HIP HOP Will Dizzee Rascal cause a stir in U.S.?

The rapper grew up in the British equivalent of a housing project.
By JAKE O'CONNELL
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK -- Americans might not understand what Dizzee Rascal is saying, but they should be able to figure out where he's coming from.
The 19-year-old rapper/producer grew up on a rough London "council estate" -- the British version of the U.S. housing projects where hip-hop was born -- that was as bleak as his beats. He was an only child raised by his mother after his father died young.
Dizzee, born Dylan Mills, was expelled from numerous schools before settling at one where, helped by a music teacher, he learned his craft.
Now the thick-accented teenager has beaten out megastars Radiohead and Coldplay for Britain's coveted Mercury Prize, practically invented the "grime-hop" genre and been showered with critical praise for his debut album, "Boy on da Corner," a mix of schizophrenic thoughts, bitter reflections and social criticisms.
"Boy in da Corner" doesn't sound like anything else -- a rare feat for a musician of any age. Literally throbbing with teenage aggression, Dizzee's music is the future sound of London -- now.
A lack of agenda is his most lethal weapon.
"I'll go in [the studio] and just look to see what I can create with music ... just trying to make something different," Dizzee said in a telephone interview from London. "I listen to other music as well, whatever beat would catch me, no matter what it was, I was really open to it and tried to understand why this feels good."
Mostly unknown in U.S.
Whether Dizzee's sound will translate to American audiences remains to be seen. "Boy in da Corner" has moved more than 200,000 units in England. His American record company, Matador, home to indie rock legends Pavement and Guided By Voices, has shipped a modest 50,000 copies since the album's January release.
The programming departments for the top three hip-hop stations in New York all said they had never heard of Dizzee Rascal. But he was in the top 20 at the New York University radio station and in Dusted Magazine, which compiles charts of more than 50 college stations.
Dizzee doesn't mind who listens, saying he "feels blessed to just be able to contribute to music." He describes his audience as "whoever -- punk people, hip-hop people, street people, grunge, electro, techno."
That's not a surprise, considering Dizzee lists Kurt Cobain as a major influence -- and it's in his brutally honest and vulnerable lyrics that he most resembles the late Nirvana frontman.
Dizzee's self-described "freezing-cold flows" -- equal parts confession and bravado -- are as paradoxical as they are staggering. Loaded with East London in-speak and patois-filled cadences, he describes his tactics best himself in the lyric "mouthfuls skippin' round my head like dancers."
Rough background
After honing his craft on school computers, Dizzee became a popular pirate-radio MC as a member of the garage collective Roll Deep Crew. He recorded his first song, "I Luv You," at age 16.
Although music gave Dizzee more direction, it couldn't free him from a violent lifestyle. He was stabbed five times last summer at the Cyprus resort Ayia Napa, and had to have an emergency operation.
"If it wasn't so public it's something I would have kept to myself like a million other things," says Dizzee, downplaying the attack. "I was living that kind of life before the stabbing, it's not new, it's something I always knew could happen."
Mirroring the violence that often plagues the U.S. hip-hop scene, members of a rival U.K. garage crew were implicated in the stabbing, but investigations proved inconclusive.
Slick Rick's success
Dizzee is not the first English rapper to cross the Atlantic. Slick Rick arrived in the Bronx from England in 1976, later introducing his regal flow on the classic 12-inch single "The Show" and the flip side, "La Di Da Di," along with Doug E. Fresh.
Slick Rick's 1988 album "The Great Adventures of Slick Rick" made him a rap legend. But no matter what happens to Dizzee's career, he shares more parallels with the late Biggie Smalls than his countryman.
On "Boy in da Corner," Dizzee's track "Do It" is reminiscent of one of Biggie's most harrowing recordings, "Suicidal Thoughts." In both, the listener senses the weight in their voices as they contemplate suicide.
The difference is that Biggie shoots himself at the end of his song, where Dizzee optimistically advises, "Strong you got to be it / if you wanna get through it / Stretch your mind to the limit / you can DO IT."