17
Terror Danjah

Yeah. At the time, 1993-94, it was hardcore / jungle, techno jungle. It wasn't full on jungle till 1994. ‘Helicopter’ changed everything in 1993.¹⁶⁷ A few other tunes that were sampling rare grooves and dancehall stuff, not a lot but everyone was into rave culture, like two-three years on from [Shut Up & Dance's] ‘Raving I'm Raving’ and all them tunes. So everyone was raving but I wasn't really raving, I was going to the hood places where the black people went. They'll play ‘Helicopter’, they'll play a bait [i.e. obvious] jungle tune, but they wouldn't go deep, so there wasn't really that around my age group – but the older ones that worked in record shops, they all was onto it. Mainly the Asian guys as well. Everyone was into Es except for my lot. I think my generation's more weed. I don't really know anyone that popped pills.

Then when jungle kicked in, was there a sense of pride that it was from here?

When jungle come, I was still a raver. By then I DJed, but coming from a background everyone bought vinyl – so going out and hearing a tune and the way it grabbed a lot of the black people, I'm hearing tunes I heard as a kid being resampled into this music. “Aah I know that tune!” Then you're hearing a whole escapade, hardcore tune, like, “This is cool!” to where you're eventually in the whole genre of it. It was like, “This is ours for the taking” – everything from my youth, the guy down the road made it, because Randall lived two roads down. De Underground record shop, that's in Forest Gate, that was Randall's shop. With those guys, they owned the shop. Their producers worked in the shop. So the thing in 1995 was to collect all the flyers and stick it on your wall and that's what I did on my wardrobe – and my dad being an old-school Jamaican dad ripped them all off the wall. I was distraught, I kept the doubles and everything, but it didn't make the difference. There was a collectors thing innit: offkey jeans, the flyers, the tape packs. But we don't know the dancehall, hip hop American artists. At the time ‘One More Chance’ was the big tune, Biggie Smalls, Bad Boy, the bad boy era. There was raves every day. You can walk on the street and go to house parties, go to the club, every other club was playing hip hop, R&B and a bit of jungle – but to hear jungle, it was like instantly, “Ahh he lives in Hackney,” or “He lives down the road. Rah, okay!” You felt part of the scene innit. I remember my older cousin wasn't into jungle but I said to him, “Come man.” I said “Girls!” Man said “Girls!” Every type of girl was in the rave.

So booze, girls and you were starting to be a DJ. When did you start getting recognition and being more than just mucking about in your bedroom?

There was a lot of raves at houses going on then. Me and D Double was school friends, we'd go to every other house rave, hear bassline, we're in there. If it was a girl's 18th, we'd just turn up because everyone's there. That was our way of getting noticed. I turned up to everyone's house rave since 15-16, turn up with my records like “Can I play?” I know they ain't got the latest jungle records that I've got. So went in, play, me and D Double, Double's MCing. He was MC Dee then – D-E-E. So I became recognised in my area, in Newham. Everyone knew who I was when I was 16-17, then when I was playing with my friend Simon who I went raving with, I played at his party, and DJ Tempo – he used to be in Bass Inject crew, on Chicago FM, Footsie was in Bass Inject too, that's how he came to prominence – so Tempo said “I'm a manager at a radio station called Future FM, you can come on seven to nine.” I was like “Prime time!” You always have to go graveyard to prove yourself but he was like “Yeah, you sure you're ready though?” I was nervous first time I went on, but the manager was like “Yeah you got riddims,” I wasn't that great but I was good selector, that's what got me through. That was with D Double, they just wanted me and D Double. His style came from jungle, all his lyrics now partially came from jungle. Same as me, it's all jungle.

We must be into 1996-97 now. The sound was pretty much jump-up drum’n’bass, Tru Playaz kind of energy, if I remember right

Yeah exactly. We still called it jungle, though. And the new MCs were just coming thought. Rinse FM was the rival station. They had Wiley, Target, Maxwell D – I don't think Paco was on there then, but Plague, Carmen, they were called Underdogs, they were my favourite crew at the time. IC3 brother is Carmen, DJ SAS1. There was Major Skitz and BK, BK is basically the rapper Mystro [pronounced “maestro”]. I think he's signed to Big Dada. He's UK hip hop, he came from that. Then you had a female MC called Dyer who moved to America. Kool FM was the station still, and Rinse coming up. Then Rinse went down for a bit and Pressure FM came on, then Rinse joined up with Pressure.

So when Rinse came back, I was the one that opened the station because I was on Pressure, because Future crashed. I spoke to DJ Rips, he owned Pressure. He's from Mile End, Stepney Green ends. When I first went on they had Raw FM, then they changed it back to Rinse. I was in the block in Barking, I'm DJing, there was a guy in the kitchen sitting on the tabletop watching me, D Double and that do our set. Do you know who that was? DJ Karnage. Because Karnage was his nephew. So I known Karnage from when he was a little kid, 14-15. It's crazy how things revolve round. So when Rinse came back on, I was automatically back on Rinse: me, Geeneus, the whole Pay As U Go started. And I kind of fell out of love with DJing, so when I started producing, 2001 time. I sold my decks, went to college and said, “Let me just learn production.” I'm still part of the consortium of Rinse, they don't mention me because I'm not a pop star – but if I blew up tomorrow I'm sure they'd say, “Yes, Terror Danjah came from here!” But I was originally from Rinse.

Did you buzz on the excitement in the pirate days, the threat of the DTI shutting things down?

That was just standard, just one of those things. “Do you want to be radio?” and it's the risk of losing your records and getting a criminal record – but you don't think of that when you're 16-17-18-19, you don't give a shit. I wasn't a bad-breed yout, I was doing my stuff but I wasn't out there robbing people, stabbing people. I was still a good citizen in the sense of that. But at the same time, the youth energy, you just don't think about it. You think, “Fuck it, if I get caught, I'll worry about it later.” I remember being on Rinse in Bow, and there was a point I was a bit paranoid because DTI did raid a couple studios. They'd find lift shafts and chop the wire. That's why Geeneus was a king, him and Slimzee used to go on the roofs, and Geeneus could climb into roof shafts because he's that small, he'd fit it into gaps and put it in so they couldn't reach it. They'd get the keys and get in, so all they could do is chop the wire. They couldn't destroy the rig so they fence it off – and somehow them guys jump roof-to-roof and go put them on the roof somewhere else. That's why they call him Geeneus innit. So they started hitting studios. Was it Rude FM in North? They were quite big as well. They started getting hit a lot. And when Future FM and Deja was linked at the time, they raided Deja. Rinse wasn't taken serious at the time, so they were going for the Freek FM, the Dejas, the Rude FM, the Kool FM. That got hit badly. Believe it or not it was in the jungle record shop in Hackney, in Clapton. It's a tyre shop now.

I don't know how true this is, but as long as your records are not in the same room as the transmitter microwaving box, they can't confiscate them. I had my bag in one room, I'll pull out a handful, played a couple then put them back, pull out another handful and play them and put them back. So if I did get lick I would lose a few records instead of my whole bag. At the time I was cutting dubs, and dubs were £25 at the time. £25 a dubplate is a lot of money, and on top of that you had to pay subs to be a DJ. Subs weren't cheap, cheaper than it is now but probably £15 a show. So roughly £60 a month, then you're paying for your records, you can easily spend £100 in the shop. And being a DJ you have to at least go twice a month, sometimes every week in case you miss something. It's a lot of money! At least £150/200 a month. Then you're worrying about DTI, then trying to be the best DJ you can.

What about the prestige of it?

The background I come from everyone and their cat and dog was a DJ, so it wasn't like, “Rah!” My missus, she's the same age group as me, she can mix. It was normal to have Technics in the house and have a chill and mix. If you're not playing Super Nintendo or Mega Drive, you're mixing. It was just normal because vinyl was a part of culture them times. Most females my age probably couldn't mix as well as they potentially could, but they could still mix better than new upcoming DJs now. She don't DJ, but decks is in most people's houses, that was standard. Everyone around me owned a soundsystem or was a DJ, so prestige didn't come into it. Until 1999-2000 some guys from Kent and all surrounding areas going [earnest voice] “Oh you're Terror D!” Like [surprised] “Oh OK.” When I went on Rinse, that's when it spread. I came on the ranks where I was one of the main DJs on there, mans from Birmingham all round the place they know of me. I had friends on Kool FM, I had people shouting at me in the rave. So I had the hood status already but where I come from, it was just like, “OK keep doing your thing.”

Because the real guys were shotters. They were the celebrities who pull up in their Ferraris or their Bentleys, I'm still walking on street, I'm getting off a bus and a man's going “Yo do you want a lift?” They're the ones all the girls are talking about. It wasn't internet them times, so if you're a criminal on the highest esteem, for them DJs was just like, “Yeah man, come play for me innit.” I was humbled, because you've got to remember, raves then were violent. When I was actually going raves 15-16, my brother would say “Why you going? Be careful because you can actually get killed in the rave.” I don't think it's as serious nowadays as it was then, because going to a jungle rave, it wasn't a joke. Always see someone get stabbed or bottled. You had glass bottles on the street, lucozade bottles were glass. So people bottled or gunshots or someone being stabbed. It's not a fake thing. You know EQ in Stratford, it was called Powerhouse at the time, there was a Telepathy there, what a horror show. This was when gassing was normal, some stupid dickhead felt like gassing the rave.

CS gas?

Yeah, CS gas the rave. So where there's an argument and you see people running you think, “Stand there, don't run with them, you'll get trampled.” The next thing you see everyone coughing so [holds sleeve over face], you'll be fine. That's gone away. You know when you see the flashing lights and it's black, it's almost like you blink your eyes. So I seen two guys doing that dancing, sway back and forward, and there's blinking lights so you're seeing them flashing black-light-black-light. Then I see this guy, back, back, back, boom. “Oh shit that's what's happened,” the other guy, missing. Next thing I know, security are running one way, coming back the other way, shirts redded up, they're picking this guy redded up. People running [screams]. By the end of the rave, the security's white shirts were red.

I weren't gonna lie, I remember looking and thinking, “Fuck this, man.” I love raving, it took the white shirts to make me see this. That was when I went “You know what, fuck these jungles raves, man. I'm going to go to more West End dances.” We had to wear shoes and that, didn't make a fucking difference. No matter where you went, violence followed. So when you fast-forward to grime, I'm like “What violence?” The MCs have an argument on stage and have a little tuff, that ain't violence, they both went home and they can both see another day. In the end you're going to see them two dancing two-three years later down the line saying, “Oh that's banter.” I'm like, “I don't know one casualty in grime.” There's been one or two that went out of hand – that's life – but I don't know one casualty where someone get shot or stabbed. The most I've seen is fights like in a pub brawl or something.

Kids on the top deck of the bus stuff?

Exactly – but I've never seen anyone get hurt. So when people say about “Grime is this and that,” I'm like “Nah, I've seen more people shot at a house rave – or heard the incidents – than in a grime rave.” Which is one thing good about grime music coming from the whole soundsystem thing. Because everyone's relatively young. We're older. Like me, Wiley, we're the originals – it's almost like because we was all young, we all ain't like that. Coming from the soundsystem days, the most you get is some stupid 14-year-old CS-gassing the all-dayer. A man's like [old Caribbean voice] “Stop doing that!” It was ridiculous to the point where they stopped doing all-dayers, it's jungle age-group that ruined the all-dayers. They still do them but it's got to be almost like a proper fest now, where it's signed off with the council. The youth centres have parties up until 11pm, 1am sometimes. When I was 19-20 thinking, “This is sad, I had all this, why can't you do it for the kids?” Obviously I'm going to big-man raves so I'm not worried about that, but still, I look back I think, “Fucking hell. It's kind of killed the culture.” Kids are running around doing their knife-crime stupidness. So now I think, “Was it the fuckery that stopped the soundsystems, was it the raves, would it be different if you could still run a sound at the youth centre?” I dunno.

There was also a whole other culture of Bhangra all-dayers in the 80s and early 90s

They're all gone. A little sight of trouble and they've killed off the whole culture, they want to say [mutters] “Ahhh ahhh it's trouble.” I don't think it's that to be honest. I think the soundsystem thing has to come back. The digital thing has made it a different day, because before it was all about vinyl and cutting things. The next level is people like myself and like-minded people, it's a lot of money but build a system. Like Dillinja's got a system. Instead of hiring a Funktion 1, bring your own sound in if you can. I wanna do that for real.

Talking of cutting records, would you go to Music House?

I'd go Music House. Music House did play a big pivotal role.

And that was part of your schooling, part of the week-to-week life you described?

More than that. Paul Chue worked there, he was like my mentor. When I first met him, he was loud, not obnoxious but Jamaican loud, cussing. I went there and he was a fuckery to everyone. You need to speak to him, he is living music history. He's my close friend. I went there and he just been “Rah rah rah!” He's Wookie's dad. So first time I went in there, like 1996, my friend made me wait down the alley, it was on Holloway Road at the time. So I'm waiting down the alley and Paul goes, “What you doing down there? Come, come man.” So, I was like “Oh shit OK.” He goes, “Sit down man! Why'd he make you wait outside for?” So that's my first encounter with him. Second time with my bredrin again, he made a tune, we stayed up all night, fell asleep at his house, we waited for Music House to open again, then he was just like, “Yeah yeah yeah, I remember you.” I kept going regular regular to where we just clicked. One day I was making my tunes then he came up to me and goes, “Yo. Want a garage tune.” And I was making jungle and I was like [sulky adolescent mumble] “I don't like garage, garage is shit.” He was like, “I want garage, make me a garage tune.”

So I went home and me and my mate Desi, he was half of Prizna, did ‘Fire’, we stayed up all night making this tune. It was Desi's tune really, but I was working on it with him. Anyway, fell asleep for an hour or two, woke up, he was in the chair upstairs, like “What's the time?” “Ah it's 11 o’clock,” Rang him up, “Yeah I've got it you know.” “Alright come. Come down.” I put down the phone, head out. I was like “I made this,” played it – and I was outside in the alleyway, and Grooverider and all the guys are there and Paul goes [bellows in thick Jamaican accent] “Oi Terror, pussy’ole!” Pushed the Minidisc in my face. “Bag a’ shit”! I was like, “Ah” [crestfallen]. Them man about to laugh, “Only joking! Too bad, TOO BAD!” ¹⁶⁸ I was like [unspeakably relieved] “Fucking hell.” Then we were laughing. I was like [mimes heart pounding] because he's raw like that. I'll have tunes where he'll be like, “Nah.” He weren't that harsh, but he can be harsh.

There's a real hierarchy in a cutting house about who's allowed in and who can jump the queue, right?

Ah yeah yeah yeah, all that. Grooverider could just walk in there. Hype could just walk in. It's like a barber shop. There could be bare man in the queue, you go to the guy in front, “Yo let me jump in quick. Nice, yes.” But they know who they are, “Cool cool cool.” I seen the man do it. I can just ring up and say, “Who's there?” “No one, come now.” No matter who's in there, I'm in the queue. But you've got to be prepared. I remember Michael Vegas, Vegas and Fresh, they just started Bad Company and Grooverider just blew their tune up. So they had another tune and Michael took it in, but it was panned wrong. Paul went “I can't cut this man, it'll fuck up the dub, go back man.” He weren't being rude but he were like, “Nah seriously, it'll make the needle jump when you're cutting on the dub. I can do a mono mix for you but I don't know how it's going to sit.” I've seen enough guys tunes get rejected. “Nah I can't cut, it's phasing man.” If the left and right of your bass are out of phase, it'll make the groove in the vinyl scraggly. There's nothing wrong with phasing other bits, I phase a lot of my high end and high mids, 1k up, above that, all the niceties and the bubbly synths and the light airy things. I learned these production tricks from vinyl, from cutting dubs. Even one or two of my records in the day got rejected. He'd be like “Your bass is phasing man, nah, go back, [sucks teeth] I can't cut that man. Next tune!”

So you carried on with jungle, drum’n’bass right through Bad Company era, the late 90s? Was there a time you stopped calling it jungle?

It went D&B like 1997-98, when Ed Rush and Optical came in. And Matrix, they started D&B.

That was that hard, industrial, cyberpunk vibe

But it still had the reggae element in it. Renegade Hardware as well, they started leaning towards it. Actually a tune called ‘Dead By Dawn’ in 1995 started it.¹⁶⁹ I was like, “Whoa, I don't know about this tune but I like it.” I remember hearing it on Kiss. I think Bukem played it. I was more on Shy FX, Brockie. My friend, black guy as well, was more on the intelligent stuff. We met halfway so we used to talk about tunes like nerds. He'd be showing me a tune, say Krust ‘True Stories’. I was like “‘True Stories’ a weird tune man,” but he would convince me to like it. We would talk about the textures, the layers and I'm like “You know what, yeah, tune's hard.” I've got all those tunes when they came out, 31 Records, ‘Shadowboxing’. So 1998 was the turning point, I think I was the only one still finding those records. Full Cycle went a bit weird, but I was playing tunes like ‘Bad Girl’, Krust's remix of DJ Rap. I knew her as well, she's from Walthamstow. She was cool so I was playing her remix.

That's another thing. In a record shop the normal customers get what's on the wall. Then you have the mandem, we get what's in the box, the test pressings. I went to Boogie Time I said yo! Why don't I get what's in the box? “Who are you?” I'm on Rinse innit. “Ah OK, so what time do you play?” I play seven-to-nine on a Saturday. “Yeah! So what's your name?” “Fucks sake, Terror Danjah.” “Yeah oh, I know who you are, don't worry, you'll get what's in the box”. So when I walk in there, never on the shelf is [flicking], I ring up, “Have you got – ?” “Yeah yeah.” Another place I had it was where Slimzee was working, Total Music. Go in the shop and he always from morning, we just had that click. That was when he was skinny, he was DJ Slimfast that time on Rinse. I was big on Future, he was big on Rinse. That why we have that affinity, so he always go, “Terror, he was here from morning.” We was both jungle DJs. But that was another key culture, you had the normal record section and you had that box, that was the privilege of being a DJ.

But then the MCs started to dominate. What stood Rinse and Deja apart in the early days was their MCs, right?

Vocals are always there for me, coming from a soundsystem. I did it! I could always host and MC, I weren't the greatest but I've always had the projection. Early I could either have been an MC or host or a DJ – but because I was a bit shy, I more lent towards being behind the scene. When I was doing raves in houses I was one of the main people holding the mic. I was an idea guy, I always have been. For example, what's never been said is ‘So Sure’, I wrote that.¹⁷⁰ I didn't write the chorus, I left it for Sadie to write, I didn't want to take all the glory. Shola mended here and there too. A lot of the After Shock singer songs I wrote. I can songwrite but people don't know, I've never taken credit, that's why now I gotta start speaking up. So when MCs are MCing, I can vocal produce, because I can be like “Try it this way, hold your throat up, try the tone down, give the emphasis here, take away the emphasis.” Sometimes I'll say to a singer the same thing: “It doesn't matter what you're saying, it's how you deliver it.” You say, “Baby I love you,” how many times do we hear that? But if you've got a talent and you can phrase it and make people go “Ahhh”, like a gospel singer can touch you with it.

So MCing was a part of my culture, because the dancehall side of things and the hip hop side. I've always had MCs on my set, so when the grime thing came along, it lent from that jungle part where we had Shabba, Skibadee, Stevie Hyper D. Stevie was my MC. Sometimes the DJs would bore me, but if Stevie was on the bill, that's one tick. Nicky Blackmarket, that's a tick. Hype or Rap was exciting me the most. If they were on the bill and Stevie was there, I'm gone. It could be a Roast, it could be Telepathy, One Nation, whatever it was I was there, because I wanted to hear MCing. How I see the grime kids now, going up-front to see MCs, that's how I was.

MCs in a rave had a real training. They weren't just doing their latest bars on a radio, they had to keep going and going

I've seen Stevie spit for straight ten minutes, commanding the crowd where he'll start spitting and he's just bubbling, up a notch, up a notch. He'll get more and more tense and tense and tense, to where four-five tunes in, he'll know I'm gonna reload now and he'll say “D-d-dingding, hold up if you want 007.” From the time he's done that lyric “We don't need no” [rewind sound]. He'll start rapping half-time, you're like “Alright.” He'll start getting more from hip hop-ish to dancehall, I'd be like, alright, he's rapping then [sings] you're like “It's coming, he's coming.” I don't think MCs have got that power to possess a crowd now. I can't think of an MC that can start off easy, reel you in and still spit over the mixes and no one to plug out the mic. When they get to the point climaxing, they're 15 mins and spitting straight and it's “Pull up!” But what's good about Stevie, he wasn't just going straight, he will pause and toast a bit but then when the DJ's building, as the set's rising, he's rising. The problem with grime MCs, they don't pace themselves, it's all bass energy straight away [revving noises]. After ten minutes of a grime set you're worn out. It's almost like being with a woman and you can't go in there and go [slap noise] right from the beginning. You're just going to burn yourself out, pace yourself, go mad at the end, that's the trick, do you know what I'm saying?

It's the same for a set, after half an hour of an MC, you don't want to hear no more because they've burnt you out. When I do a DJ set, I like to play the vocals at the front end, DMZ tune, warm them in so when I've played the instrumentals now, then the MCs can go high. But if you started from the beginning and did that, it's like the set goes “Eeeeeeeeeee!” [high pitched noise]. I think dubstep was the other balance, where the MCs would MC here and there but I think they had the better balance. But if they had a bit more of the grime emphasis, it would have been perfect. I get it though, it's about grime, it's that energy. Because if there's ten MCs there, there's no time to play around.

Crazy D is one of the ones who finds that exact balance

Yeah! You just have that complementing the music, and with jungle you had two types, you had the Crazy D style. They all learn that from jungle, the Shabba, Skibadee type. When grime I think wins over D&B – I mean, it doesn't win over D&B, don't get it twisted! – but musically, the MCs are more in touch with the music, as in there's more artistry, so with the grime MCs, they're getting the more prominence. Because to be honest, D&B with those MCs is flawed, you don't really have a good D&B MC-type of tune. Not saying it can't be done, but people don't want it.

There are SO few

I think the music don't want it. Not just the DJs, but if you go to a D&B rave, you don't want to hear a song, you want to hear hype, “Dibby dibby wayyyyy”. You just want to go “Rah!” It's still got the sound-man mentality, where you start off the rave old-school, hip hop, R&B, then you put in newer stuff, newer stuff, then when you play the jungle part, that's the hype part of the set. Then you bring MCs on for 20 minutes, buss it up, then bring it right down, playing the classic hip hop again, the slow-down section. If you ain't got a girl at that time it's time to go home. But with a grime set, it keeps the soundsystem thing. I play that way, the type of set where I play all my classic tunes, the bait tunes, then I play all the tunes what's been played on radio like side by side. I play it again, then you start the instrumental set now, the instrumental segment, the MCs are ready now, you play a bait tune then you play a couple new ones. Just like a soundsystem. With D&B, I can't say they don't happen, but MC-wise, they're just there to shut up and just get the crowd hype. That's why I'm working with Trigga, Trigga is one of the few from that sound I can put on grime music and it makes sense because he does the dancehall thing, Shabba and Skibadee style.

He's schooled in drum’n’bass from young too

Yeah. Shabba and Skiba can do it but it doesn't correlate as much as it should.

I shouldn't say that because now they're going to probably shoot me. Nah nah, Shabba's my close mate, but I think Stormin does it well when he does Teddy Bruckshot. But on the D&B scene, I don't know.

Let's get to the birth of grime proper. Was it Paul Chue demanding a garage track that forced your switch into producing a different style that wasn't D&B?

That wasn't my tune really, it was Desi's. It was his tunes. What really happened was I made millions of jungle tunes then I had a friend –

[interjects] Did you ever release any jungle tunes or was it all just dubs for your sets?

Never released them, just dubs. So at the time, I had the bredrins, a guy called Looney and Skanker and Leon Smart, you know, Scratch. Looney said to me, “Rah, make garage! Make 130 [bpm].” I'm like “Ah man, not that stuff, I'm into my jungle, man.” It's like, “Really dude, jungle's dead bruv.” I was still in it bruv, but I know it's time to let go. So I said, “Yeah, alright.” So I made my first garage-y tune, and Slimzee played it straight away. This was when Slimzee was making the transition, so my mate was like, “See!” Them man were spitting on my track, but he played the instrumental – I went “Alright, cool.” Then the second tune I made, Slimzee played that. I was like, “OK.” This was for Pay As U Go. So then the third garage tune I made got signed to Solid City, that was ‘Firecracker’ with ‘Highly Flammable’ [on the b-side]. That was the name of the crew we started, Highly Flammable. That third tune was when I didn't really go back to the 170 but kind of stuck at 130-something. 135-136.

But those tracks were not exactly garage. Already you were doing something else

It weren't 2-step though, because at the time, I think I had Wiley's ‘Nicole's Groove’.¹⁷¹ I remember D.O.K. – he lives on my road – coming to my house, when I had the turntables and decks, and I still didn't really like garage yet, but D.O.K. played a Wookie record, the bootleg of the Brandy tune [hums tune]. I was mesmerised. I just sat there. Turned the flip over, I remember [hums tune]. I was like, “I'm not one to like this,” fighting not to like it – but you're sitting there like, “This is garage yeah?” Flipped it over again, “This is garage? This ain't garage, this is jungle.” He's like, “What you talking about?” “This ain't garage, this is sick.” Wiley's ‘Nicole's Groove’, I went, “I can do that!” It was the biggest tune around at the time. Then I heard [Wookie's] ‘Down On Me’. That's jungle programming, D&B structure, so you build up before the tune drops. When I got there, a lot of people in there said, “Nah, Terror's shit, that's weird man, don't like his stuff.” But I kept at it. I took the shit as a drive to be good, not a disheartenment. I knew I was still fine-tuning myself, then when I kind of clicked I went, “Aah, fuck it, I don't care if you like it, this is it.”

In East London, no one touched me. I went South, I had to do adverts, things like that. At the time, I was still hanging around with Paul, he said, “I got a friend that wants to do music.” I'd met him previously when he was on East Iz East, guy called Flash – we eventually started After Shock – so I done a tune for him called ‘We Told U’. I had to dumb it down into a stupid garage mix – so to speak – because the original was the one I put out on my Lost Tapes.¹⁷² The original was [beatboxes complex drum sounds], but I had to tone it down to “bom-bom-tish” [simplified pattern]. I was like, “This is shit man.” But they went, “Nah I'll do it.” By this time, too, I found Statik, so he was part of the family as well. I said “Yeah, I got this thing coming man.” So I said, “Yo, have him do your garage-y shit while I do my shit” so Looney and Statik, we all linked up and Statik had the tunes. Statik was tight with Heartless Crew, but they didn't really take him serious at the time. He was tight with Fonti and them guys because they were from north innit. So when we had a meeting with Timmi Magic from Dream Team I got overlooked. I was cool but they signed Statik and Looney's record, and my bredrin's record. I was like “Rah, OK,” like, “That's cool.” When I showed him the ‘We Told U’ one, he was like “What the fuck is this?” So I shown him the one with Looney, the stripped-down one, it had Magnum Force, K.T. on there, and a couple man was on it. Played it, he went “Yeah, this one's nice, I'd play this though.”

He played my tune which he didn't even sign, so I got paid for 12 weeks straight on Radio 1. So imagine 2001, it was mad. That's when I turned a ghetto celebrity. Dream Team played me and they had two shows innit so they played me on a Sunday morning or on the Saturday afternoon. That was a big thing. That's what started me getting things, people going “Terror man, play me that tune.” I'm like, “Really? I don't even like this music.” When I showed people the original mix, everyone's like [puzzled screwed up face]. Mak 10 was the only one that got it and played it and battered it. Then things started happening. But not until I started doing adverts and putting my tunes out, where I seen Wiley or Dizzee selling 100 in a shop, and I was selling four-five, then next release I sell ten. Then when we started After Shock, the first record ‘We Told U’, we just did 100 white labels because we weren't too sure. The second release, it went from there. That was ‘I Can C U’ ¹⁷³ and the third was ‘Cock Back’.¹⁷⁴

That's when I noticed the change where we were walk into Rhythm Division. I've just gone “Yeah, here's the next instalment, it's ‘Cock Back’”. “Ah yeah yeah yeah, the usual, SOR?” ¹⁷⁵ Jumped in the car. “Give us two boxes!” “That's a bit ambitious innit?” But ‘Cock Back’ was getting battered, it was on Power Play on Deja Vu, everyone was playing it. You could get away with rawness because it was Deja, it was pirate. Everyone was playing my tunes but it didn't go to my head, I thought “Whatever.” We're there about half an hour chatting to Sparky, he's like “Yeah yeah yeah,” all casual. Jumped in the car, we didn't get down two junctions there's a call [screeching brakes noises] “Yo! Come back. We need another couple boxes, they're sold out already.” I was number nine in their chart, but ‘Cock Back’ went number one. They've always been supportive but now it was like [excitable] “Hey man! Yo!” But it was more like they're happy for me. I'm sitting there seeing people with bags, like they're cutting out food, cutting out cocaine, everyone's coming to buy the record. Flashy, we're looking at each other like, “We finally got our fucking record!” I was seeing people walking in wanting it, I'm like, “Did that just happen? Nahhhh!”

And all this completely without contact from the mainstream media, record industry, distributors, anything? Just cutting house, pressing plant, take it to the shops

Radio, pirate radio. RWD mag was around them times. Chantelle Fiddy was around then, mention in the magazine, but it was mainly radio. Channel U just started then too, that was new.

Those magazines were really for the people who were into it already. You weren't reaching NME or anything like that

That came shortly after though, but when that happened with ‘Cock Back’, I was just like, “Rah!” That changed everything, that tune.

How many copies did that do in the end?

About 10,000 eventually. Beforehand records could do 100,000, but the sales were dwindling, so I came off the late end. But I still got a good portion. I was signing on because I left my job in May. We put a record out in July, so I walked out and I was broke. So that day I turned the car around and was like, “Rah, I've got no money”, then we're splitting the cash from the record. I was like, “Shit, I've got to buy a phone!” From that day, 2003, I bought two phones. From that day I've never been offline, I've always been able to call out. I remember Loudmouth saying to me years after that: “If you ain't got no money, you've always got your phone, you can always call out. That's integral for your business.” I just thought, “Fuck not having a phone, I need to chat to girls. I need to phone people if I need anything.” That day changed everything.

After that I did ‘So Sure’. It got seven reloads at Raw Mission, and I thought, “You're just doing that because mandem are telling you to.” No no, he got 80 missed calls.¹⁷⁶ I was like, “What, 80 missed calls?” I was with Sadie [Ama] and them lot and I'm going, “The tune got 80, are you listening?” I rang him up and said, “You just gassing that innit?” He said “No! No! Seriously!” I went, “Alright, I know you won't lie.” “No no no, bruv!” Then the next day, phone was ringing, Elliott Ness, he cut it [to dubplate], bare DJs started cutting the tune and that's another one that just went [whoosh noise]. Then when I done a tune with Shola, that's when the magazines started contacting me.¹⁷⁷ “Shola's on your music! How does it feel?” They was really after her story, but that rose my profile. First I did DJ Magazine, Knowledge magazine, Mixmag, all the magazines, even i-D. All because of Shola.

So Shola brought me on the centre stage. To the point Wiley rings me saying, “You got all the white men on your side [laughs], you got the press.” I'm just like, “You're where I need to be. You You've got a deal!” Obviously the XL deal kind of fell through because really they wanted Dizzee innit.¹⁷⁸ I think Wiley knew it weren't going his way, but he should have made the most of it. Wiley, Jammer, they didn't know how I did it, they were like, “You've got the press on side. You've got the white people.” I'm like, “What? You're Wiley though! No but you, though.” I think everyone was surprised, as a producer I got to the level where you have to be an MC. But it wasn't just because of my tunes. The model I had, I had the label. Every other producer was under a label, someone managing, whereas I was the head honcho. So that's why I stood above everyone.

Was there any thinking behind it saying, “This style needs vocal tunes?” – or was it more seeing it as another garage tune, where vocals were standard?

Nah! I liked slow jams, I still do, I love the old style of slow jams. Slow jams and reggae goes hand in hand for me. I love R&B. Not R&B as it is now, now people call it neo-soul, I don't know why, it'd still be R&B but it'd be slow.

Quiet Storm

Yeah. Jagged Edge, ‘Rain’ ¹⁷⁹ and all them tunes [bassline sounds]. It's got that movements. I didn't even listen to the lyrics. I like all them [hums bassline], I just love the basslines. ‘So Sure’, I was actually trying to make a reggae tune, how about that?

Lovers rock is a London thing. That connection of soul and reggae is specific to here

The same thing! So I was halfway through the tune, it sounded like a reggae tune, then as I finished it – at that time I couldn't control what I was making, I felt like that TV show Heroes.¹⁸⁰ I was on a course, I didn't know how to come one with the equipment. Now if I had an idea I can put it down exactly how I have it in my head. But then it would come out somewhere else. Like that “Sounds cool, sounds cool, ah fuck, that's not what I wanted.” The first person I rang up was Dirty Doogz, I said, “I got this artist called Sadie, what you saying?” He was like [creditable impersonation of Doogz's nasal tone] “Nah, really want the tune for myself.” “Nah that's not the vision man. I want singing on it.” So the second person I called was Kano. I know he'd probably say no, I thought he'd be like “Nah, I want the tune for myself.” So I thought of Dirty Doogz. It almost felt I was chasing him. But Kano's perfect because Kano was one of my favourites of all time, to this day. If we ever worked, I know that we would take out people. Those are the only two I would think of. If Kano didn't do it I don't think ‘So Sure’ would be ‘So Sure’. So what happened was, that was the first time Sadie was even in the studio, and Kano walked in and Kano looked at me. He had his head down. It's almost like they were lovers, they both looking down. I'm like “What's going on here?” Then when Kano delivered his verse, he heard the tune in the room, nodded, and went “Yeah.” Like, “I'm ready.” He was writing it there on the spot. That's what I'm saying. He delivered a 24 [bar verse] and it was magic! It was like, [flabbergasted] “Shit.” We were all sat in the room, went, “This is fucked.” That was the first one. First take.

I made ‘Cock Back’ just a month before I made ‘So Sure’. It was February 2003. What I was trying to do, I always go back to Dizzee. Dizzee at the time was my favourite producer because there was no rules to his music. His music was offkey, I didn't rate him at first. I remember hearing his tunes get played in the rave in Hackney, it stopped the rave, people like, “What the fuck is this?” Six months later the same tune is blasting the rave. When he done ‘Wheel’, I thought, “Bastard! This is so new. This is sick! It's a vibe.” ¹⁸¹ What I got from Dizzee was this guy don't give a shit. He put the tune, went, “I don't care.” I adopted that attitude more so when I did my tunes, I just said, “Fuck it, this is staying.” When I did ‘Cock Back’ – you know when Dizzee had the gunshots in the middle of his tune [gunshot noises]? I just wanted to put the gunshots as a sound effect to go in time to the tune, that was supposed to be just a fill [gunshot noises] cocking back. But I'm listening to this, “Yo, this is a tune!” I sat there, paused it, stopped it, put everything in. I went “Fuck! This is the tune.” I was like, “Yeah.” There was no bass in it, just “Boom, tsch, tsch, boom”: “You know what? This is hard.”

So the original copy had no bass, it was just boom. The kick was heavy. I went “Nah, it needs something”. I put the “Boom, tsch, tsch, boom” it in there, “Fuck it.” That's the most simplest tune I've done. I had doubts, “I can't get it right, I'm taking the piss.” Then Hyper came in as I was making it, he was like “Whooo! What's this?” Then he went, “Any time we go cock… back, them man there they go cock… back” just out of nowhere, I was like, “Aaaah, yes! You know what, I'm putting you on the tune.” He went, “Freeze, nobody move! Right, I'm gonna write the bar, it's on your tune!” So he went off and started spreading the lyric in raves and radio, but no one know the beat. Skepta's got a tune called ‘Gunshot Riddim’, so he went, “Aah, what you say about ‘Cock Back’, I want it on the ‘Gunshot Riddim’.” ¹⁸² Hyper went, “Nah, to be honest, I went to Terror's house, he's got a gun riddim before you have, called ‘Cock Back’. But no one's heard it yet and that's what inspired me to write the lyrics to his tune so I can't give that lyric to you.” Skepta had the ‘Gunshot Riddim’ creeping in.

There was no plan, I was like, “I'll go Commander B studio.” Commander's a pillar to the grime scene, he had the ‘Pum Pum Riddim’,¹⁸³ he had the Night Flight show, where there was the Dizzee and Asher D clash, Wiley and Doogz.¹⁸⁴ A lot of things happened on his show. He gave the commercial go-ahead, him and his brother CK Flash. CK Flash was the garage guy on daytime Saturday, almost the whole afternoon. That's how Sticky got the play, Sticky blew up because he was playing all the Social Circles stuff on there. So I went to studio Walthamstow and I remember this guy in there, obviously Wiley and Lethal, that's when ‘Pow!’ was vocalled in the studio.¹⁸⁵ I knew CK Flash through Paul [Chue], I went gave him tunes, he gave me my chance as well, I'm not gonna lie. So we met Commander through Wiley and Paul, so Commander B says “Yeah come up.”

I swear this is what happened. Me and Flash was like “Fucking hell!”, not shaking, but you know! This is Commander B now, this old guy, quiet, just sitting there, I remember this guy as a kid. I was like, “Fucking hell, this is the big boss now, the commissioner!” He's very well calm, like “Yeah, what you saying, you alright man? Yeah man.” On radio, he sounds very [smooth radio voice] “Yes, you're listening to the Night Flight,” just chilled, zoot, zoned out, chill like a monk, like a Shaolin monk. Looks like he's ready to go fucking sleep. Went in there like “Yeah, I got a new tune.” He always had no emotion. I played ‘Cock Back’. The room was like, man in his desk is behind him, the equipment, so he wheeled his chair back, turned it on loud, sounded sick in his studio. I was like, “Alright.” He stayed emotionless, not moved, sat there. I thought, “Ah he don't like it.” He turned his chair around and still emotionless. Ah fucks sake, oh shit. “Can I have this? Who's got this?” I said, “No one, I've only showed you.” He goes, “Can I have this exclusive?” “Yeah!!” “Alright, I'm gonna play this, any time a war starts I'm gonna use this riddim, the Cock Back riddim yeah. Can I get people on it?” “Yeah!!!!” He played that tune for six months straight before the vocal was laid on it.

He blew the instrumental up, so when you heard the Night Flight, you hear ‘Cock Back’ instrumental. So it was crazy, the lyric was big on the Nasty Crew set, the riddim was separately big over there. I remember Mak 10 comes to me and said “Can I have that?” I went, “Nah. When we vocal, you'll get it first, but let Commander B do his thing.” He's like [sucks teeth, grumbles] “Nuhhh, but bruv.” I said “No man, this is the one tune that if he's doing the job, who am I to say? No disrespect Mak but Hype is spitting the lyric, don't worry you'll play the vocal first,” which he did. So like, Commander B got different roles. He got Shystie, he got bare different man on it, then when I got the official vocal done, that's when peak week came together. That's why ‘Cock Back’ blew up. He blew it up on Choice FM and everyone was listening, so everyone at Eskimo Dance, everyone listened to the Night Flight heard that tune. I remember mans going [hyped-up voice] “Heard your laugh, that gremlin, Commander B, what's going on with that tune?” He didn't say what it is. So when the vocal was done, that's when the record's flying out. If Commander B had said “Nah I don't like it,” the tune could have been dead.

You talk about Wiley and Jammer calling up, people from other crews calling up. People looking into the early days of grime, seeing the DVDs or whatever, they think of arguments as the defining factor – but as you describe it, it seems like there was actually loads of camaraderie too?

I think a lot of it was just rivalry of competition to be honest. I knew Jammer in 1997, I knew Wiley before that. I used to hang out with Wiley's cousin. The original lot, the pioneers, whatever you want to call us, we were just kids doing this thing together. When things started to kick off and it become what it was, we still talked. A lot of it was like people that didn't know each other all starting their crews. So say I had my label, the kids under me didn't know the kids over there, some of them did but it's like, you're creating a community. We're all family in this room, then we go off and have children and the grandchildren don't know they're grandchildren because everyone ain't got time to link up. So they could be feuding and you're kind of related. “No, you are related so hold it down.” “Ah but nah, it's all rivalry though because I want to be number one!” That's what happened. But between the original circle, if it was beef, it's like “Forget music, bruv. What are you saying? It shouldn't even be that.”

We've all fallen out but it all comes together. Like Wiley'll always say, “You're my brother because that's what we've been.” With Wiley, we ain't got no love-hate relationship. I can't say nothing bad on him because I know him differently innit – like my missus, she used to hang around with him. We were all a community, she's got stories, we've all got stories on everyone. I know him differently. When I see Jammer, I know him as Jermaine. If he was saying a lot of stuff – and yeah we have fallen out, we've had some stuff. Even Paul Chue said, “Come on man, Jammer I met you through Terror. What you man doing, man?” If I did fall out with Wiley, it would be let it settle, then go, “Come on, it's stupid innit?” It won't be like the grandchildren fighting. It's different innit. There's no love lost. That's what grime is like now, no love lost.

It's natural with any scene that grows beyond its roots. Hip hop is no longer just one neighbourhood of Harlem

Exactly. I think the difference, I'm not Run DMC, I'm still a Timbo or Dre in my own right, I'm not millionaire, we're yet to hit that plateau. The first generation of grime hasn't even gone through yet, because you can't surpass the Hypers, the Bruzas, all them. All the AJ Traceys and Jammz, they're massive. Even Chippy, they still gotta pay homage. But you put Hyper on a set who ain't been around for a year or two, he buss in the rave more than them! I said to Bruza recently, “The only difference is, when you smacked it with me, you came up in a time that it was too early, then you hit a plateau where there wasn't all these things accessible to you.” Anyone will lose heart. I said to him, “It's hard, but you have to get up on the horse and get it again, you're already there. You gotta convince the new audience and your compatriots, because they're gonna go, ‘Yeah, it's my time now.’ You gotta say, ‘Your time yeah? Let me show you something. Bang!’ You've got to propel yourself into Jay territory, Kanye West territory.” I want to be that guy that younger lots come to and I can move them into place. We've got to move up for the scene to move up. If these guys coming now move above, there still isn't no infrastructure. Kurupt FM, they're managed by –

Stanza

Exactly, so man, they should get in his position. Not management necessarily, but you look at me, I'm responsible for Butterz, Champion, the After Shock lot, Bratt, Jammz and them lot are their own thing but they're still around me, Spyro came from me, do you know what I'm saying? It was only when my old man passed away, I kind of stopped everything and had to take a step back. But now stepping forward it's like, “Who else is going to go and say this is what it is?” Why aren't I not doing this? Why ain't Dexplicit? Why ain't P Jam? Wiley's obviously done it and he's alright, but why are we sitting back and letting people control what they do?

No one can base their careers on Wiley. Wiley does things no one else in any genre ever could

Exactly. But then I think he gets a lot of creditation for things he ain't done as well. But you can't knock him, because he put himself in position. And that's what I've kind of done, but as me. If I was an MC and did what I did, I would be just there with them all. I'm not vocal as him, so I'm always a notch behind. Realistically, when you check the body of work I've done, I've done much more. He's done a lot because he's Wiley. Not taking anything away from him, don't get it twisted, he worked for it.

So to fill in the gap, there's this 2003-04-05 period, grime is hot, the newspapers are paying attention, Dizzee is a superstar for the first time, everyone thinks there's going to be more – and then you get to 2006 and out of nowhere, dubstep shoots out

You know why? The bay between 2003 to the end of 2005, there was no name for it. That's the one problem, so history is always blurred.

Grime was obviously used as a term then, but it was also sublow and also still garage

Everyone who was making it was trying to term it themselves. It's not till when Run The Road came out, the first grime compilation – then people went, “Fuck it, I want to get paid.” ¹⁸⁶ Not me because I was already doing it. I watched the artists fold when 679 was giving single deals for a compilation and calling it grime. It was based around promotion of Kano ’cause they'd signed him – but that's when the name grime stamped its mark. That's when the press went bang: “It's grime.” Chantelle and Martin Clark were the powers that be at that time – like, not complaining, it was gonna be called something innit. You couldn't go calling it “What do we call it?” ¹⁸⁷ That time is just bang, gone, but you got to remember as well – except for myself and a few others – there wasn't no business ethics. They came in, fuck it, the majors came in and just stripped us of everything because we didn't know we was the first. I was a kid, first time, I was 23-24, what business did I know? I didn't know fuck all. I was happy getting my remixes between three and a half and seven grand. I didn't need to DJ and everything those times, it seemed easy, so there wasn't no need for business ethics.

If I saw what I see now, I would have held onto a lot of tunes. I would have had my specials, I would have been DJing then – but it wasn't a trend. It was just like rah. Dubstep had business models within business models, when the grime lot, the oldest was me and Wiley, and we were in our twenties. They saw us from a mile off and just went [rubs hands]. They cherrypicked who they wanted. That's why when dubstep came in, those guys watched the grime lot couldn't get in. They turn around and made it a business and people went, “Why don't we just do that there and that there?” Look at dubstep, even to now, there's been this model. It's still more sounder than what's in grime, because they had the dances, this was the business. Grime wasn't a business. it was mandem vibing and coming off the vibe and it just happened.

Grime was a lot more people as well. It felt like was like half the city. Dubstep was a much smaller core of people, in the phase where it was getting its shit together

It was business! And the guys who were in it were like, “Come on.” Arthur [Smith aka Artwork], Zed Bias, Kode9, they're guys that are uni lecturers, this that. They have the sound mind.

Arthur had been techno, garage, he'd produced pop records, he'd done everything

So all you need, him, then you've got Sarah Soulja works at EMI yeah, who runs Tempa. She's business-minded, she signed my publishing for ‘So Sure’. Who in grime was doing that? No one. We had nobody. The most business-minded person was probably me. Paperchase, Rob, everyone at grime labels didn't see the point. It was like we were hitting a brick wall because we didn't know no better! Probably Paperchase were doing the Jungle Mania stuff, but when you check it deep, we had no one doing business. We had no one. Who? So in the end it was like, “[casual] Rah, rah [pulled up short] rah! Whoa, hold on a minute”. Dubstep had Big Apple records, they had business people, lawyers, things behind it – but in grime, we was fast food. The lawyers that came in didn't sustain us, they came and ripped us to pieces. We was left with nothing, like we got violated.

The dubstep scene looked at what we did, same thing with the jungle scene. D&B scene was parallel. Looked at this and went, “Yeah, OK.” Wiley didn't have the best ethos either. His biggest mistake was, if he had put a label on his white label, put a Eskibeats label on it, then me, Jammer, DaVinChe, all of us would have been a part of Eskibeats. That would have changed everything. He would have the brand where he would be able to sell that different. Wiley kept recording. I would have been one of the main producers. There wouldn't have been no After Shock. But because I had so much records, and also the label and logo, that made me synonymous. I became the guy, because he couldn't be bothered to spend £100 more [to print up labels]. That's the truth! Imagine what I was missing, what the dubstep lot saw. I didn't know! I looked at the dubstep scene and went, “Fuck, wow, we got our arses beat.” We got ripped! We just got violated left right and centre. It was almost like, when you're a young buck you come in the game, you had your run, you had your fun, now, strip us down. Go learn the game now.

That's how I felt so when I looked at the dubstep scene, I was like, “What did they do that we didn't?” My tune is still one of the biggest tunes in the dubstep rave and I'm not even getting nothing of it. I've learned and went “Ah right, you know what, I've just got to come back here and be reimbursed.” When I linked to a live show, that's how the Butterz thing came about. I was short-sighted, because “Hey, he wants to offer me how much? What, £5,000? Fuck, gimme.” Now fast-forward few years, them guys were getting that in booking money to play. I think now everyone's caught up. But dubstep had the business right from morning, because Arthur's probably been through what I'm going through. He was the governor. He made bare man happen. The Zed Biases, they've all been there. When people talk to me they say, “You're a jedi.” Yeah, because I made all the fucking wrong mistakes because I didn't even know. I can't go no more wrong now! I think with the dubstep scene, it was a lesson to where, ‘Whoa. We wasn't taught that.” But sometimes you can't get taught unless you go through it.

So what were you doing from 2006-07, when grime instrumentals weren't selling any more?

The internet, iTunes and CD came in.

And it was just MCs selling their mixtapes and stuff

Do you know what? I was on the CD thing first, when the rest of the mandem were still on the vinyl thing. So I bought myself a CD printer and done a mixtape quickly, mixed, all the bait tunes, got it vocalled here, and then I done them in the mix. I thought, “If I put them in the mix and I put vocals on it and I put sound effects, you can't exactly sell the tunes separately as a mix ting.” I had a few people giving slack, but I was using P Jam's tunes and that. I'd just left 1Xtra, my time was done. I just thought, “Fuck, I gotta do something.” So I had all the tunes I was playing – because everyone was giving me everything innit – so I said, “Let me do a quick mixtape.” I had everyone ringing me, I said “Look, I'm not selling your tune yeah, it's in the mix! It's a DJ mix. I'm selling the CD but it ain't like I'm making anything, I'm just doing it for my own mix. You're acting like I'm trying to sell the tune, but the tune's still available. I've got some on top and it's mixed, sound effects, the tunes are mixing.”

So P Jam's like, “That's bless man, what are man making noise for?” Everyone's happy, I'm still Terror Danjah innit. So everyone was like, “Cool man!” But certain guys were making noise thinking I'm trying to take the tune off of their label and try and put it on After Shock. It wasn't the case. I was like, “Nah, you can do what you want with the songs, I don't give a shit. I'm just trying to turn a CD.” I went to the RWD office and they put it online, I was like “Rah!” That's when I realised things had changed. I walked up with 17 CDs and they went in one day. I went, “Flash, this is future.” “Ah, CDs cost too much”. But I said to my man, “You know what it is yeah, tapes don't run, people don't play vinyl unless you're a DJ. CDs is the course of action, you can put that in your car, rip it and put it on your device, in your iPod.” I knew I was up on the times. But that was the beginning of the end for After Shock as we know it. That was one of many reasons. My CD sold up with all the big mixtapes, but when I convinced those guys a year or two later, it was already too late. The market's been cornered, True Tiger was killing it. All the MCs are killing it,¹⁸⁸ everyone's realised the CD market. Vinyl is slumping, you're lucky if you're selling 100 copies now. It was just horrible, so like in 2008, I had to walk away. So I'm walking away from something – and the dust settles, boom! Because they're selling the vinyl, it's crazy. I look at 2009, all these names I've never heard of are the big guys now. The guys everyone was laughing at are now laughing at us. I remember Cameo going, “This is shit, it's shit!” and I'm like “Cameo man, look. My man's hitting all them festivals, he's on about £4,000. I don't think he's shit you know. Have to respect what he's doing.” Not that it's about money but yeah.

So that was like dwindling times. That was the hardest time for me, that was the haaardest time. 2008-09 was very hard. The only god-saving grace at the time, I've always had my head one step ahead, I was chatting to Elijah since 2007 – I met him through Loudmouth and we went to Mistajam, he used to do the hip hop thing in Nottingham – and then 2008, he tried to do a rave so I made a couple of tunes for that, but it didn't happen. We kept in contact, though, talked about grime all day long and that's the time I was doing my stuff with Bratt so I had a tune what saved me, ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ You know I produced that right?

I didn't know you produced that

A lot of people didn't know. I did that as a joke. I did another electro tune with Bratt and Lauren Mason, it got played a lot. It weren't like our thing but Wiley come with ‘Rolex’ after so I had to remind him, “Don't try it because Logan was playing my record the week before he played ‘Rolex’.” ¹⁸⁹ So I was on the ball, Wiley ain't getting in there. It's Wiley, it doesn't matter innit. So Wiley did get it in the end, but it doesn't matter. After that I said fuck it, it's love. Let's do an electro tune. The second one, let's do ‘Who Do You Think You Are?’ Even that was all a concept, meeting Bratt up in KFC, taking the piss. “Let's fucking do this!” So she went shop the next day and I made a beat in ten minutes. Came back, fine-tuning it, done it, sat it down and went “Fuck it, fuuuuck it. It's hard innit.” I was listening to a lot of Deadmau5 and Calvin Harris at the time, listening stuff out of the box. It wasn't I was trying to do old electro, because that's part of growing up as well. I had a manager called Shaurav D’Silva at the time, along with Maurice, who was part of Butterz too. He pitched it to my man from All Around The World, they were like, “Ah OK.” Pete Tong played it three times on Radio 1. The first time he played it, he went [claps] “Right!” Kano go, “Watch, I'm getting signed.” I went, “He played you, that's sick.” He wasn't lying, Universal picked it up. Then when we played it a couple more times, they shot a video, sold, money from it. It wasn't great but it was still money.

2010, Paul McCartney wife had a TV show in Australia and they took the syncing rights for the theme tune. “Ah, that's alright, yeah!” And Planet Mu approached me 2009, they said, “We'll give you £2,000 advance for your tunes.” I was like, “Fuck this, yeah.” I was broke. I got the deal with Bratt, I thought, “You know what. God's great.” I couldn't sign on any more because they threw me off. I got that money, I'm like “That's brilliant, I can live off that for four, five months. I don't need that much. I'm used to not spending money anyway.”

At that time I was wicked with my money. I was walking everywhere, I was good at budgeting because I can cook. When the Planet Mu thing came along now, I thought alright. LuckyMe did the artwork. They said, “Do you want to come to Glasgow to do a launch party?” “How much is that then?” £350? No grime DJ gets £350, they get about £150 or £50. I already knew the dubstep scene, they're getting at least a grand. At the time I was speaking to Joker and he was like, “Bruv what you doing?” “I'm broke.” “What? Why are you not DJing?” At the time I was like, “What?! That much?! Oh my.” If I get a quarter of that I'm happy. That spurred me on and I started to understand what was going on. Joker was considered grime but then dubstep.