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16 February 2011

Tinie Tempah – you heard him here first

By Daniel Trilling

Well, no you didn’t – but the star of last night’s Brit awards was the subject of our Art of Listening column back in March 2010:

Tinie Tempah, whose single “Pass Out” is enjoying its second week at number one, has made a somewhat slicker bid for attention. Over a slow, imperious beat that has much in common with conventional US hip-hop, Tempah, a 22-year-old south Londoner, delivers an account of bling-fuelled bragga­docio, undercut with a very British ear for the banal quotidian detail: “I’ve been to Southampton but I’ve never been to Scunthorpe . . . I’m about to be a bigger star than my mum thought.”

You can read the rest of the column here. And if you’re interested in a world beyond the pop charts, have a listen to this mix by Oil Gang – for the London club night Wifey – of current UK grime. Click on the pic below…

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