“I don’t know what people perceive of me, but I always try and correct them by the work that I do. A lot of people may perceive me as a tearaway when I was young – always robbing, always doing mad shit, doing bad things. Other people see me as a man ’cause they’ve seen me with my son, trying to get through life and work at all kinds of jobs. I would like people to think of me as a guy that works hard, ’cause that’s all I ever do.” All photographs by Olivia Rose
Photograph: All photographs by Olivia Rose
“Fourteen years ago, from the bowels of Bow E3, the voice of a generation emerged, blinking furiously under the glare of Canary Wharf’s aggressively gleaming paean to financial power. It was dark, it was angry, it was loud, it was unapologetic. It was innately provocative, it was fiercely independent. It was the brittle sound of disillusionment, resentment and despair, but also the voice of hope. It was grime.”
So begins This Is Grime, a new book by i-D magazine music editor and grime fanatic Hattie Collins, with original photography by Olivia Rose. The book is an oral and visual history of grime music: the striking black-and-white photography is interspersed with quotes from all the major players of the early scene – Dizzee Rascal, Wiley, Kano, Lethal Bizzle – talking about the origins of the movement, as well as the newer generation – Stormzy, Little Simz, Novelist – on how it’s evolving.
It is framed like a conversation between the artists, who share self-contained snippets about learning their craft, writing, recording, how pirate radio shaped the genre’s sound and the inspirations behind their music. There are also longer essays that explore certain themes in more depth, for example, Danny Weed and DJ Target on style and fashion, Mizz Beats on her struggles with depression and others on violence, religion and inequality.
Apart from a brief introduction, Collins only interjects once in the book, to acknowledge her friend and early grime advocate Chantelle Fiddy. But the rest of the book is fittingly in the words of the artists themselves. Grime gave a voice to a generation of young people who felt voiceless, something that feels particularly timely in the light of the UK’s growing #BlackLivesMatter movement, which, along with Mark Duggan, gets a mention in the book’s dedication.
This Is Grime by Hattie Collins and Olivia Rose is published by Hodder & Stoughton on 8 September (£25). Click here to buy a copy for £20.50
