A Beginners Guide to West Midlands Hip Hop

I have this friend called Blaine, we've known each other since we were kids. Blaine isn't what you might call a music connoisseur yet its through him that I first got to hear Birmingham hip hop. It's Rubbish! I thought and repeatedly told him out loud.
I also remember walking past some Birmingham rappers on-stage in Victoria square on a rainy Friday night a while back, me and a mate were going to the cinema, watched it for a few seconds and then walked off. 

Now that I run a blog on Birmingham I've been wondering whether there might actually be anything good and worth hearing, its been difficult as its a very underground scene but this is what I've Found

SP

I found out about this guy while Browsing through the Provide store in The Custard Factory, the staff are quite chatty so I told them about the blog and that I was looking for good Hip Hop to write about and they told me about this guy. I downloaded his Mixtape from a year or two ago and he seems to be the only person from the scene that I feel is worth listening to. I don't know an awful lot about him but I'd say that he stands out from usual grime, lyrically he's a bit more intelligent than the usual bad man posturing of grime and his flow is quite unique with a voice that only contains a hint of a brummie accent.
They told me at the Provide store that he's got his own brand too called SuperKid.
I think I need to listen to his stuff in more depth but I'd say that he's Birmingham's best rapper.

If you want to her more I'd recommend Downloading his free Mix tape. (Note. you may have to sign up for Datpiff to get it, but its a brilliant site that's well worth the hassle of signing up for, Don't worry about Viruses its a legit site)

http://www.datpiff.com/SP-SP-Im-Different-mixtape.422364.html

http://www.zyrecords.com/artists.php?artist=1

Tenny Ten

Tenny Ten, (AKA Ten Shott) Is from Wolverhampton but this blog is actually about the whole west Midlands rather than just Birmingham, so I can tell you about him. You may remember that I blogged about him before a while back. but that was a while a go and He's kept active, aswell as releasing the odd single, such as the so-so 'Swagnificent' he put out a mixtape 'Freedom of Speech'. as you may expect from the cover and title, its a pretty angry, politically motivated record. The songs on it vary from being quite silly such as 'jumpin on my dick' or quite bleak such as on 'The Prison Visit or 'Blood Diamonds'. Its a well produced record full of varying styles, that has been made to reflect the times we live in. 

http://www.datpiff.com/TENNY-TEN-Freedom-Of-Speech-mixtape.312831.html
http://burminum.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/mr-hudson-tinie-tempah-tenny-ten.html


I'm not sure I really want to go into more detail on the scene as I haven't heard enough of it and don't really like all of what I've found. Other acts you may want to check out though are, Trilla, Saf.One, and Preditah.