London collective Roll Deep crash landed to the top of the UK charts with ‘Green Light’, a cut of house injected hip hop that seems to have continued the winning formula from their previous #1 ‘Good Times’. Roll Deep, led by grime’s most enigmatic character Wiley, have been in existence since 2002 but are now enjoying their most fruitful time in the limelight. While former members Dizzee Rascal and Tinchy Stryder went on to find chart success in their solo careers, Roll Deep hadn’t topped the charts until May of this year; now it seems they simply won’t leave.
The track is taken from their forthcoming album ‘Winner Stays On’, due for release later this year. You could do worse to bet that the album will be bothering the higher end of the charts on its release. Their recent success is yet another interesting chapter in the world of Wiley, who recently gave away several albums worth of demos on Twitter and previously dismissed his last album ‘See Clear Now’ swiftly after its release. ‘Green Light’ is currently available on iTunes.
In an industry where mega-stars such as Radiohead and Prince give their music away for free, you may stop to wonder how less famous artists make a living from selling records. It’s clearly not something that worries UK rapper Wiley. After a fiery spat with his manager Wiley made the unprecedented decision to leak his entire unreleased back catalogue through his Twitter feed – a move that probably jolted his label into a sense of disbelief.
The timing couldn’t have been worse. Wiley’s long endured a tumultuous relationship with the music industry. He’s been signed, and subsequently dropped, by Atlantic, Big Dadda and XL. However with a number one under his belt with his grime collective Roll Deep and a new album with Island Records on the way things were looking up for Wiley. The possibility of that new album actually appearing is now anyone’s guess: the only thing that’s clear is that there are 203 previously unreleased Wiley tracks now floating through cyber space.
For more info you should check out this great article in the Guardian which goes someway to explaining the artist’s apparent moment of madness.
Check out ‘Up A Level’ above, one of the highlights of the leaked material so far.
Sidney Samson takes the number one position in our Shazam Pre-Release Chart UK for another week with his soon to be huge ‘Riverside’. New tracks in the chart this week come courtesy of Wiley, Plan B, Lostprophets, Jay Sean, Private, Gucci Mane and Gramaphonedzie with their huge underground house track, ‘Why Don’t You’.
To check out the full chart click read more. Read more…
