'5 Questions With': Shay D
"Music and entertainment has always been a man’s world and a lot of entertainment is made for the male gaze and I think maybe not our generation, but the one next, things might start really changing."
Meet Shay D. There’s not much that she doesn’t do: In the past years, she has landed a resident show on Reprezent radio, a BBC 1xtra Drive-Time mix, collaborated with brands such as Nike, RedBull, Tate Gallery and is actively running her own music youth projects. She has also set up the first ever all female Hip Hop tour in the UK and successfully brought women together to wave the flag in 2019, followed by selling out her London headline show in 2020. The multi-talent is undoubtedly a force to be reckoned with and her passion speaks for itself.
Now, she returns to bless our airwaves with a brand new A Class-produced track ‘Best Shot‘, for which she teamed up with fellow rappers Lioness and Dibo. The new release flawlessly highlights the North London-based Persian talent’s outstanding lyricism and eccentric blend of Grime, Hip Hop and Spoken Word.
Read the full interview below…
EQ: Your sound is a remarkable blend of various genres, which artists did you grow up listening to?
S: Oh I love the word remarkable thank you 🙂 I grew up listening to a lot of bashment, grime, hip-hop and R&B including slow jams! But rap really resonated with me. In the UK, some examples I listened to were Ms Dynamite, Grime sets from lots of sick MCs (Newham Generals, Roll Deep) & Hip Hop from Klashnekoff & Joe Black, but outside of the UK was my main love; rap, obviously stemming from American hip-hop. Those artists include Mobb Deep, Capone n Noreaga, Tupac, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, Shabazz the disciple, Onyx, Foxy Brown, Salt-N-Pepa & those icons!
EQ: I love how you’ve organised a all-female Hip Hop tour in the UK, do you think the scene is on the right track to more representation for women ? And, will you be doing a tour like that again in the future?
S: I have different weeks where my opinion changes on how the scene supports women in rap. sometimes I think it’s doing really well and it’s positive and feedback is amazing and I can see other female rappers being supported by mostly the same people. Then some weeks more often than not, I see the lack of representation and more so what really irks me is that a lot of “gatekeepers” DJs, presenters, content creators are constantly asking “where are the female rappers” or “why don’t female rappers collaborate” or “why don’t female rapper support each other”, “why don’t female rappers speak about something else other than sex” and I do feel like when a solution (like the tour with 22 different female artists on it are presented to them) suddenly everybody goes quiet and goes ghost, so to me it seems like one or two female rappers are almost picked to be the ones of the year from labels, and all the other female rappers that are doing amazing bits and making good quality music are not being supported, so it just feels like people want to ask questions for question sake or for engagement, rather than actually wanting solutions.
Music and entertainment has always been a man’s world and a lot of entertainment is made for the male gaze and I think maybe not our generation, but the one next, things might start really changing.
I’ve definitely seen positive changes even from when I first started rapping but it seems to be different in a singers world, but for rappers, we still have a long way to go.
“Our projects are music-based, literally from hip-hop theatre to rap to dance to the technical side and the aim is to have a safe space where young people from all over can meet, network and have connections that they wouldn’t normally have within the industry and between each other.”
- Shay D
Photo Credit: Ellie Ramsden
EQ: So tell us more about the amazing youth work that you’re currently doing - What exactly are you doing and what are you hoping to achieve with it?
S: I love my youth work!! I am the education manager for ‘Breakin Convention‘ and I run my own projects where we develop young artist skills, mentor them to do what they need to do to be in the career that they want to be in and to inspire them!
Our projects are music-based, literally from hip-hop theatre to rap to dance to the technical side and the aim is to have a safe space where young people from all over can meet, network and have connections that they wouldn’t normally have within the industry and between each other.
We work every single week with lots of different young people and we are also opening a hip-hop Academy in 2023 at the new Sadlers Wells theatre building in the Olympic Park site, which is an accredited course and they will be able to study before going to uni. It would be amazing to have our own youth hub one day where all of this can take place in one space because at the moment we work all over London. We’ve taken our young people on trips they’ve been to national radio they’ve been played by DJs they have music videos out some of them are acting some of them are DJing, it’s just such a good vibe and really good for their mental well-being.
EQ: With working on so many projects at the same time - youth work, making music, being on radio - how do you divide your time, and how do you manage to juggle all at once?
S: I wouldn’t have been able to do just one thing! I have a super short attention span and I’ve always been really active, I have a problem of getting bored very easily and if I had just stuck to doing music I definitely would’ve stopped by now will been sick of it to be honest lol.
Same goes with anything I do. I love variation, I find that as human beings we have different skills that we like to tap into and that really feeds creativity. I also used to run events and host the club night so that’s been locked off coz of covid, but it just goes to show that the more things you do if it suits your personality then the longevity is there.
I just rest in between work and spend time to recharge if I’m tired. I also learnt how to say no to commitments that don’t serve my purpose or my goal, that’s what was taking up a lot of my time, running around in between things or saying yes to opportunities that unfortunately was better for the person offering it to me and I feel like I gave a lot of my time and energy to that already, so I started focusing on my main work.
EQ: What else have you got planned for this year?
S: We are doing a digital stream of the Queens Of Art tour which will be rolled out later in the year which is exciting as our live event of course didn’t get to happen I’m dropping my album in August which is called “speaking in tongues”. I have two more singles out before that and I’m also making my first ever vinyl of my album which I’m really excited about as I love collectable things that you can actually hold in your hand. I have another EP coming out called “The Persian” which I am hoping to release early 2022!
Watch the visuals for ‘Best Shot’ ft. Lioness & Dibo below…
Youtube/Shay D
Stream ‘Best Shot’ HERE
Follow Shay D on socials:
Instagram: @shaydrap
Twitter: @shaydrap
Website: http://shaydmusic.com/
