Digital Cover: Kwengface Enters a New Era

“I couldn’t write anything. A change of environment like that can affect you as an artist. I spent 100 days in a segregation unit,” explains Peckham-born Kwengface. “You can only imagine how it is going from performing on stage to mopping the floor. It was a shocker for me, being there.” This is the first time the drill lynchpin has spoken since serving his 21-month prison sentence, for a Conspiracy Charge he eventually accepted a plea deal for. It was a gruelling period that he struggled to adapt to, but he’s out of the other side and chatting to us while driving down the motorway, heading to a studio session.

“There’s no TV, no nothing. You’re in there for 23 hours a day, but they give you a radio, so I started listening to bare types of music,” he says. Tuning in to BBC Radio 1, 1Xtra, Capital and Capital Extra became a ritual that gave him a deeper connection with the outside: funky house, reggae and old-school R&B, particularly Rihanna and Usher, provided home comforts that inspired him to start writing again.

Victim of Circumstance – an explosive seven-track EP that’s arguably his most emotionally unfiltered and versatile to date – is the product of this period of creative perseverance. Chronicling his experiences inside while analysing life as a young Black man in Peckham, thematically, there’s a lot to unpack across the 20-minute run-time. He doesn’t just tell us how he feels as Kwengface, but as a 26-year-old from south London whose life has been affected by situations he deems out of his control. Since going solo and leaving the seminal UK drill collective Zone 2, music is all Kweng has ever wanted, but the dream has been impossible to pursue without setbacks.

The project’s first single is ‘2 Summers’: a stream of consciousness that he raps through gritted teeth. Kwengface laments missing appearances at Wireless and Glastonbury and feeling isolated in prison. The beat features an eerie East Asian melody that’s been prevalent in UK rap since the birth of Sinogrime, a style of grime music that incorporates traditional Asian instruments and samples from Kung Fu films. It’s also incredibly popular in drill and has become synonymous with Kwengface since his early productions. “Have you heard of the phrase, ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’? I noticed people like me on that vibe,” he says, cutting out mid-sentence while driving through a tunnel. Compared to previous releases, the beat gives space to analyse the wordplay acutely, which he deliberately employs to help us properly take it in.

It’s the first time we hear him address parenthood, which has become a point of lyrical interest for Kweng since had a child of his own. “I know my dad didn’t like me, is that because I acted like him or looked like my mother?”, he raps, acknowledging the fractious father-son relationship he had before his dad passed in 2019. “I feel like a lot of African parents don’t try to understand you, it’s more about discipline,” he says, before admitting that he wants to foster a more honest relationship with his kid. Experiencing prison and fatherhood simultaneously helped him understand the importance of communicating with words rather than actions. “I used to react off impulse. I’ve learnt to think about the long term and be less irrational. When I was inside, I was finding it hard to adapt and would channel my emotions physically; I learnt the hard way that you can’t do this. You have to communicate properly.”

Whilst serving his sentence, Kwengface released the single ‘Freedom’, which samples AJ Tracey and Mabel’s ‘West Ten’ and blends UK drill, garage and other dance styles into a fiery three-minute production. His manager interjects on the call and makes the point that there’s a poetic irony to dropping a track with such a title in prison. It also came alongside his debut A COLORS SHOW, where he revealed his identity, marking a new era and removing the signature balaclava for the first time. “When I was inside, I didn’t get to see how well it was doing. I’m only seeing it now,” he tells me. Its popularity surged when two of British electronic music’s biggest names shared their remix. Joy Orbison and Overmono’s turbo-charged interpretation, pairing the rapper’s flow with a devilish bassline and chopped-up vocal samples, became inescapable that year.

Rattling the chests of ravers and through the soundsystems of clubs and festivals globally, the single introduced Kweng to a whole new audience blissfully unaware of his legal status. The remix currently sits on 11 million Spotify streams and remains one of his most popular releases. “I’m honoured that all of these electronic producers want to work with me,” he says, citing Interplanetary Criminal and Fred again.. as two names he’s currently working with. “These people are a big deal. Knowing that a completely different genre is taking me in, appreciating my music and my talent makes me realise that there’s something here. It’s like, ‘Cool, I’m actually a musician,’ it makes me have more faith in myself.”

Another collaboration released during this time was ‘Tough Talk’ with Chase & Status. Taken off their latest mixtape, 2 RUFF, Vol. 1, the DJ and producer duo threaded his gruff and gritty a capella vocals through a delirious jump-up framework, creating a mutant, breakbeat-heavy track with the immediacy of ‘90s rave culture. “I went for a nicking, governor said she a fan of the song with Chase & Status,” he raps on ‘2 Summers’, genially referencing his mainstream cross-over while in prison. Kwengface found it frustrating hearing his music having an impact from afar and not being able to capitalise, but this moment reminded him of the goal. “She was listening to the new Chase & Status album on the way to my hearing and liked the song. When she looked at her phone and saw Kwengface, she thought, ‘Ah fuck, I’ve got to do his nicking in the morning,’” he recalls. “I remembered who I was after that. It’s easy to lose yourself in there and forget who you are. I think I said something cheeky like, ‘I’m everywhere, you can’t get rid of me,” he laughs.

Later in Victim of Circumstance, on the song ‘Parallel Theory’, Kwengface explores different paradigms, asking himself whether the world would be different if he wasn’t famous and didn’t pursue music. Growing up, he and his friends envisioned life beyond from the delinquency they lead at the time; these manifestations materialised for Kwengface, but not everyone around him was so lucky. A lifetime of Austerity imposed by British governments since Thatcherism has put strain on areas of south London. Only this month, working-class protesters and campaign groups Shape and Aylesham Community Action held a protest march against the private firm Berkeley Homes building unaffordable houses and … accelerating gentrification in Peckham. Like grime’s reaction to the false promises made by Tony Blair’s New Labour, the rise of UK drill coincided with the failings of the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats coalition government on working-class communities. The fact Kwengface and many of his peers are still here shows there’s more to say.

“In Peckham, it was always about how bad you are and how much of a criminal you could become,” Kweng says. “A lot of us were misguided. My mum always told us, you aren’t bad kids, you just fuel each other to do stupid things. An element of that is true, we would gas each other up and there was nobody sensible enough to tell us when to stop.” As part of the formative drill collective Zone 2, Kwengface became one of the scene’s ubiquitous names. They released lauded mixtapes like Known Zoo and the Carns Hill collaboration Hillside Zoo but perhaps their most notorious moment was when they dropped the controversial single, ‘No Censor’.

Taken off YouTube less than 24 hours after it was uploaded, the track went viral for explicitly naming dead rivals rather than merely alluding to them. YouTube told Newsbeat at the time that it did not want their platform used to incite violence, which follows a common fear-mongering tactic used by politicians and the media in the late 2010s to ALIENATE UK drill. The collective, who were finding out the hard way how to navigate a career with rap injunctions, saw it as a learning curve. “Everyone wanted to make music, but we were all in different situations, which made it harder for us,” says Kwengface, talking about the group’s eventual disbandment. “I had my personal problems, but I always felt like music was gonna help me out, so I just stayed focused and kept pushing my thing.”

There is only one feature on Victim of Circumstance and that comes from Jungle, who “isn’t really a rapper,” explains Kwengface, “he’s a veteran from my area.” The story goes that ex-gang member Sodiq Adejojo was sentenced for the shooting of the then-promising athlete and 17-year-old Sylvester Akapalara in Peckham. He was jailed for 30 years and is currently halfway through serving his time. “The reason why he’s the only feature is ‘cause everyone from Peckham knows his story. He’s innocent and in jail for a crime he didn’t commit,” believes Kwengface. “I just wanted him to feel that the world hasn’t forgotten and that he’s not lost in the system. His story still goes on, I had to let him talk his shit.” Two generations of Peckham colliding, they recorded the song in HMP Fosse Way, which hosts music workshops and encourages rap as a tool for creative expression.

Since leaving prison and moving to an undisclosed location, Kwengface has become more conscious of giving back to his community. Right now, he’s on a curfew from 7 am-7 pm and can only visit south London for an hour a day. With a blessing from his probation, he wants to help non-profit organisations like the Peckham Soup Kitchen and find ways of supporting children in the area through music. “When I was growing up, there were lots of youth centres, but many have closed down since Covid. When I’m fully off tag, I can stretch my legs properly,” he says.

As for the music, Kweng is quick to acknowledge that the fans he found when coming up off drill want to hear something new. Remaining versatile, working with different producers and harnessing his hot streak in electronic music have become the priority; he’s keen to make up for the two years lost in prison. “I feel like I’m still young and there’s time before I’m considered an old head,” he laughs. “You’re only young once, so you’ve got to live it up to the fullest. I’m just starting out, man, I’ve got my whole life ahead of me.”