Get to know Oscar #Worldpeace, the grime-influenced rapper with heaps of lyrical substance

So far in 2018, grime, drill and UK rap have been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Targeted by some media as a contributing factor behind the recent spike in knife and gun crime, the unfair blaming of young black voices hasn’t stopped rappers like Oscar #Worldpeace from sharing their truths. “Being from Tottenham, there’s a lot of things that go down,” says the Mike Skinner-approved wordsmith. “I’ve had a real life – I’m not one of these fakes – and I’ve pretty much seen it all. I may not have done it all, but I’ve definitely seen it all. I want to be the change I want to see in the world, so when I approach my music as a black man I have a responsibility.”

Oscar grew up in North London to a Jamaican mother and Ghanaian father, his music-making cousins inspiring him to do the same. “I wanted to be just like them,” he says, “so I started getting into it, writing bars and trying to impress them.” Those bars would lead him to an early life of grime during his school years, his favourite MC being Kano and his favourite album ‘Home Sweet Home’. Along the way, though, reggae, hip hop, and r’n’b powerhouses like Lauryn Hill, Mary J. Blige and Faith Evans would sway Oscar’s sound, contributing a more thoughtful side to his musical roots. “I remember my mum playing a lot of women at home,” he adds. “That’s been a big influence in my music – my mother’s record collection.”