.

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