East London Grime Artist Opium went head to head with Leeds Grime Artist Dialect on the LOTM6 DVD, the official LOTM6 DVD is available on pre order from the LOTM website and will be dropping this Saturday the 28th September so we can find out who was the champion, before the release we caught up with Opium at Redbull studios for the first screening of LOTM6, to find out about his experience of clashing on Grime’s Battle platform.
Do you have road beef with your opponent or is it just a music thing?
No Road beef man just Music, nice and melodic
Do you view LOTM as a platform to promote your talent or a platform to test your talent?
I would say test first because I’ve never battled before but people always told me that my lyrics suit the battling genre, so in that fact I really did want to test it and see how the end result would be for myself and my opponent but for promotion I would say yes as well, regardless of LOTM I would of still been Opium and carried on my Musical journey but seeing both worlds really helps me to see both sides as a Musician.
If you couldn’t clash with bars and had to clash with Musical Instruments which would you use and why?
It would be the violin straight away, because when I was in primary school I used to play the violin, I had lessons in it and I would use that cos its like the power tool in an orchestra, it really does have an effect sound wise so yeah I would say violin and just let the strings do the job.
Knowing that all of your fans will be watching you and possibly judging you based on this on this performance how much pressure is that and how does that affect your performance?
It’s a lot of pressure actually, because at the end of the day, who is music for? I do it for my own reasons because I like writing music and I believe I can test myself on any instrumental but for the viewers and my fans it really does put pressure on me cos they are trying to see if I have a certain level in the war, which is the art of war, battling, sending for an opponent, seeing if you can hold up against an opponent, if you can go each round, if you stumble if you forget lyrics. I look forward to hearing what people think about what I done, so yeah its like a challenge to see if people like you or they don’t, I just have to better myself regardless if the comments are good or bad.
What does Grime Music represent for you?
Everything! it’s what I started with when I went to school listening to Wiley Jammer and Pay as You Go’s, Old Skool sets, Grime let me understand that it expresses where I come from and its like the world to me. Anything that I do musically from this day on, because I like to test myself within different genres is just music but Grime will never be neglected thats why I’ve been doing it for 10 plus years with my close friends like Villain.
What is it like to work with Jammer and the LOTM team are they supportive or is it intimidating knowing that they are veterans?
First thanks to my musical journey I was MC’ing with all of the music veterans from young so for me being on Lord of the Mics has been a really supportive experience, access to studio, one on one advice from Jammer and him just generally checking up on us as people to see how were getting on with life, cos we do live a life as well as music and people forget that, so when you have elevated figures around you like the LOTM team and they do care for you and ring you, you feel that energy so it makes you want to acknowledge them and work harder on your own aspects, so whenever you are releasing Music these people really cherish what you say.
Keep up with Opiums’s musical journey by following him on Twitter at @Opiumartist
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