Central Cee is hard to avoid right now. That’s because he’s the latest doomed attempt to make UK grime blow up here in God’s Favorite Country. This time, it’s the Sony Music borg burning USD trying to turn anthems about GBP into club hits in ATL. This is not a recipe for success, but I’ve been wrong before.
I’m not dissing grime. D Double E is one of my favorite rappers alive and we’ve given a lot of shine to UK artists here at Real Yeti Rap over the years. But I don’t hold the subgenre in the same religious regard as many rap critics do. Living in Montreal at the dawn of the century, Blue Dog on St. Laurent had a weekly ragga jungle night where emcees would line up along the wall for a chance to grab the mic over some drum’n’bass and garage beats, and the formula hasn’t changed much since. This is an distinctly international sound, but no question, the British Isles have always done it better than anyone.
If you didn’t know anything about the strong lineage behind it, perhaps it wouldn’t be so obvious that this kid is weak tea. On the mic and on camera, Central Cee is kind of a gimp. He is all cool and no charisma, all threats and zero menace. While his flow is a studied replica of the artists he came up idolizing, he’s only aping their precision. He can’t muster their fire. Which is inevitable, since he’s also a tourist who switched styles under the advice of his management. All content is value neutral to skinsuits like this; he’s basically a male model. The soundtrack is secondary.
So putting him up alongside 21 Savage only emphasizes how pale the product is, here. It’s just a brutal juxtaposition. Sure, Cee’s fits are impeccable and the sets look incredible, but none of it can make up for who he is. If anything, all the John Wick excess of slow motion stuntmen firing blanks & choreographing fights makes it even harder to take this kid seriously.
I understand Sony’s predicament. From a business perspective, Central Cee looks like a reliable investment: he is desperate for nothing but fame, and happy to sign on for anything that could conceivably get him there. Cut a single with a feature from a trans-Atlantic legend and shoot a high-gloss, CGI-heavy music video to push it with that Lyrical Lemonade seal of approval. It all works on paper.
And who knows? It would be a cruel twist indeed if this vapid, empty vessel was to succeed where so many better British artists have failed. It would also be hella funny.
21 Savage deserved this paycheck and I hold nothing against him for participating, but this whole spectacle was big, stupid, and entertaining only in spite of itself. Two Dickies.
