- Mon, 2011-02-21 12:34
The grime scene - and British urban music in general - was a heavily male-dominated game in 2010, not because there was a lack of female talent putting in the hard graft, but for one reason or another the recognition wasn’t coming their way. With 2011 still relatively young, artists like Lioness, A.Dot and now Baby Blue are looking likely to buck that trend.
Baby Blue has been playing the game for many years now, collaborating with some big names along the way, including Sway, Estelle, John Legend, Ms Dynamite, and most recently Wretch 32 on the single Run. Much like Wretch, Blue blurs the boundaries between grime and UK hip hop, a distinction that she has denounced in the past as arbitrary. With a debut studio album set for release later this year, Blue is stoking the fire with the release of her new single Paper Haterz on March 13th.
Produced by DaVinChe (whose past credits include Wiley, Kano, Tinchy and many, many more), the beat is based around a sample of Blue herself, bolstered by carnival drums, dramatic synths and a dubstep wobble-bass breakdown. Blue’s flow is pretty minimal; she delivers a couple of good punchlines but largely lets the music do the talking. Paper Haterz introduces another facet to her already varied canon of musical styles, further confirming that her debut is an album worth getting excited about.
