Wiley

Wiley, born Richard Cowie in 1979, came up through the London grime scene as part of the Roll Deep collective. His debut album 'Treddin' on Thin Ice' arrived in 2004, followed by records like 'Da 2nd Phaze' and 'Playtime Is Over' that helped define the genre's early sound. The track 'Boasty' from 2019, featuring Sean Paul, Stefflon Don, and Idris Elba, showed a different side, reaching a broader audience while keeping his name in the charts.

Through it all, songs like 'Cash In My Pocket' and '50/50' maintained a direct, unfiltered approach that felt true to the streets where grime began.

Wiley's influence on British music is hard to separate from the noise around him. He helped build grime from the ground up, working with peers like Dizzee Rascal and Skepta when the scene was still taking shape. The sound he helped pioneer, tense, quick, and confrontational, remains a touchstone for artists who came after, even as his own path has been anything but smooth.