Youngiz: "When it’s time to step up, I want to step correctly – and do everything in my power to make a name for myself"

For the better part of five years, Youngiz was regarded as an enigmatic force – hovering around the edges of the Dublin scene, always on the verge of a major breakthrough. Following a string of early stand-alone singles, he was still a relative unknown when he crafted an underground hit alongside Tallaght’s Smilez – with their 2021 collaborative track ‘Outside’ garnering nearly 780,000 views on YouTube, and similar figures on Spotify.

But it wasn’t until 2025 that the Leixlip-raised rapper saw his profile officially rise from promising up-and-comer, to a commanding presence in homegrown music. In less than a year, he’s made the jump from thousands of social media views to millions, as well as further cementing his position in the Dublin scene with a high-profile guest spot on Travy’s chart-topping SPOOKY project.

Youngiz has stepped up as a serious force on the international stage too, with an appearance on the massively popular US music platform On The Radar, which has previously played host to the likes of Drake, Central Cee, Kodak Black and Ice Spice.

But as he reflects in the opening lines of his On The Radar freestyle (which has since been released as a single, titled ‘JAY-Z’) it was football, not music, that he first fell in love with.

“I feel like that’s every young boy’s dream, to be a footballer – but that dream kind of died down, and I needed a new dream!” he laughs. “I never wanted to be a rapper. I dropped my first song with one of my mates who was on my football team, just because I saw him rapping, and I was like, ‘This looks fun’. That’s how it all began.

“I always had some sort of creativity in me,” he adds. “I maybe wasn’t the best in school, but I was always good with words, and I always knew how to talk my way out of situations. So I could sense there was something there – it was just about where it needed to be channelled into.”

After football, he started to view music as his “new way of escaping”.

“I needed a new way out,” he nods. “An escape from financial struggles, but also life sometimes too – because with music, you can be in a whole different dimension.”

It’s a concept that he’s continued to embrace with his own brand and mantra, The Great Escape, or TGE – which he not only calls out in his songs, but, at the time of our conversation, wears emblazoned on a chain around his neck.

“TGE started with football, when me and my mates were playing,” he explains. “We were low in the league, so The Great Escape then was about not getting relegated. But it just became a whole thing – that extra boost of power within yourself, when you say ‘TGE’. It’s like, ‘Okay, lock in’ – or remembering what the goal is. And then it just grew.”

Although he’s been releasing music for over five years, Youngiz tells me he wasn’t “actually in the game until last year.”

“I started treating it more like a job,” he resumes. “I didn’t understand what it meant to market your music. Before, I just thought you’d drop on YouTube, get a bit of attention, and keep moving.

“But I did a writing camp at Warner in 2024. I met Sexyy Red and a couple of people. It was meant to be for Offica, but he couldn’t go, so I got the opportunity. I didn’t even know what it was. I didn’t even know I could be meeting all these established artists until I got there. But it showed me that these people aren’t too far away at all. It was at that point I told myself I was going to start taking things more seriously with rap.”

Hailing from Leixlip, the Dublin scene was never that distant: “It’s basically Dublin,” he laughs. “We still get the Dublin Bus!”

“There’s a lot going on,” Youngiz says of the scene here. “Rappers-wise, there’s guys like Travy – but people know that anyways! deathtoricky as well. He’s doing really good. I met him at Travy’s show, and found out he’s from near my area too. And then there’s new-comers like Kaeyan.”

Back in August, North Dublin rapper Kaeyan shared his own spin on Youngiz’s On The Radar freestyle on TikTok, with the video going on to clock up over 1.5 million views.

“It went crazy,” Youngiz enthuses. “For a second I was like, ‘Yo bro, chill – this is my song!’ Nah, he’s definitely going to go far, if he keeps putting in the work. I’m not a bad mate or anything, but it takes a lot to impress me – and he actually does impress me. I think he’s really cold.”

As evidenced by his shout-out to his manager, Nathan Sauramba, on ‘JAY-Z’, Youngiz is also quick to give credit to the behind-the-scenes figures who make Dublin rap so special.

“Liam Harris is a very talented producer,” he says of the long-time collaborator of Travy and Elzzz. “He’s the one that made the beat for my On The Radar freestyle. I probably make my best work with him, when it comes to the drill essence of stuff.”

Youngiz. Copyright Abigail Ring/ hotpress.com

Youngiz makes no secret of his Irish pride in his lyrics – embracing that identity as what sets him apart from other artists in the global rap scene.

But that stance has also drawn unwanted attention from the murkier corners of the internet. Earlier this year, a man The Times have previously described as “a prominent far-right figure on social media” targeted Youngiz and Travy in an anti-immigration compilation video, captioned “Ireland is finished”. The video, which was viewed nearly 344,000 times, also took issue with customers enjoying Mama Shee’s Nigerian dishes on Moore Street, and Baxto’s Kebab Kurdish Cuisine in Dublin 15.

“If I was out here killing people, then okay,” Youngiz says of that far-right attention. “But all I’m doing is representing the country, and doing what I want to do – and they have a problem with that, because of my skin colour. This year especially, I feel there’s been way more racist comments and stuff on TikTok. In other years it wasn’t that bad. But now, if you see a Black person post and say anything too Irish, you’ll see the comments going crazy.

“But they’re not even wise, because they’re only making me bigger, and bringing more eyes to me,” he adds. “I don’t get the way they think sometimes…”

For now, Youngiz is focused on “staying in their faces”, and continuing to build momentum ahead of his debut EP, IT IZ WHAT IT IZ, which is expected soon.

“It’s about attacking this thing with as much pressure as possible,” he concludes. “But not forcing it, either. When it’s time to step up, I want to step correctly – and do everything in my power to make a name for myself.”

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