Interview by Garry Mulholland

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The most bonkers thing about hanging out at Dizzee Rascal’s place is its total absence of bonkeration. The rapper’s Dirtee Stank label HQ is a modest, purpose-built business space in a quiet mews in an anonymous part of outer London. I can’t be any more specific than that because the entire Dirtee Stank workforce - that would be label boss Laurence - has sworn me to secrecy. As Dizzee, aka Dylan Mills, puts it later, “I like moving in the shadows.”

Bow’s most famous export may prefer to keep his private and business life on the down-low, but there’s nothing shadowy about the vertiginous rise in his profile over the last year. Since his collaboration with disco wise guy Calvin Harris and singer Chrome, ‘Dance Wiv Me’, spent four weeks at number one last summer, the former grime pioneer and teenage bad boy has become the dance-floor friendly rapping choice of everyone and their mum, charming his way through appearances on Newsnight and Friday Night With Jonathan Ross, triumphing at this year’s Glastonbury, and scoring a second successive chart-topper with the Armand Van Helden-produced ‘Bonkers’. ‘Bonkers’ wasn’t just the first single to sell over 100,000 copies in its first week since 2006’s ‘Crazy’ by Gnarls Barkley, it made Dizzee the first artist to score successive number ones on his own independent label. The most bonkers thing about that, according to Dizzee himself, is the fact that he only left previous label XL because they didn’t understand his new pop direction. It’s evidence enough that Mills is casually turning the pop world upside-down.

Dizzee’s major break of the Britpop rules comes down to something entirely more complicated, though. He has pulled off the impossible - crossed over to the white mainstream as a black British artist without enduring a violent backlash from fans of underground urban music. There are those, he insists, who do see him as a sell-out, but their voices have been drowned out by a majority who have finally decided to be happy for a young black man doing well for himself in pop’s fickle milieu.

Dizzee has always been a little different. The boy was just 18 when his debut album, Boy In Da Corner, won the Mercury Music Prize. In the same week in August 2003 that the record was released, he was stabbed six times while performing with Roll Deep crew in Ayia Napa. Rumours about infighting between both rival gangs and rap crews threatened to engulf his career. But Mills survived both physically and emotionally, refusing to be drawn further into the murky situation in either song or interview, touring relentlessly, getting back into the studio, and beguiling everyone in the business who had dealings with him.

While 2004’s Showtime album continued to mix grimey tales of the East End streets with eclectic samples from rock records and musicals, 2007’s Maths + English saw Dizzee beginning to gradually change tack. There was a rambunctious old school hip hop feel to huge tracks like ‘Flex’, ‘Bubbles’ and ‘Sirens’, and single ‘Pussyole (Old Skool)’ bordered on raved-up hip house. When Mills made the decision to get in touch with Calvin Harris and ask if he had any good beats knocking around, it was an inspired gamble timed perfectly to chime with Britain’s desperation to dance away the recession blues.

But today, at Dirtee Stank HQ, surprises continue to abound. It turns out that Dizzee’s career mentor, manager and co-producer Cage, aka Nick Cage, is a large, white, middle-aged cockney with the demeanour of a bouncer and the earthy wit of a market trader; that the only drink you’ll find at the studio-cum-office is crates and crates of vitamin water that they were sent for free; and that Cage and Dizzee are busy putting the finishing touches to a tune produced by, of all people, Dutch king of trance fromage Tiesto, and deciding whether it should be put on the new album, Tongue ’N’ Cheek, at the last minute (they went for it; it’s called ‘Bad Behaviour’, and it’s ruddy fantastic, actually).

‘Bad Behaviour’ fits perfectly on a rude and bubbly 11-track long-player that will probably disappoint fans of the brooding Boy In Da Corner, but will absolutely delight everybody else with its blend of rave, hip hop, reggae and punch-your-lights-out boy-pop ebullience. Another Harris and Chrome collaboration ‘Holiday’ will probably have hit number one by the time you read this, and ‘Dirtee Cash’, an inspired reboot of Stevie V’s early nineties rave anthem ‘Dirty Cash’, will be the party theme of the ongoing credit crunch.

And Dizzee himself? He looks predictably spry in his sportswear and is so relaxed and easy to talk to that my prepared questions become redundant. The boy’s on top of the world, and loving every second of it.

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SP: You’ve pulled off something pretty unique for a black British artist: you’ve crossed over to a young mainstream pop audience, and the broadsheet critics and chattering classes, but without compromising your street edge and alienating your original urban fanbase. How the hell have you managed what so many have tried and failed to do in the past?

DR: Ha! For a start, I’ve got good people around me - Cage, who’s a solid rock, and the Dirtee Stank team. And doing what I wanted to do the first time around with the first album helped... just doing things my way and then just making a natural progression. It’s so mad because, with the XL label, Maths + English was the last album of that contract. And tracks like ‘Flex’ and eventually ‘Dance Wiv Me’... I showed them to XL and they just didn’t get it! So people should understand... there was no pressure to get into pop. That was me. It was just from sitting and really reviewing pop on MTV all day long and shit like that. Plus I’ve been on tour with everyone from Justin Timberlake to the Red Hot Chili Peppers to Jay-Z to Nas. Because once you reach that level it’s all pop, innit? 

SP: You make it all sound simple. But if it was simple then Hot Chocolate and Junior and Soul II Soul and Mark Morrison and So Solid Crew and countless other short-lived black Brit phenomena would have pulled it off before you...

DR: No, it’s not that simple, but I’ve always been willing to learn. I’ve never felt comfortable, or like I’ve made it and everything I do is cool. And as much as I’ve got the pop kids in my sights when I make my tunes, I’ve also got the person on the estate in mind: what are they gonna think about it?

SP: But it’s those estate kids that give someone like you a real going-over if they think you’ve sold out or become too pop or too white...

DR: And they do! But, at the same time, make up your mind. You’re calling me a sell-out but you’re still doing music that I was doing in 2001. So a sell-out I might be, but I’ve left something at least. You’ve got to take everything with a pinch of salt, even the compliments. Take a step into the real world, outside of the music industry. That helps.

SP: How do you feel now about your early career, especially Boy In Da Corner, which was such an instant critical success?

DR: I listen back to it and some of it just makes me cringe. But I’m proud of it. It’s like what you were saying about critics... kids might say I’ve sold out, but there still hasn’t been an album to match Boy In Da Corner since. It’s embedded in British music history. So I’ve done my part as an artist.

SP: Does grime even exist anymore? Unless you’re part of the scene you never hear about it...

DR: That’s because it’s so low under the radar, probably back to where it was in 2000; the kids on the estate an’ that - beyond the estates. It’s round the world in little pockets and it’s gone back to underground, probably because a lot of the people who tried to go mainstream... it didn’t work, whether the songs were crap or whether they just didn’t know how to be at that level when they got there. And the rest are just too ignorant to step out and make any changes.

SP: Any exceptions?

DR: [Dirtee Stank label artists] Newham Generals. Obviously. D Double E from the Generals... I respected him before because he was drum’n’bass before grime. I love his beats. Me, him and Cage just sit and talk about music and he’s got a proper, wide scope for music in general. He comes from a musical family.

SP: This is the thing that separated you from your peers from the beginning, though. You’ve always had an eclectic taste in music and you were happy to sample, and talk in public about, music that had nothing to do with the urban scene.

DR: Yeah, a lot of artists say it, but I was really open to everything. I could talk about rave records and Nirvana records ’cos I was into them heavily, like I’m heavily into hip hop now. It’s definitely helped, being into drum’n’bass and all those extreme types of music... it just widens your education. Originally, as a kid, it was heavy metal concerts that I wanted to emulate. I wanted people to jump around and mosh around and do all that wild shit. And now people do that at my shows while I’m making the poppiest music I’ve ever made. I love it, man.

SP: So has the big commercial leap of the last year taken you by surprise? 

DR: A bit. I was going over it with Cage last night and it’s a bit nuts, when you look at where we’ve come from. I’ve always had a bit of a business vision and the imagination to be this larger-than-life thing, but to actually do it... to actually look at the statistics on paper with the kind of shit that we’ve done, it does surprise me. It’s baffling.

SP: How much of this was a cunning plan?

DR: I wouldn’t say plan, I just have business acumen. I used to call myself an executive when I was young; I just liked businessy things. I always had these little crews when I was at school.

SP: So third album Maths + English wasn’t a deliberate ploy to move away from grime and start establishing a pop and rap audience?

DR: It was, but not at first. At first it was just going to be Showtime part two. Cage reached the point where he wouldn’t let me go into the studio and work unless I had a clear idea of what I wanted to do. And that made sense, ’cos I’d just be there pressing buttons and making music the same way I made Boy In Da Corner. That was cool then, ’cos I was young and excited, and it worked. But you can’t keep doing the same thing. It’s gotta be larger.

SP: When you decided to do ‘Dance Wiv Me’ with Calvin Harris, did you and Cage have any moments of doubt about whether this was the right direction to go in?

DR: No. As soon as Calvin sent me that beat I knew it was massive. Anytime I get a beat which I listen to over and over and over again, it means I’m absorbing it... becoming part of the beat. I didn’t know how big it would be till we’d actually finished it, because at the beginning we didn’t have Chrome on it. There were certain things missing and some of the lyrics were pants. But in the end I didn’t regret a thing. I knew with some people it wouldn’t be their cup of tea, but it’s a positive, sun-shiney track; doin’ it my way. I’m glad I reached out to Calvin.

SP: You’ve made new single ‘Holiday’ with Calvin, too. Do you work together in the studio?

DR: We’ve never been in the studio together. Once I laid down some guide vocals in London for another track we didn’t end up doing. With ‘Dance Wiv Me’ and ‘Holiday’ it was just files back and forth. All the producers I work with, it’s always on the phone. The only producer I ever really work in the studio with is Cage.

SP: Did you think that ‘Dance Wiv Me’ was a number one - a career-changer - when you were making it?

DR: I knew that more with ‘Bonkers’. We were immediately getting a bigger reaction than we did with ‘Dance Wiv Me’. I didn’t think ‘Dance Wiv Me’ was a number one until it pretty much got there. But it being number one for four weeks - that was a turning point in my life. And the way it happened... I remember when we were talking about going independent: ‘The major labels are full of shit. They’re still trying to offer me the same money as for Boy In Da Corner. I mean, I’m a sure bet. I don’t need to be told to go in the studio. I don’t need to be told to write a song. Either way I’m gonna be putting in that work. I’ll tour even if I’m ill. I’ve probably missed, like, three shows in seven years. And I’ve got a track record behind me: top 20s, this award, that award. If I was an indie band they’d be throwing half a mil at me.’ So we said, ‘You know what? Fuck it! Let’s just do it. What have we got to lose? Let’s just do it with this one track, ‘Dance Wiv Me’.’ And we did it, independently, and it went number one. So it’s mad how it happened. The timing was brilliant.

SP: So the Dirtee Stank label was a reaction to circumstances, rather than something you’d planned all along?

DR: Well, I was just a kid when I started it - 2000/2001, just to get my instrumentals in the shops. Then when I got signed, I kept Dirtee Stank to put out other artists’ music. But at that point in my career it was perfect for putting out that one song. This album’s pretty much made on the back of ‘Dance Wiv Me’. So the challenge was to make every song not like that one.

SP: Were you nervous about competing without any label money behind you?

DR: I was just so inspired by what Jay-Z and so many other people in hip hop had done. I love the idea of being a mogul and being an entrepreneur. Even at XL, me and Cage were so much part of every decision that it had always been in our hands anyway. So I weren’t too scared. It almost felt like there was fuck all else to do. 

SP: You say that you immediately felt ‘Bonkers’ was a number one, but ‘Bonkers’ is one of the most in-your-face, noisy and - let’s face it - tuneless number ones of all time...

DR: It shouldn’t really have got any radio play. It’s as hard as ‘I Luv U’ or anything I’ve put out before, but it’s got that euphoria, innit? That thing from the nineties that I used to get from house tunes; that ravey pop. I’ve tried to encapsulate a lot of the nineties feel in this album, like on ‘Dirtee Cash’. It’s taken me a while to get a real understanding of that rave feel, because I really wouldn’t have done this four or five years ago. I hated it! Now I’ve been around and been to places like Ibiza and seen it in its environment and I see why people like it. Being at the top and understanding what works on radio, I get it now. My taste in music is changing as well. I’ve got hip hop sussed. It’s my favourite music. So it’s about trying to suss out different types of music. But to do it, I needed to bring in Calvin and Armand Van Helden because I’m not necessarily gonna make something like that. My thing normally when I do shit myself is a hybrid - a bit of everything; a bit unorthodox. But I’m at a stage where I know that unorthodox would only get so far. I’ve seen too much to allow that.

SP: One of the biggest surprises about Dirtee Stank is the office. I know you don’t want me to give any clues as to where we are, but we’re in a modest space in a backstreet in a very unglamorous part of London. Weren’t you tempted to rent some bling-bling building in the West End and show the world how well you’re doing? ‘Let the champagne splash!’ as you put it on ‘Bubbles’? Where’s your hip hop front?

DR: Look, I’ve always been a bit of a dark horse in that way. I always try and show the least. You don’t see me in the papers a lot. I like moving in the shadows and then come in and do my ting and fuck off again.

SP: The most notable lyric on Tongue ’N’ Cheek is, perhaps, ‘Leisure’. You’re counselling against people on the urban scene pretending that they’re more gangsta than they actually are...

DR: I’m just saying what’s that all about anyway. These are things I’ve got to think about for myself, too. Still being stupid enough to listen to a lot of the critics and people in hip hop in general; that you have to be hard to be a rapper. You know what? I’ve genuinely come from some bullshit; I’ve genuinely been in enough bullshit and enough fights and enough nonsense to justify being bad. There’s a lot of shit people don’t even know. But do I have to exude that all the time? Can I just make music? Was I even really about that in the first place? I just collected all them thoughts and put them down into the song. I mean, let’s all just take it easy, mate! I’ve tried to make the most positive album. It’s naughty, and there’s things some people ain’t gonna like about it, but the other day I was in Leyton... I went to play the album for a few people, just normal estate kids an’ all that, and they were shocked because they were buzzing and happy. But it’s still me. I’m happy, y’know?

SP: You’ve started smiling a lot in the videos. Rappers aren’t supposed to smile.

DR: I know! That’s the thing! Do you have to badden before people take you serious? Why can’t we just have fun and it be alright? Do we have to just suffer all the time? It’s all bollocks really, innit? And I don’t really get that from any other kinds of music. Rock’s got a bit of that, I s’pose, with the emo shit, which is about being miserable. But part of being an artist for me is ever-changing. I can’t feel the same way all the time.

SP: Does that mean you’re a happier person now than when you were making Boy In Da Corner and Showtime?

DR: Yeah! Definitely. I ain’t going through half the shit that I was going through on Boy In Da Corner. And the things I moan about now... I wouldn’t dare moan about it on music because everyone would think I was an arsehole! I’ve been told enough times, believe me! I wanna make music that says it’s alright to be happy. The next generation of youths who listen to Tongue ’N’ Cheek; that will be their Boy In Da Corner. So they’ll be able to make an album that’s fucking bubbly and lovely. I know there’s a recession an’ that, but there’s not gonna be a recession forever. And this is baller music for UK ghetto youths. English bad boys. An English take on all the shit that I loved from Snoop and Jay-Z and Too Short and Cash Money an’ that.

SP: I know everyone is wary of the term, but do you think, by accident, you have become a ‘role model’?

DR: I think, because of some of the choices I made, I was always gonna be. For a start, I weren’t a saint at school. I put all my energy into one subject. At the beginning of my career that was one of the biggest things about me - my music teacher and the school. So that was all about putting trust and faith in the school educational system in this country, for a start. And that’s not to mention all the kids from all the fucking council estates across the UK, before I was on TV, that heard my tapes or came to raves to see me. They’ve pretty much grown up with me and they see me on the TV now. That’s a role model. I’m a role model for a million-plus MCs, even if they don’t wanna admit it. Boy In Da Corner meant that a lot of my peers look up to me.

SP: And you’re comfortable with role model status?

DR: Yeah. Because aside from ego... if your heart really is in artistry you wanna influence like you’ve been influenced. That’s the main reason I make music. I get paid an’ that, but there was a point where I weren’t getting paid; where I was doing things to get money to make music. That’s how dedicated I was.

SP: My favourite new tune on the album is ‘Can’t Tek Me No More’. I’m amazed that you’ve made a track inspired by a 1980 reggae film, Babylon.

DR: The mad thing about that is I was at a cousin’s house after the MOBOs, we started watching Babylon, and I fell asleep on the couch; just conked out. I woke up, and you know when you can hear something going over and over in your head? [sings] ‘We can’t tek no more of dat, no no no no no no, we can’t tek no more.’ I was like, ‘What the fuck is going on, man?’ I woke up and that scene was on when they’re in the youth club all chanting this. For the next couple of weeks me and my cousin were chanting this phrase at each other. But the mad thing was, about a month later, Shy FX sent me a beat with that exact same sample. I’d never mentioned anything to him. I’d never even heard the Aswad track [‘Warrior Charge’, which ‘Can’t Tek Me No More’ samples] before and I still ain’t seen Babylon because I fell asleep in the middle of it! Mad! It was just meant to be. 

SP: Hearing ‘Can’t Tek Me No More’, with its protest lyric, and watching Babylon again recently made me feel that things haven’t changed too much in the last 29 years...

DR: To me, it’s different. There’s still racism and everyone suffering urban problems. But my problems aren’t the same as when I lived in Bow. So I gauge it through my friends who are still there and what they’re going through. What I tried to do with this track was talk about a few depressing issues over a happy beat.

SP: That’s exactly what the best protest music is...

DR: Yeah. But a couple of years ago it would’ve been a down tune talking about some down shit. So I’m glad I’ve got the balance now. ‘Dirtee Cash’ is the same thing; the same kind of lyrics over music from a time that people will remember weren’t so great as well, economically. But, musically, it makes them reminisce on the good parts of that time. Economically it’s fucked up, but hopefully there’ll be some good music that goes along with it. And throughout history that’s always been the way, innit? 

SP: So, you and Prince Harry. What’s all this about the third in line to the throne hanging out onstage at your Hyde Park show earlier this summer?

DR: Yeah! He came to the dressing-room first. He’s a fan. He was with his boys and being a bit cheeky. But it makes sense because people forget I’ve done two Oxford balls and Cambridge as well. I’ve sat and done... erm... what is it? The one where they sit and interview you in their chambers...

SP: ...The Oxford Debating Society?

DR: That’s it, yeah! So I’m known in that tier of society. It would only be a matter of time before it got to him. It was wicked because he’s born the same year as me, so hopefully he might get a sense of what the fuck’s going on through music. Something that the rich share in common with the poor is my music. And that’s cool as well, ’cos I had to work my way from the bottom to the top.

SP: Did you find any common ground for conversation?

DR: [laughs and swaps conspiratorial, ‘I’d better keep my mouth shut’ look with label boss Laurence]. He was just bantering back and forth. Him and his mates, they’re naughty. I don’t wanna expose the Royal Family. Ha! He’s cool, actually. If he wasn’t royalty I could probably see myself palling round with him. We had a laugh. Then I went onstage and they were by the side raving it up.

SP: Perhaps the biggest turning points for you in terms of crossover acceptance were your appearances on Newsnight with Jeremy Paxman to talk about the election of President Obama and Friday Night With Jonathan Ross. Were you aware, after those two appearances, that you’d charmed the white middle-class nation?

DR: That was the idea. It was strategic. As soon as they asked me to go on Newsnight, I was like, ‘Yeah.’ I knew I was gonna piss some people off, but I knew I was gonna make light of the situation and make people say, ‘Oh, he’s a joker.’ I weren’t going on there to be fucking politically correct and uptight and show how worldly my views are. I showed that I didn’t give a shit and it’s all bollocks, and ‘Look at me, I’m on the Jeremy Paxman show!’ but still say what needed to be said because it’s all pretty obvious, really. It’s not that deep, politics. Basic human nature, innit? Be nice to ’em, they’ll be nice back. 

SP: Have attitudes changed towards you since?

DR: Yeah. People taking me more seriously. Like you said, for a lot of people that was their introduction to me. And that’s good because it really matches the album - light-hearted. The Jonathan Ross one... that was something I definitely couldn’t have done five years ago. I was too tense and in a different place in my head. Even my body language was [mimes a classic sullen hoodie pose straight out of Kidulthood]. I’ve known Jonathan Ross for years because he interviewed me once. But it was different being in a studio with a live audience. I’ve always been a bit of a charmer, though. That’s part of how I’ve got through as well. Even when the music was dark and depressing it was still saying some shit that a normal black working-class person wouldn’t say.

SP: I interviewed you around the time of Showtime. You were just 19, still making dark grime, but even then you didn’t have much bad boy attitude in an interview situation. No entourage, no aggressive vibes, you didn’t try to intimidate those around you or control the atmosphere or stonewall any questions...

DR: No. I saw so much of that bullshit growing up. So even when I was doing raves an’ that I didn’t feel the need to go on like that. There was always a fight waiting for me if I wanted one. If I wanted real trouble, I always knew where to find it. So I didn’t feel the need to be 50 Cent. I was never really like that... but I had problems. I’d been in a few bits and bobs. But I don’t feel I was ever a fucking psychopath gangsta. I never ever wanted to be like that.

SP: Just after the release of Boy In Da Corner you were stabbed in Ayia Napa and came close to death. Taking your cue from 50 Cent, you could’ve used that incident as your street cred and marketing angle for the next few years...

DR: Of course! But if you wanna talk about street politics an’ that, I can tell you a load of stories that would be shocking. People might not look at me the same. But, how important is any of that anyway? The main thing was that I really thought I was a shit-hot artist-musician who had loads to offer, and I really did want people to know me for that.

SP: What do you hope Tongue ’N’ Cheek achieves and what’s next for Dizzee Rascal?

DR: Platinum would be good. But what I really want it to achieve is that everybody has a good time. My vision for this album was Snoop Dogg’s Doggystyle; a genuine good time, across the board, for anyone who puts it on; for the kid on the estate who’s going through some shit, to the mum with three kids taking her kids to school, to the fucking aristocrat, the accountant... whatever. It sets a nice vibe for this year. I want people to associate this album with happiness and a good time. Forever. And that’s worth more than money to me.