Dizzee Rascal

"ABC", as the Jackson Five once put it, "it’s easy as 1-2-3": Dizzee Rascal’s third album, Maths & English, is the most complete, intense and thrilling British hip-hop record ever made. Bar none.

From the Korn-inspired metal guitars of the barnstorming first single "Sirens", to the vivacious Bugsy Malone-inspired backchat of Lily Allen (on the irresistible "Wanna B A G", every track on this album seems to find a new way of grabbing the listener’s attention. But the amazing thing about "Maths & English" is the way the huge number of different styles and ideas that it showcases come together as the perfect vehicle for one man’s voice.

Whether Dizzee is going mano a mano with American gangsta rap legends Bun B and Pimp C ("Where’s Da G’s") , or paying his dues to his UK heritage by collaborating with drum and bass legend Shy FX; whether he’s sampling Lyn Collins on the straightest hip-hop track he’s ever done ("Pussy’ole") or going way out there to a Martial Arts film soundtrack of knives being sharpened ("World Outside"), it never takes more than half a bar of his raw, guttural, urgent rhyming to realise you’re in the presence of the Rasket. The more musical ground he covers, the easier he seems to find it to be true to himself.

As if to confirm that sometime you have to travel a long way to get really close to home, Wiz – controversial video for "Sirens" (in which Dizzee – the fur trim on his parka marking him out as a true urban fox – is hunted through concrete walkways by redcoats on horseback) was filmed on a Romanian council estate. "They’ve got estates over there that look just like ours", Dizzee explains, "except there are still bullet holes in the buildings" and that’s in the nice part. It’s definitely being opened up a bit because they’ve just joined the EU, but away from the touristy part, it’s still a deep and eerie vibe. It’s like my friend over there was saying, the facade is thin – it feels like anything could happen at any time, and sometimes it does".

You could say the same thing about "Maths & English." On the one hand it’s easily Dizzee’s most upfront and accessible record to date – "Sirens" is a UK half-brother to Jay Z’s "99 Problems" and full on party tracks like "Flex" and "Bubbles" will soon be turning up the heat on dancefloors the more melancholic Mercury Prize-winning debut "Boy In Da Corner" might have cleared. On the other, it’s as brutally honest and potentially confrontational as anything he’s ever done.

"The direction changed a lot with this album", Dizzee admits. "It started out with a lot of more reflective tunes about how sad shit is and what a fucked up world we live in – because that was kind of where my head was at the time. But then I started listening to a lot of different music – old Outkast stuff ,Young Jeezy, Dem Franchise Boyz, D4L’s "Laffy-Taffy": that whole Altanta snap thing – and it got me back into the mould of that jump up party shit, so I wanted to make banging tunes – tunes that people can bump to and be ignorant to".

While American influences were vital to the creative evolution of "Maths & English", the album never compromises its distinctively British identity. Even when Bun B and Pimp C step up to the mic. "Those are two of the most important rappers in America, as far as the hip-hop scene is concerned" says Dizzee, proudly. "These are certified gangsta rappers. The real deal. It’s not a joke… And they’re on a grime tune – respecting it, and understanding that I’m different, but in some way we come from the same place. For me, that’s a real achievement for British hip hop".

Where does the album’s title comes from? "It kind of sums up my philosophy of grafting", Dizzee explains. "Numbers, words: that’s what I do. The writing side is the English. The notes, the beats, the deals, the money – that’s the Maths. But it’s about going to school too, and how everything I’ve learnt since then has made me look back and reflect on that. In fact everything you’re thinking, that’s what it is".

It’s not just "Maths & English" then, but science and history and art as well: a complete education in itself.

Dizzee Rascal was one of the U.K.'s most prominent music subjects during the latter half of 2003. Just a few months prior to winning his country's Mercury Prize -- for Boy in da Corner, his debut album -- his name was known only by his peers and devout followers of the garage scene. Though the innovative MC/producer was only 18 at the time of the album's release, there was plenty to talk about beyond his music.

Born Dylan Mills, Dizzee Rascal grew up in a council estate in East London and was raised as a single child by his mother. He didn't fare well in schools; he was booted from several of them, often for altercations with teachers. While not in school, he got himself into further trouble by robbing pizza deliverers and stealing cars. One particular music class, however, proved to be a safe haven and helped push him in an alternate direction. With support from his instructor, he began making his own productions on a classroom computer. Noisy, off-kilter tracks were made to back his own MCing, since he found that the average garage track was not suited for his style of delivery. Taking cues from a host of admired U.S. MCs, Mills began to develop his songwriting skills, which began to take on an increasingly introspective quality. He was no stranger to making boastful pronouncements, but he drew from his own life and various mind states in a way that few other MCs -- regardless of background and nationality -- had done before.

When Mills recorded the underground white-label single "I Luv U," he had just started to make a name for himself in the U.K. garage scene, as a member of Roll Deep Crew. He, his fellow crew members, and a cast of other groups and MCs were building on a more aggressive and abrasive offshoot of relatively slick, R&B-oriented garage that would begin to be referred to as grime. "I Luv U" became one of grime's key singles and paved the way for Mills' first full-length album, which was routinely praised by critics upon initial release in July of 2003. In what might have initially seemed like a press stunt to cynics, Mills was stabbed several times while visiting Ayia Napa, a resort in Cyprus, just before its street date. He made a safe recovery, picked up the 2003 Mercury Prize a couple months later, guested on Basement Jaxx's Kish Kash, and saw his album receive a U.S. release in January of 2004. He became more of an underground sensation stateside; Anglophiles with equal love for dance music and hip-hop tended to embrace him, while others found themselves baffled by all of the hype. In September of 2004, Dizzee released Showtime worldwide, followed by Maths and English in 2007. Between the release of the two albums, Dizzee set up a fledgling label for younger talent called Dirtee Stank. ~ Andy Kellman, All Music Guide