Reflections
Grime is a genre of music that oringated within the UK and has seen much success over recent years as the number of people listening to the genre has risen. Grime can be considered a sub-genre of UK Garage and hip-hop but has its own distinctive style which sets it apart from other similar genres.
Grime's Giants
Over time, Grime has become a more rapidly growing branch of music, and this has undoubtedly come from significant artists whose views and interpretations of modern society are expressed through their grime music videos.
Skepta - Shutdown
Skepta, is an English MC, rapper, grime artist, songwriter and record producer of Nigerian descent. Shutdown is his number one selling single. It was released as the second single from Skepta's fourth album Konnichiwa (2016) on 26 April 2015 through Boy Better Know. His Second top hit 'Shutdown' in his album had significance to the genre of grime as in the music video and lyrics, there are controversial. would say the music video falls into the style of a hybrid of Performance and narrative. He is shown to be rapping to lyrics thought the video and performing to the camera. However I also feel that there is a hidden narrative in the video. The narrative shows story of how Skepta has risen out of poverty into fame through grime.
Grime was a platform by which youthes of london could communicate and get their voices heard by the public, and politic issues could be raised. Looking at the lyrics
"Me and my G's ain't scared of police
We don't listen to no politician
Everybody on the same mission
We don't care about your -ism and -cisms"
Carol Vernallis states that a clear convention of music editing is that the video may disrupt or break the conventions of continuity editing, shown at different points of the video when the lyrics change to a controversial young girl's voice the video is disrupted and the scenery is changed to a dark stairwell.The editing may also be brought to the foreground, become visible and not hidden opposed to the invisible style of continuity editing. Meaning the video will have a style of editing running throughout that is distinctive to that video this shown through the jump cuts used which adds to fast moving grime lifestyle.
As grime music was slowly diluted in a bid to make it acceptable for the mainstream, the artists who once pioneered this gritty genre turned to electro beats and vacuous female backing singers to sell their records. Grime became confused.
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However, not all integrity of the street genre was lost in its commercial transformation. In amongst the brain numbing pop records - falsely tagged with grime - have been some truly grime worthy commercial tunes that have not only kept their honour, but have also appealed to a more knowing mainstream audience without losing the vision.
Kano - P's and Q's
P’s and Q’s was made up of a structure different to the clattering bass lines and rapid fire bars that we were used to, but it was definitely still grime, and it was good. The beat complimented Kano’s now laid back style and the content was more mainstream friendly than grimes fundamental crack dealing, gun toting verses that often frequented in those days.
P’s and Q’s brought a sense of professionalism almost unprecedented in the grime scene at that time. Ironically, the fact that it wasn’t even released into the charts, being available only as a 12” record, makes P’s and Q’s truly ahead of its time.
Tempa T - Next Hype
Within grime the growth of music videos has become prominent with more artists making music videos for their songs. Usually grime videos have certain conventions which most videos tend to adhere to. Examples of this would include Tempa T "Next Hype", the video has an urban backdrop as well as some scenes within a gym and within a building.
However some grime videos don't stick to these conventions and do something completely different and do a different style within the video which often works well. Examples of this include "Game over" in which the video does a 360 degree pan around the artists and some cuts, close-ups, mid shots, and some long shots.
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