To The Ends Words by Robbie Russell Photography by Sam Crowston Robbie is a freelance journalist and the co-founder/ assistant editor of PUSH magazine. @robbie_russell_
@robbierussell_
To The Ends is an exploration of the streets and spots that helped shape an artist into who they are today. Driving through leafy suburbs, past shopping parks and a myriad of confusing roundabouts, Leicester seems like any other city in the East Midlands. To an outsider, the maze of interspersed communities appear connected by little more than the first two letters of their postcode: but appearances can be deceiving and, as a city, Leicester is beginning to get used to causing a shock. At the start of summer last year, 250,000 people lined the city’s streets waving flags and basking in the glory of their football team’s unlikely Premier League title win. Claudio Ranieri’s men had defied 5000-1 odds to cause one of the greatest upsets in the history of sport and, for pretty much the first time, the eyes of the world were cast upon the humble city. What they saw was unity. “That day was the most together I’ve seen the city ever. If you’d have come here to this exact spot, you would’ve seen every race, every walk of life in this park.” Guiding me through Victoria Park, the site of last year’s victory jubilations, is 23 year old Dagenham and Redbridge midfielder and MC, Matt Robinson, aka Kamakaze. With us is his long-term friend and collaborator Darryl Reid. Under his moniker Massappeals, he’s taken the sounds of Leicester streets, fused them with internet escapism,
and has become a recent favourite beat maker with the new vanguard of UK grime. Together, along with local MCs Rezz-Ra, G-Tek & Skeez, the pair made ‘Fearless’ an LCFC champions anthem covered by CNN, Sky Sports and the BBC. It’s a track that not only boasted about the Foxes’ world-beating squad, but also about Leicester’s hidden lyrical talent. They were all there on the historical day that their city came together; and on all of the days before, when a victory parade through the streets they grew up on seemed like fantasy. When trying to make it in a city without a hall-offame to speak of, and only Kasabian holding the musical torch, you learn to dream, scheme and grow a thick skin. Kamakaze has always been a dreamer, and no matter how often he’s told it’s impossible, he’s flourishing with a double life; shaped and guided by football and music in the city that raised him. Growing up, Robinson had to become accustomed to splitting his time between his twin passions. Training intensively as part of Leicester City’s youth setup, he spent a lot of time with young footballers from all over the East Midlands,