Konnichiwa

To push grime forward, Skepta had to go back to his roots. On <b>“That’s Not Me”</b>, the lead single from 2016’s <i>Konnichiwa</i>, he denounced the glitzy elements of the scene that he’d increasingly bought into across his previous three albums. “Yeah, I used to wear Gucci/I put it all in the bin ’cause that’s not me/True, I used to look like you/But dressin’ like a mess, nah, that’s not me,” he spat amid video-game bleeps and strident synths that recalled grime’s DIY foundations. In three head-rattling minutes, any pop leanings that had been encouraged by his brief stint as a major-label artist were consigned to the trash with a Rolex sweep. That tone set, <i>Konnichiwa</i> arrived as a masterclass in using old-school intensity to break down borders. The late-album salvo of <b>“Man”</b>, <b>“Shutdown”</b> and <b>“That’s Not Me”</b> may have served up three grime anthems in the classic mould, but, before that, tracks such as <b>“It Ain’t Safe”</b> (with A$AP Mob’s Young Lord), the A$AP NAST-assisted <b>“Ladies Hit Squad”</b> and <b>“Numbers”</b> (featuring uncredited production from Pharrell Williams) offered grime and UK rap their clearest, most robust routes yet to global success. Skeppy’s fiery, pin-sharp lyricism proved just as suited to US hip-hop beats, and the independently released <i>Konnichiwa</i> breached the charts in the US, Australia and multiple parts of Europe. On home turf, the North Londoner beat David Bowie and Radiohead to 2016’s Mercury Prize. More than accolades and handsome sales though, the album’s legacy is as a keystone of grime’s late-2010s resurgence, one that many MCs in the UK—and beyond—have taken inspiration from but struggled to better. As Skepta says on <b>“Shutdown”</b>, “They try to steal my vision/This ain’t a culture, it’s my religion.”