UK Rap Has Brought Forth The Nation’s True Identity

While the nation’s increasingly losing faith in their government, UK rappers are becoming the beacons of hope for a post-Brexit Britain.

AS A WORLD WITH NO BORDERS, THE INTERNET IS WHERE RAP THRIVES

With a handful of the city’s rappers reaching the top of the charts, performing on the world’s greatest stages, and headlining some of the most iconic festivals, London’s still considered the hotbed of UK rap. Even still, we’re only just beginning to scratch the surface of the city’s rapping talent. The seemingly endless list of up-and-coming UK MCs Stormzy plugged on Glastonbury’s Pyramid Stage this year hinted at the plethora of talent still waiting to take to the world’s main stage. And that’s only one city. More and more UK rap tributaries are forming, particularly in Manchester and Birmingham. There’s even a slightly questionable subset of UK rap taking over Blackpool at the moment.

As a result, the sound of UK rap is becoming increasingly perennial, and in the coming years, it’s likely scenes won’t just be geographically fixed. Since the internet has provided a world without borders, it’s no surprise that it’s been an invaluable asset to UK rappers, who also happen to be some of that savviest internet users out there. There’s no doubt that rappers know how to make themselves seen. The rise of the internet also certainly helped to disseminate and distribute the UK rap scene’s diasporic vision, while also allowing more regional voices to emerge.

After all, today’s UK rappers came of age and sound this way. Now considered one of the most distinguished subdivisions of UK rap, grime first found its footing through torrented software and hijacked samples. Today, the genre’s not only become the sound of Britain, but the sound of the internet at large. Nothing has democratised the music-making process like the internet, and arguably, no genre has fewer barriers--particularly fiscal ones--than grime. The internet and grime are mutually exclusive. “No matter who you are or where you’re from, you’ve just got to keep on putting the work in and continually put up new music on YouTube, and things like that,” Lord Of The Mics’ Jammer told Red Bull in 2012.” What was born on radio and forced out of clubs due to Met Police discrimination (form 696 anyone?) has found a home online and flourished.

Now that top-down corporations and bottom-up bedroom rappers and producers are converging, the role of the gatekeeper is diminishing, meaning there’s fewer obstacles in the way of discovering new talent. It’s been many decades in the making, but UK rap is finally getting long overdue credit and the spotlight, as well as becoming a globally-recognised phenomenon.

UK HAS SHIFTED THE CAREERS OF THE MOST FAMOUS STATESIDE RAPPERS

Accusations of trying to cop the stylings and flow of US hip hop dogged the UK scene while it was still trying to find its sound. Nowadays, the reverse could be said--and often is. The US’ most renowned rappers have been forging allegiances with British crews over the better part of the past half decade, which has not only leveraged UK rappers further into the limelight, but given a certain level of prestige to those Stateside. Drake’s the most obvious example here. Not only respected as a rapper and musician, but now as a tastemaker too, Drake has taken on the traditional role of the A&R guy, who, with one tweet or IG story, has the power to excel a rapper’s career tenfold.

Now with a complete and defined sound, you’ll hear inflections of UK rap and some of its more recognisable tropes popping up overseas. Just compare Drake’s sound now with how it sounded before he discovered BBK. It’s evidence UK rap has not just shifted culture on home turf, it’s altered the world’s sound at large.

One of the most deliberate attempts at synthesising US and UK urban culture came over a decade ago, when Estelle and Kanye West teamed up on the single ‘American Boy.’ While it felt jarring back then to hear “Ribena” and “rrrrabbish” coming from a US rapper’s mouth, the grammar and dialect of UK rap has since become something of a natural second language overseas.

UK RAP CHALLENGES WHAT IT TRULY MEANS TO BE BRITISH

UK rap exists in a constant state of flux. Emerging into the mainstream every so often, then burrowing down in the underground, UK rap has had to persistently prove itself. Pushing back against opposers, while remaining a resilient network of tradition and talent. Representing everything the UK has been, could and should be.

The idea that the UK has its own stable and fixed identity is nothing but an illusion. Instead, it’s buttressed on an intermix of diasporas and outside cultures; the language we speak in itself relying on a mixture of arabic, patois, Latin, german, french, and so on. Representing a confluence of diasporic ideas and flows itself, UK rap music has traditionally been the sound of British migrants. Their mission not to prove their authenticity but smash these parameters completely, to decentralise the notion the voice of Britain speaks only in the Queen’s English.

UK rap scenes first began to emerge in direct response to the rising number of first generation West Indian migrants settling into the UK sometime in the late 1960s and ‘70s. Importing sounds from the motherland, with a palpable penchant for Jamaican dub in particular, these first-gen MCs or toasters were balancing sounds to make sense of their new situation, and to configure their identity as a community. They soon merged with underground clubs and soundsystem culture, these UK rappers bringing beats that would pound the country’s subwoofers harder than ever before.

While dancehall and Caribbean influences first came to dominate the UK’s diasporic sound, the rappers of today are bringing a greater mix of sonic traditions to the airwaves. It’s no longer uncommon to hear afro-beat traditions and adlibs full of references to African culture on the radio. Currently, the Nigerian alté (alternative) scene are shaking up the soundwaves, and adding another layer of influence to UK rap. However, as two of the scene’s forerunners, Santi and Rema prove, diasporic rappers are in a balancing act between representing their culture and not having it ghettoized. While Rema wants “to take the Nigerian flag all over the world,” as he recently told Pitchfork, Santi has more assimilatory ambitions. “You know how you see Jordan Peele movies and you forget that you’re even watching black people? That’s exactly what I’m going for,” he said in a recent interview with The Fader.

THE MORE YOU PULL US DOWN, THE QUICKER WE RISE UP

Despite all of this, UK rap has yet to be truly been treated with the reverence it deserves. Its legitimacy is still being questioned, and now that UK rap and politics are mingling more than ever (some of the most popular topics for rappers today is Brexit, and the morally-repugnant incompetence of the Tory party), the pushback is harder than ever before.

Some alleys of UK rap, particularly the anglicised version of Chicago’s drill music, have been blamed for the rise of youth violence in urban areas across the country. It’s a false correlation and paranoia which doesn’t seek to understand how music of this type functions, and what purpose it serves. The gatekeepers of UK rap now exist in parliament, but their voices are increasingly being overpowered. The more you try to quiet the voice of UK rap, the louder, and more powerful it becomes.

Now that the general public are losing, or have already lost trust in their government, today’s UK rappers have taken up the empty helm, and are giving the nation some of its biggest source of power and inspiration. No more so than when Stormzy headlined Friday night of Glastonbury 2019. Wearing a stab-proof vest with the Union Jack spattered on it in white, Stormzy not only inscribed himself within the legend of black Britain and UK rap itself, but in the country’s history at large. Black marginality is finally coming to the centre, and it’s progress that’s largely been steered by this country’s rappers.

As a genre that instinctively challenges power, authority and hierarchies, it’s fitting Boiler Room Festival will be placing some of the most innovative names in rap right now in their intimate, in-the-round set-up, on a lineup without headliners. Sticking to the spirit of UK rap, the festival will exhibit the power of community, rather than privileging one act over another. It’s the ideal set-up for celebrating the roots of UK rap, while demonstrating where it’ll go next.

Written by Emma Madden

Boiler Room Festival Day 2: Rap with Jameson

Based on a shared belief that the power of together can create, push boundaries and turn something small into something big & great, Boiler Room and Jameson are uniting & celebrating the most important voices in underground rap. Buy tickets here

Centred around Peckham, the Boiler Room Festival will push the boundaries of a traditional festival. Four Days. One City. No Headliners