On BBC Radio 1 and 1Xtra, Skepta spoke to Annie Mac and DJ Target about his new project and the release of his new track “Greaze Mode” ft Nafe Smallz, which was premiered exclusively on Radio 1 and 1Xtra.
Speaking to Annie Mac on Radio 1 and DJ Target on 1Xtra, Skepta discussed his huge influence in the UK Grime scene, the success of his Mercury Prize-winning album “Konnichiwa” and the inspiration behind his new album “Ignorance is Bliss.”
Impact of Konnichiwa and his influence on Stormzy as well as the UK Grime scene
· “It was a really selfless act what I did with Konnichiwa, even all the lead up to it. We were doing shows and going around doing loads of stuff in the beginning where it was like we weren’t thinking about the money or we weren’t thinking about signing anyone. I never wanted to sign Stormzy or I didn’t want to earn off him or earn off Novelist - these were people who I thought they deserve to be heard because they really represent as well, they represent London like how I do.”
London being a leader in the music scene
· “Breaking America isn’t a thing anymore - people don’t want to just break America. People understand this world and if you do this London thing it goes everywhere - people want to know what slang we speak here, people want to know what we wear, people want to know what we do, what clubs we go to and stuff like that.”
Album inspiration
Speaking to Annie Mac about feeling uninspired by the “repetitive” music he was hearing Skepta says: “I really wanted to refresh the game with like new sounds, new music”.
· “I wanna make different sounds, that’s what used to make me want to listen to the whole Grime scene, you couldn’t hear one track that sounded the same.”
Speaking to grime expert and 1Xtra DJ Target, Skepta says: “I don’t think one track on my album sounds the same out of the thirteen, everything’s different, and like the bars that I’m spitting is just factual lyrics.”
New track “Greaze Mode”
Skepta also speaks about working with Nafe Smallz on his new track “Greaze Mode” which has been named Annie Mac’s Hottest Record in the World:
· “Even what I was doing with “Praise the Lord”, to be able to still speak in my accent and still do me, and it to transcend how it did like, I felt when he did that hook on “Broken Homes” it was like, perfect and I was like yeah, we need to just call him.”
Social media culture
Describing people’s social media addiction as an “epidemic”, Skepta explains why he changed his phone number before making the album and how social media can hinder creativity.
· “So many people have got these amazing talents, the internet, Instagram, Twitter is just like deleting it, because you’re just being distracted from the thing that you do best.”
· “I really like one of the last people left in my era of music that’s even doing anything- one of the very last. I have to understand my value and what I do, and to do that it needed my full concentration.”
Fatherhood
· Skepta also mentions how he’s recently had a new daughter and she’s making his days “so sick”.
