“Growth in everything”: Giggs, UK rap’s most influential MC, is still building

It’s 15 years on since the release of ‘Walk in da Park’, Giggs’s independently released debut LP. The album caused a mini moral panic in 2008, propped up by the stale argument that it glamorised violence. On it, Giggs’s unhurried narrations over gothic, wintry beats paint a dark, vivid picture of life on the roads, in one of the UK’s poorest communities. There’s no glamour to be found; ‘Walk in da Park’ unfolds like a horror movie. And despite the hostile media scrutiny, the album was a success. But what did its release represent for Giggs, at the time? “It was a bit of everything, to be honest. Like, getting off the street. And knowing I can make it happen in music, even though them times there wasn’t a career for rappers [in the UK] really. But it was still like, ‘yeah, man can make it happen!’ Do you know what I mean?” he explains. “I didn’t really have an end goal. But it was time to drop an album. It just felt right, and that was it. So I just went for it. Now, people overthink dropping an album, you get me? Like it’s too much pressure. With me, it’s just about the art.”

Read this next: Ty and the history of UK rap

The legend goes that ‘Walk in da Park’ was recorded in two weeks, at Peckham’s Unit 10 studios. In comparison, ‘Zero Tolerance’ represents two years’ worth of work for Giggs. “That’s mad long, for me,” he admits. “But it was a weird one, because I was working on it on-and-off. I was trying to do different things, but it always led back to that.” He felt he was on to something when he recorded the booming lead single ‘Mandem’. “Because it was just hard, bruv!” he continues, “I knew ‘Mandem’ was gonna be track two. I didn’t have any more tracks, but I said, ‘yeah, this is it.’ And I knew ‘Spiderman’ would be track three. That’s when I knew this was an album.” ‘Zero Tolerance’ is loaded with anthems like ‘Mandem’, shaped in the classic Giggs mould, where he cuts a big, bad brooding presence over skeletal, spacious beats. But there’s artistic risks, introspection and vulnerability too. “Where I’m at now, this mindset is more about growth, do you know what I mean?” he says. “Like, growth in everything. In life, relationships, travelling, work. That’s where it’s at. That’s why it’s ‘Zero Tolerance’, because I haven’t really got the time for much. As you get older, you understand how important time is. And your priorities.”