After a year of teasing a new album, Unknown T released his anticipated debut album, Blood Diamond in January 2024. Following the predecessor to his debut, a four track EP, Before the Smoke, T signalled a glimpse into a new direction that drifts away from drill, rather emphasising a new experimental direction. Jule Rimenschneider shares her thoughts on the newly released album.
While the album is not necessarily conceptual or cohesive, it is without a doubt creative and showcases T’s versatility, technicality, and overall improved rapping abilities. The first song, 2023 displays his classic drill introduction. With T seamlessly rapping over the drill production, the hunger within his delivery increases anticipation for the rest of the album, while reminding the listeners of what he's best at. The second song Time takes a turn into an American route as it draws on American hip-hop in the track’s style, beat, production and T’s rap delivery. Perhaps, T’s versatility and experimentation can be most evidently seen in the tracks Welcome 2 My Strip and PASSA. The afrobeats influence not only brings T closer to his Ghanaian roots but the assistance of Odumodublvack’s feature on Welcome to My Stripe creates a seamless intertwining of the East London driller with Odumodublvck’s West African rap style. Moreover, PASSA combines the uplifting beat with a message of hope as he sings, “our lives still matter.”
In my opinion, the album contains two stand out features which demonstrate T’s skilful qualities. Hocus Pocus featuring Loyle Carner utilises straight, head-to-head rap which pays homage to the battle-style, confrontational and boasting elements of rap, while seamlessly merging their different styles. On Adolescence, T pairs up with his long-term friend and frequent collaborator, Digga D to create another hit. This time the two young drill prodigies pair up to pay homage to Giggs and Dubz’s cultural anthem. With the support from Giggs and Dubz’s voice notes on the track, the pair give the legends their flowers whilst reaching their rap potential.
T continues to step out of his drill label and display his versatility in the gospel inspired track, Rain, featuring Grammy nominated singer, Tiana Major9. With subtle echoes to Stormzy’s 2019 track Rainfall, Tiana’s angelic voice harmonises nicely over T’s softer voice. From American hip-hop, to afrobeats to gospel, T utilises the first half of the album to demonstrate his versatility and flex his muscles by trying out each genre to a good standard.
The latter half of the album takes the listeners back to his drill roots, particularly drawing parallels to his first mixtape Rise in the Mud. The album's turn into a drill heavy direction is introduced by the track Right Hand featuring Knucks. The track serves as a testament to Knuck’s classic and easily recognisable sound with his laidback instrumental and smooth voice which is intertwined with a softer drill beat. The following song AVEN9ERS ASSEM8LE serves as a sequel to Rise in the Mud’s AVEN9ERS showing his close ties to the people around him, alongside being a hard-hitting and entertaining cypher. T reminds us that he is one of the most technically gifted drillers in the music scene with tracks such as Wisdom & Smoke, Like SZA and Till We Meet Again closing off the album. In addition, T’s clarity, cadence, low voice and menacing tone are utilised to the max and are supported by his iconic adlibs which are spread across the whole album.
Overall, Blood Diamond meets the fan’s needs, alongside successfully pushing Unknown T’s sound, style, and rap abilities outside of his drill origins. The album’s high production and strong features is complemented by T’s improved lyricism and rap performance. While the album demonstrates his hunger, it also showcases his versatility in the ways in which he can adopt his sound to experiment with different genres and execute them to a high level. As such, the album cements Unknown T as undoubtedly one of the most talented and gifted rappers the U.K music scene has to offer, with even more potential, excitement and respect yet to come.
Jule Riemenschneider
Edited by Natalie Howarth
Featured Image from Unknown T's Blood Diamond Official Album Cover. No changes were made to this image.
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