Skepta: The United Kingdom grime rap heavyweight dishes on deejaying, Flo Milli and more with Apple Music

A full-fledged interview from hip-hop artist Skepta? I’m here for it. The rap heavyweight steps up and delivers a more than memorable Apple Music interview with entertainment personality Ebro Darden dishing on topics ranging from deejaying roots and working alongside fellow rapper Flo Milli to his longtime inspirations.

It’s a super solid chat and while you’ll see some pulled quotes below, it’s a fire Q&A worthy of 30-plus minutes of your time. Tap in.

Skepta tells Apple Music how DJing was his first true passion

Ebro Darden: I was privy to you being a DJ first, your love for just music and playing music for people and bringing people together, culturally together, whether you're playing dance hall, whether you're playing house records, whether you're playing hip hop records. That was your original love, right? 

Skepta: Yeah, for sure. My dad used to DJ when I was younger, so it's kind of all I've ever known, bass music in the house. Even when I'm sleeping at night, I'll just always hear bass through the walls and stuff. So I feel like as an extension of that, I remember my dad had this karaoke ... It was a tape player, but it was a karaoke. But you could adjust the speed on it, and I had another turntable where you could adjust the speed. So I would always try and mix when I was young, young, young. I'm trying to mix in the house. Then just music Music 2000 on PlayStation, making this. I was listening to garage music, house, speed garage, all the early dance music.

Then I think slowly, how the grime scene formed was us. We was always looking for the breaks on these vocal tracks to MC. So after the singing's done, you'd find a little bit, and then you'd MC there and stop when the singing comes. So I think after a while of finding those breaks, we just started on these programs like Music 2000. I think I was working on Cubase at the time as well. We just started making our own beats. Yeah, I think it's the blessing of being from London. Everybody's so mixed. 

Skepta tells Apple Music about being inspired by other rappers such as Busta Rhymes and Missy Elliot

Ebro Darden: We came up at a time where there weren't really boundaries on what a rapper could do or where hip hop could go. You even talk when you talk about grime, when you're talking about finding the break in garage records, that's the same thing they was doing in the Bronx when they was trying to figure out how to rock parties, was finding breaks.

Skepta: Yeah. Because I kind of know that without all of this stuff, deep down, I am an artist. You know what I mean? Even in my worst times, I'm going to create the best art. But I just know that I'm really blessed and I need to keep being the example for that young girl or boy who's sitting in their room one day, thinking, man, how do I break out of this frequency?

Ebro Darden: Or even break out of these silos and these boxes that everybody puts you in. Oh, because you come from this neighborhood, you got to be like this, or because you look like this, you got to be like this. 

Skepta: Because I used to think like that, but it's because of the frequency that I was in, and it was me looking at Biggie. You know what I mean? It was me seeing Busta in the 'Gimme Some More' video. It was me seeing Missy Elliott. They don't know how much they inspire. I'm sitting here right now because of these people. You know what I mean? And they never told me how to do it. They just were embodying it, and it was just for me to find time. There's this quote that I love. It says, "When a student is ready, the teacher will appear." Because they just have to keep doing that, and when I'm ready, I will find the lesson in that person. So yeah, I'm just on a real shooting start mission, man, until I burn out.

Skepta tells Apple Music about his song with Flo Milli, 'Why Lie?'

Ebro Darden: Let's get to that Flo Milli, 'Why Lie?' I like how you don't rap until the end of the record. You kind of give the ladies something in the beginning. You know what I'm saying? But then you get to the bars at the end. I like that. 

Skepta: Bro, I keep it 100. I wasn't even supposed to do that second verse, but Flo's verse was so crazy. 

Ebro Darden: You was like, "I got to get something." 

Skepta: Yeah, verse was so crazy. When she hits the, "True Religion greedy. Heart cold, I think I need" ... that, when it starts going, it started getting crazy. Then I was like, "Bro, wait. I need to do something." But yeah, man, it feels good to be back. I feel like a lot more people are in tune to what I'm doing right now. It feels like I'm at home now when I'm in the States.

Skepta tells Apple Music that Project Pat is featured on his next album

Skepta: Three 6 on "Ain't Safe," so over time when I come, especially if it's not a grime track like these tracks I've just mentioned, if it's not a grime track, I will always make sure I'm paying homage to the genre that I'm stepping into, to the arena that I'm stepping into. I know where I'm coming into, not that I'm just going to always take someone's flow for a rap record, but I will always have little nuances in my bars where people will know. Yeah, this guy knows what he's doing.

This is a leak, but I have Project Pat on my next album. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and it was a long time coming, because I'm sure he's heard "No Security." He's heard "Ain't Safe." He's heard "Greaze Mode." All these tracks is Three 6 bounce and flow. You know what I mean? Actually, I made the track and I sent it to him. He hit me back and he said, "I'm going to flame-throw this record." I remember just sitting there. Like I said, I don't have no number ones. I don't have no Brit Awards. I don't have that kind of stuff. You know what I mean? I don't have no Grammy or nothing.

Burna Boy: Here's a behind the scenes look at his sold-out London Stadium takeover

It’s no secret - Burna Boy is really on fire these days. Pun intended, of course. The hip-hop artist shows no signs of slowing down and takes fans deeper into his non-stop grind with a deep dive conversation with Apple Music 1’s Ebro Darden.

From a behind the scenes look at his historic sold out London stadium show to talking about his latest music, the global superstar doesn’t hold back on this journey.

Burna Boy sits down with Ebro Darden on location in London ahead of his Apple Music Live performance to talk about the journey from Nigeria to the legendary London Stadium. Burna Boy knew that he was destined for greatness telling Ebro, "I guarantee you there's nothing that's happening now that I didn't tell them in 2013 and 2014, '15 and '16. I've been saying this was going to happen because I knew.” The Love, Damini artist is dedicated to helping listeners continually discover music saying, "We're trying to make the world understand that music is bigger than a genre.”

The GRAMMY® Award-winning Nigerian artist’s sold-out performance at London Stadium will debut this Wednesday, July 19th at 12:00pm PST / 8:00pm UK on Apple Music at apple.co/-BurnaBoyAML, Apple TV+, and on Apple Music and Burna Boy’s TikTok pages @AppleMusic and @burnaboyofficial. Fans can also stream Burna Boy’s performance on demand on both Apple Music and Apple TV+. 

Burna Boy is both the most-streamed Nigerian artist of all time on Apple Music worldwide and the most-streamed artist in Nigeria of all time. His acclaimed 2019 album ‘African Giant’ broke the record for the biggest African album by first-day and first-week streams worldwide and 2022’s ‘Love, Damini’ became the No. 1 album on Apple Music in 70 countries and smashed the record for the biggest first-day and first-week for an album by an African artist — a record he still holds. Burna Boy’s songs have reached the Daily Top 100 in more than 130 countries, including 98 where they’ve reached the Top 10, and on TikTok his most trending songs include "For My Hand”, “Jagele”, “Last Last”, and “Bank On It”. 

Benny The Butcher keeps it 100 on Conway The Machine and Griselda status

New York rapper Benny The Butcher has plenty to talk about these days. Notably? How about the unexpected departure of Conway The Machine from being signed or under contract with Griselda. The hip-hop heavyweight chop it up with Apple Music 1’s Ebro Darden.

Check out some sneak peeks from the interview and gear up for the full chop up session at 12 PM PT/3 PM ET.

"I’m gonna break something down for you… We’re going to always be crew…I don't think Conway is still signed to Griselda, but that's “signed" to Griselda. He's going to always be Griselda. And no, West is the sole owner of that. I think that's one of the big misconceptions is that they own it together. But that's West's baby. Like Conway tell you if West own a building, he did the construction type of thing…”

"It ain’t nothing to even trip off, for real. I don’t know what’s going on… everybody just doing so much man, just on the individual side that we don’t really kinda be having the time to really connect all the time and link. We don’t all live in the same city no more, we don’t really hang out and do s**t no more, see each so all these conversations we don’t necessarily get to have all the time."