How 6LACK Found a Sense of Balance

It’s a rainy weeknight in May, but 6LACK seems to be in his element. Before eating his first meal of the day — around 7 p.m. — the rapper and R&B artist, 33, opts for a quick stroll through New York’s Lower East Side. He’s had a long go of it promoting his latest album, Love Is the New Gangsta, and needs to decompress. It’s taken time for this five-time Grammy-nominated artist, who grew up in East Atlanta, to enjoy visiting New York. “Five years ago, I didn’t like it because I was always here for work,” he says. “I figured out that I need space when I come here.”

6LACK — whose stage name derives from his childhood neighborhood, Zone Six — loves simplicity and the finer things. When we meet for dinner at a downtown izakaya, he takes the lead on ordering: cucumber salad, spicy tuna crispy rice, hamachi with serrano peppers, steak, salmon, and oxtail rice. “Wings were always number one for me, but at this point in my life, I think sushi is top, for sure.”

His capacity has developed across multiple areas, such as artistry, fatherhood, and partnership. Space and contemplation, themes in his daily life, are also the foundation of Love Is the New Gangsta. The genesis of the project came when he and his partner, artist Bianca Leonor Quiñones (a.k.a. Quiñ), were expecting their daughter, Blaze. “Before the pregnancy, our relationship was on the rocks,” he says.

He’d returned around that time to Atlanta, where he worked with rapper and producer Childish Major. “I started to vent and have open conversations about what I was going through, and we just knew we had to make an album about it. It was this ongoing session of therapy and being creative.”

6LACK found Quiñ on YouTube 13 years ago. The two officially began dating in 2018 and had a baby of their own in 2025. A father of two, 6LACK lights up talking about his oldest daughter, Syx (from a previous relationship), who’s nine years old. He credits Quiñ’s honesty as the foundation of their family dynamic. “I got a partner that’s sharp. If she sees, hears, or dreams anything, she’s like, ‘What’s going on?’”

This, in turn, has made for a deeper connection to his own feelings. “My love language at this point is quality time,” he says. “Another is support. To perform music and see people celebrating is a form of reassurance. It’s never like, ‘I have to win a Grammy.’ It’s always just, ‘I want to make what feels true to me.’”