'I gotta be the best': The extraordinary rise of rapper Blxckie

While stuck in Joburg during the first lockdown of 2020, Blxckie recorded and released music almost daily. A few viral hits later, the Durban emcee, singer and producer is having his moment with the release of his sharp debut album B4Now.

South African hip-hop faces stiff competition in amapiano. For local fans, a catchy chorus in a native language is preferred over intricate raps — it's been that way since the 1980s.

Before lending a hook to local deejay and producer Dr Peppa's hit single Mntase, Blxckie, one of SA's most promising hip-hop artists, found himself in the deep end. "It was tough," he says about performing in those days.

"But uPeppa helped me through 'cause he knows ukuthi [patience] even if it's five people there in front [in the audience] wilding out to the music, that's enough. At least you caught someone."

Explaining his game plan and how he deals with competition in general, he tells Riky Rick during an episode of his podcast "LAB LIVE": "In the studio, I always gotta come up with the best. On social media, I gotta be the best. Everything has to be the best before I even pull up on stage. You need to be the best ... and I'm working, dawg, I'm working."

It's been a few months since the release of B4Now. Before that, Blxckie displayed an air of self-assurance which manifested as a mischievous smirk. He obviously knew something we didn't — that his highly anticipated album would be a gem.

As a rapper, he sounds sharp, sure of every word. He strikes a great balance between vulnerability and bravado as he slices incrementally through his story. At only 12 songs and 36 minutes long, B4Now doesn't stay in one place for long and some of its great moments are missed if you blink. For instance, the introduction of a brief stroke of airy synths towards the end of the track Hut creates a pleasing transition into the song that follows, Sika.

It's one of the signs of the chemistry between Blxckie and Christer Kobedi, the project's main producer alongside the likes of 808Sallie, Hercules Beats, WxVambient, Yukiibeats and GeekFam. "Most of my beats, I get from the e-mails," Blxckie says. "Then I contact that producer and tell them, 'Yo, I just used your sound, is it OK if I put it on something or if I drop it?'" Most of the beats are touched up and tweaked by Kobedi.

At 21, Blxckie is a digital native, and his online presence is effortless; his Zulu captions sprinkle an extra cool to his Instagram posts and he has plenty of content to share - music videos, roundup videos of his shows and regular interactive live streams. The music video for Big Time Sh'lappa, his breakout single which features his partner in rhyme, Lucasraps, recently hit a million views — a big feat for any South African artist, let alone an independent rapper.

It's a feat that places him at the forefront of the new wave and engraves his name on the annals of the new decade. "There's a lot of music being put out and it only makes sense to give people something different," he says on the role played by visuals in his rise.

VISUALS

Ntando Butho has been the man dedicated to Blxckie's visuals since the impromptu video for Big Time Sh'lappa. He's filmed videos like Ah Ah Ah, Stripes and Mntase, and is responsible for the images and videos on Blxckie's Instagram feed (hence the omnipresent caption "umthwebuli: @ntandobutho").

Butho, who also doubles as Blxckie's road manager, found himself tagging along to shows, studio sessions and other key moments. "That's where the idea behind documenting everything came," he says. "On Travis Scott's Netflix documentary Look Mom I Can Fly there's so much archive footage from when he started. We don't see that in SA; we've never seen the behind-the-scenes of how AKA, Kwesta, Nasty C or Khuli Chana came up. I saw a gap, and thought, OK, there's really an opportunity here to document the full story."

EXTRAORDINARY ASCENT

Blxckie's ascent is extraordinary and is the epitome of a good plan coming together. After coming up in the Durban hip-hop scene as a member of Dope Fam and later Clout Internet Boyz, Blxckie, who was a first-year psychology student at UKZN in 2020, started visiting the City of Gold. "So, I missed a lot of school," he says, "but it was cool because I got back on and I caught up. Then there was the semester break — I came here [Johannesburg], and then, while I was here, the first 21 days of lockdown hit."

Stuck, unable to return to Durban, he and his rapper and producer friends were recording and releasing singles, freestyles and videos almost daily on their SoundCloud and YouTube pages.

B4NOW

In between then and now, Blxckie released some songs that are staples to his core fans, with him from his SoundCloud days, but are unknown to those who might have met him on Mntase or Big Time Sh'lappa. Those songs, such as Uppity and Hold, connect with newer songs to tell his story so far.

On album opener, Mama It's Bad, he croons a sincere message to his mother:

Mama, it's bad by my side.

These n****s said some s**t, now we mad, gotta slide.

Don't even know what to go grab, where's my knife?

All I pray is that at the end I have my life.

"I wish I mentioned her more in the album," says Blxckie.

Another of several mentions she gets is on the album closer, Tall:

Brother told me, 'man, wake up and get straight to the cheque'

Mama told me she gon' pray for me so that I'm set, yes, I'm blessed

Pops told me, 'don't be ever afraid, speak from the chest'

Tall and Uppity were recorded within that [first] 21 days of lockdown; [it was] the first time I was in Joburg," Blxckie says in the album's notes on the Apple Music platform. "It's just about advice people gave me before I moved here from Durban. Just putting all that advice together and putting it in a song."

With B4Now, Blxckie has caught the attention of fans in a way not seen in a while in South African hip-hop. His is reminiscent of fellow Durbanite Nasty C's rise circa 2016.

Blxckie is a rapper's rapper who also appeals to the casual listener — it's his X-factor, the Zulu phrases that he skillfully weaves into unexpected places and his tendency to keep the listener on their feet with tongue-in-cheek plot twists in his rhymes. Right now he's having his moment, and he knows it.

• 'B4Now' is available on all streaming platforms.