Key facts
- Skepta said the album took six years to make because it was important not to be tone deaf.
- Skepta said grime is a product of immigration and that he wanted to represent multiculturalism.
- Skepta said he is here to set levels and to make rap sophisticated again.
Skepta released The Fork and Knife on November 6, his first album since Ignorance Is Bliss in 2019, he told BBC Newsbeat. He said the record had been in the making for six years and that he wanted to make sure it was not tone deaf.
The album addresses immigration, racism, Brexit and culture wars, according to the interview. In the track Innocent Smile, featuring Chase and Status and Madness frontman Suggs, he raps about the lack of love for an immigrant child and asks whether it was Brexit or Covid.
Skepta, whose real name is Joseph Olaitan Adenuga Jr, was born and raised in Tottenham, north London, to Nigerian immigrant parents. He said grime is a product of immigration and that he wanted to represent what it looks like if you give an immigrant child a chance.
He also said he is here to set levels and to make rap sophisticated again, and that a rap chart would give newcomers a chance to be seen and heard.