Nadia Rose interview: I don’t want to get lost in the stew – I'm very different to my peers

Nadia Rose is more than Stormzy’s cousin. After electrifying Glasto she’s back playing to a home crowd in London, says Jimi Famurewa
Flower power: Rose is quickly following in the footsteps of cousin Stormzy
Jonangelo Molinari

“I’ve been quite chuffed ever since it happened,” says Nadia Rose, reflecting on a happy moment at this year’s Glastonbury Festival. “But I’m also trying to play it cool,” she adds quickly.

So what was it that slapped a smile on the face of this 24-year-old Croydon MC? The fact that Annie Mac asked her to help kick off proceedings on the Introducing Stage on Thursday? The gleeful frenzy stirred up by her full Saturday afternoon set on the Park Stage? Not quite.

“While I was backstage I was stopped by these two gentlemen who happened to be Jeremy Corbyn’s sons,” explains Rose. “They were campaigning, giving out Corbyn T-shirts, and we just had a nice little chat about politics.” But merely meeting the Labour leader’s kids isn’t the prime source of those fond memories. “I took quite a liking to one of them,” she adds, declining to clarify which of the two younger Corbyns in attendance — Tinder-using Seb or Elijah Wood-lookalike Tommy — it was. “We did swap numbers. I haven’t messaged him yet but maybe I’ll give it a few more days.”

Whether she does pursue this opportunity or not, it makes sense that scions of socialist dynasties are just as keen to get on board with her as grime fans and pop tastemakers: in just a couple of years, Rose has emerged as one of British rap’s most exciting and distinctive voices.

Armed with her trademark hair bunches and a musical style that splices rap, dancehall and garage, she’s hurtled from the mischievous, bassy wobble of 2015’s Station (the video for which featured her doing some unsanctioned skanking on a Southern train track) to the Best Video Mobo at last year’s ceremony (for the one-take dance routine of infectious call-to-arms Skwod) via the rugged style-switching of DFWT (1.8 million YouTube views and counting).

Having seemingly arrived fully formed (in a similar manner to her cousin Stormzy), she was named No 5 in the BBC’s Sound Of 2017 list. In January she even performed the decidedly provocative Tight Up Skirt on Woman’s Hour. What’s more, she was picked for MIA’s Meltdown Festival last month and next Saturday she’ll play Afropunk London at the Printworks in Surrey Quays.

'Stormzy and me do have music together that we did ages ago before all this blew up'

All of this — the rocketing online views, the packed gigs, the high-profile co-signs — would be noteworthy enough. But it’s all the more impressive when you consider that, until pretty recently, Rose was working behind the window of a south London betting shop, scrawling lyrics with a stubby pen whenever she got a chance. “The tips from big winners were a perk,” she laughs. “And, as a writer, I’m always inspired by meeting different people. But I felt trapped because it wasn’t where I wanted to be.”

The eldest daughter of a Jamaican DJ-turned-gas engineer and a Ghanaian nurse, Rose grew up in Thornton Heath with her little brother and caught the performing bug from an early age. She elbowed her way into playground rap battles at Westwood Language College For Girls in Upper Norwood and ended up at the BRIT School (performing arts incubator for Amy Winehouse and Adele) before studying music and music management at university while still pulling 12-hour shifts at the bookies.

On the pulse: Rose may focus on light-hearted zingers at the moment, but she's keen to continue her political engagement 
EMPICS Entertainment

She had always danced, sung and dabbled in theatre (“I was a bit of a triple threat,” she says, half-jokingly) and she presumed acting would be her chosen career route. However, when people from her postcode started making waves as musicians — Krept and Konan, Section Boyz and her cousin, the erstwhile Michael Omari — she was jolted into action. She quit her job, cultivated that distinctive Star Wars-worthy hairstyle and discovered that rap was the perfect outlet for her frantic creativity.

“Through writing I found a way to balance everything that I could do,” she explains. “My flows were almost like I was dancing to the beat; my content and the way I would deliver things tied in with my drama background. It was like I fused it all together.”

'My flows were almost like I was dancing to the beat; my content and the way I would deliver things tied in with my drama background. It was like I fused it all together'

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It’s a perceptive description of her zinger-heavy bars (sample lyric from early party-starter Boom!: “Poured me a rum and I chased it with rum/Bought your tape and I want a refund”), weed-fogged pop culture references and Missy Elliott-indebted bursts of characterful sing-rap.

Inevitably, this style has also prompted observers to bracket her with the other female MCs — Lady Leshurr, Little Simz, Sound Of 2017 winner Ray BLK — reshaping British rap’s male-dominated landscape. Does she welcome these comparisons? “I’m definitely for the breakout that’s going on right now,” she says cautiously. “It seemed for a while that, as women, we were taking a back seat. But I definitely don’t want to get lost in the stew. Because at the end of the day, I’m very different to my peers. Yes, we’re all women but we’re all different.”

She says she has spurned offers to collaborate with female acts for this reason — “There’s a lot of that, where people just want you to work with someone because they’re the same gender as you” — but one studio hook-up she is keen on is a family love-in with Stormzy. “We’ve always been close — our families actually lived on the same road for a long time — and we do have music together that we did ages ago before all this blew up. But it’s something we’re definitely going to do again. I’m working on my album next so that will probably be a good time.”

It’s a tantalising prospect. But what else is in the future? As well as pondering her debut record — and enforcing her cat Simba’s much-needed diet — Rose is also keen to continue her political engagement. Having loudly supported Labour and urged her Twitter followers to register to vote, she sees the spike in youth turnout as an exciting sign of a newly politicised generation. “People who didn’t care about elections went out and thought they could be heard,” she says. “But just because the election is over doesn’t mean it’s finished. I’ll do anything that furthers the Labour cause.”

She leaves the sort of perfectly timed comic pause that fans of her songs will be familiar with. “And, I mean, hopefully Jeremy Corbyn’s son and I will be going for a drink soon…”

Nadia Rose will be performing at Afropunk London on July 22, tickets from afropunkfest.com/london

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