Grime And Punishment

Dizzee Rascal doesn’t believe in the curse of the Mercury Prize. Why would he? Since bagging the gong for his 2003 debut, Boy In Da Corner, the east London MC has seen his career soar into high orbit. He’s whipped critics into a state of hyperventilated shock and awe, freestyled at the Oxford Union and recorded with Beck, Joss Stone and the Arctic Monkeys. Last month, he was back at the Mercurys, watching his third LP Maths + English lose out to Klaxons.

“Mercury curse – it don’t mean nothing to me,” says Rascal, his rat-tat-tat patois splitting the difference between a reggae toast and a soccer player in post-match interview mode. “People have talked about it. But I can’t see how winning or not winning a prize has any effect on your career. You’ve got to make your own luck. There’s no curse that hard work can’t overcome.”
Steeped in clattering grime beats and gunshot tempos, Maths + English witnesses Rascal both refining and widening his music vistas. Lyrically, he doesn’t hold back: ‘Sirens’ finds him admonishing the British police whilst bragging about this bad boy status (“12 black boots on my bedroom floor, what they want with Rascal I’m not sure”); on ‘Hardback (Industry)’ he fires potshots at the music business (not that Rascal’s entirely high-minded – no need to elaborate on the subject of ‘Pussyole’).
From most rappers, this might come off as a schtick. Rascal’s flow rings powerfully true, however. A native of east London’s infamous Bow housing projects, he was expelled four times from school by the time he was 15 and once arrested for robbing a car. And while hardly in the 50 Cent shot-nine-times-in-broad-daylight-league, he’s experienced his share of street violence. Shortly before his Mercury win, Rascal was pulled off a moped in Cyprus and stabbed four times in the chest.
Looking back, he’s reluctant to dwell on the incident. But he acknowledges that, from an early age, conflict was part of his life. “Where I come from, that sort of stuff isn’t unusual,” he says. “Fights break out. Kids die. It goes with the territory, man. It’s not right and it needs to stop, but it’s in the atmosphere. People accept it. It’s what they know.”
Rascal says he’s not proud of his gangster past. Still, it’s clear he’s not above claiming bragging rights on Maths + English, particularly on ‘Sirens’, based, he confirms, on a real life mugging he carried out as a teenager.
“Yeah, it’s true. Not that I’m proud of myself, you know. But you gotta talk about what you know. You can’t deny what you are or what you’ve done. When the fans hear the music, they know what’s for real and what’s bullshit. I ain’t giving them no bullshit.”
Still, the new record is notably more upbeat than the post Mercury-comedown release, Showtime. Rascal attributes this to maturity but also to his increasing willingness to embrace the perks of hip-hop stardom.
“I’ve learned to chill, how to enjoy the things that go with being well known. There’s a lot of good energy in my life today. Positive energy, which I pour into the music. Because, in the end, that’s all that counts.”

Dizzee Rascal plays Some Days Never End at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham on October 25 with Groove Armada