Perhaps because so much post-millennial music has seemed safe and blandly palatable by comparison, grime – and the distinctive forms of homegrown rap that emerged in its wake – still boasts a freshness that distracts from its actual age. Those old enough to remember its birth might flatter themselves into thinking it’s still a nascent art form, but it’s really not. Dizzee Rascal, once the boy in da corner, turns 40 this year. Hits by stars such as Wiley, Lethal Bizzle and Kano are now considered old-school throwbacks. Grime is entering middle-age and feeling a bit wistful, as evidenced in last year’s BBC documentary 8Bar: The Evolution of Grime or DJ Target’s book Grime Kids (recently adapted into a BBC drama).
Fitting this mood of reminiscence, Aniefiok Ekpoudom has crafted a singular account of the rise of the genre, focusing on a careful selection of the people and places that shaped the music.
In his words, Where We Come From is “not intended to be an exhaustive chronicling of UK Rap and Grime. Instead, this is a book about the connected realities that have birthed [them]”. “Nor is it an entry-level guide – an understanding of and respect for UK rap is expected of the reader. Terms like “bars”, “shotting” or the cultural significance of the Candy dance are assumed, not explained.
It’s also perhaps the only rap history to include a reference map of the West Midlands. East London – for so long seen as the only locale in UK rap worth celebrating – is gleefully shunned here, in favour of Birmingham, South Wales and south London. Deliberately eschewing big names, Ekpoudom’s subjects are the artists Phil Davies AKA Traxx, co-founder of Welsh metal-rap hybrid Astroid Boys, and Despa, who experiences so much death during his adolescence that he takes to chronicling the West Midlands grime scene with a Samsung flip camera before it slips away. In south London we follow the steep ups and downs of Cadet, a rapper who deploys a radical honesty and vulnerability in his lyrics as part of his quest to make it big.
Despite the laudable aim of shining a light on lesser-known figures, the fact that Ekpoudom’s protagonists are relatively minor players sometimes feels like a miss. And with no pictures of any of the subjects, it’s easy to find yourself dragged online to fill in the gaps. The book is not helped by moments of what feels like padding. When Cadet goes to work in an Apple store, we get a potted biography of Steve Jobs which – truly – nobody needs in 2023.
But it succeeds, nevertheless, as a unique and eclectic social history. Ekpoudom bridges the past and the present to explain what gave grime the legs to make its artistic leap into the mainstream. We learn how So Solid Crew and other pioneers were the first generation of British Caribbean children whose parents were born and raised in the UK, how they had been nurtured by homegrown Black British institutions, whether pirate radio stations such as PCRL in Birmingham or the Notting Hill Carnival’s Rampage sound system.
Instructive links are made between the thunderous ire of grime and the righteous anger of the Windrush generation. Witness the words – preserved by the Birmingham Museums Trust’s Black Oral History Project – of Esme Lancaster, who arrived in Birmingham from Jamaica in the 50s and was met by whispered racism from her colleagues: “I am here. We are here. We are coming, and we are increasing. One day we will be like the children of Israel in the land of Egypt, and if you don’t like it, you can go, or die.” This is not just the Black British story either: the story of Traxx’s Greek Cypriot heritage leads to a wider exploration of Welsh diversity, including the fascinating migrant history of Tiger Bay.
The book’s publisher, Faber, has used bombastic words such as “landmark” and “monumental” in its marketing, which I think is a mistake. They obscure the fact that this is a highly original, almost subversive project, full of personal stories and small-scale experiences. None of its main characters changed the world. Yet the changes they made in their own lives – spurred on by the rebel force of underground rap music – really are remarkable when studied in painstaking, loving detail.
• Where We Come From: Rap, Home & Hope in Modern Britain by Aniefiok Ekpoudom. To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
