Song 35: Sick 2 Def

Sick 2 Def - Plan B

Talking of UK hip-hop ... this is one of those who has had the success Roots Manuva hasn't. Plan B is his own little cottage industry, singing, rapping, acting, directing, and he's been pretty successful all round. He's seen as some kind of spokesperson for the yoof, and his chubby little glowering face seems to be everywhere you look.

Like Roots Manuva and Dizzee Rascal, he was, initially, on the indie side of the hip-hop coin - this, the very first thing I heard by him, I got free on an Uncut CD. It's probably the Plan B song I like the best. In truth, it's probably the only Plan B song I actively like.

Which is not to say I don't think he deserves his success. That's rather the point. I know, for every hunch we has that turns out spot on, we have five which come to nothing and we conveniently forget about (I woke up a couple of days ago convinced that Murray would be defeating Ferrer in the Aussie Open final  after Tsonga had beaten Federer and Ferrer beaten Djokovic- I mean convinced!), but as soon as I heard this song by Plan B, I thought "This kid'll go far, he's a bit special".

He hit the big time on his second album 'The Defamation of Strickland Banks', which is much more along the white boy soul lines - it's fine, his falsetto's a little dodgy really but he carries it off with gusto, but the first album 'Who Needs Actions When You've Got Words' was much more acoustic hip-hop.

This song is pretty shocking - it takes a lot for me to me be shocked, but he clearly enjoys employing the shock factor, fs and blinds aggressively and angrily - so far, so standard - bit what marks it out is his flare not just for language and turn of phrase, but his frame of reference and gift for storytelling. In a neat conceit, he tells a story in reverse towards the end of the song, and does so with absolute precision.

In the song, he references his inspiration for this, Nas, in the song 'Rewind'. Nas is supposedly one of the greatest MCs of all, and his 1994 album 'Illmatic' considered one of the greatest in all hip-hop. Funny thing is, in 1994, I was a kid who wore backwards baseball caps and ridiculous baggy trousers but I wouldn't have got within a thousand miles of buying or listening to a Nas album, while now I'm a balding 34 year old in brown slacks and woolly jumper and I recently bought 'Illmatic' and, you know what, it's really very good. I wonder if Nas thought as he was making it his album would be being bought 19 years later by suburban middle-Englanders. Anyhow.

Sick 2 Def. Learn to spell, boy. But how much is affectation with Plan B? His articulacy and artistry is without question, I've seen him accused of being a middle-class kid acting the hood, the truth is more complicated, as with all of us.

His music is not really my kind of thing, just as this kind of London-kid urban poetry thing like the Streets, say, or Scroobius Pip flatters to hold my interest for a while and then gets kind of irritating. But Plan B is a pretty immense talent and as long as he doesn't turn too quickly into a musical James Corden (I perfectly like Corden, but it's the ubiquity ... which, to be fair, he's pulled pack from a little) he could go from strength to strength. Listen to this song, it's pretty repellent, but the skill and control and genuine sense of menace he creates are hugely impressive.

It's definitely a song to be filed under "Don't put on compilation tapes that might ever be played in a car with your mum". My own finest ignoring of that rule is a tape I made which started side two with 'Over the Rainbow' which had my mum sinking blissfully into her seat, before (as I'd forgotten) 'Bring the Ruckus' kicked in for Track 2. Baffled but understanding, she was. But I think 'Sick 2 Def' might test anyone's understanding. It's brutal and misanthropic, but it's also the work of a born storyteller and clever little feller.