Last Sunday, October 30, marked a decade since Skream released his seminal debut album Skream!
With three years of dubstep-shaping productions already behind him, aged just 20, Skream’s status switched from banger baron to creative artist almost overnight when this dropped.
Hinting at the rich variety, scope and reputation he is now respected for, the album flexed the whole dub spectrum: from the famous aggy anthem Midnight Request Line to sassy jazzy UKG Summer Dreams by way of ominous oscillating paranoia (Rutten), skanky p-funk (Blue Eyez) and timeless bouncing bass funk (Dutch Flowerz). Capturing a critical formative moment in dubstep history – complete with cameos from JME, Warrior Queen and Howard Marks (via a Human Traffic sample) – not only is it one of the genre’s earliest artist albums but it’s aged incredibly well, too. Refresh yourself on Spotify.
Before you do, refresh yourself on Skream’s most heavily viewed track on UKF: Shot Yourself In The Foot Again with Example.
Uploaded January 2011 it came in the midst of one of the Croydon artist’s most accelerated career chapters. Just months after his second album Outside The Box, mid way through his chart-punching Magnetic Man mission with Benga and Artwork, a weekly show on Radio 1 and massive underground scene tracks on Deep Medi and Keysound, Skream tagged up with Example and delivered this dramatic piece of bass story telling. First came the audio, 10 days later the video (directed by Example himself) – between both uploads they’ve clocked up over 20 million views. Not hard to hear why…
Biggup Skream
