Blackhaine

On Space Afrika's iconic 2021 album "Honest Labour" a voice booms out that cuts through the noise like a hot knife through resin. That's Tom Heyes, aka Blackhaine, the Preston-born rapper and choreographer who brought his rain-damaged, surrealist poetry to the album's breakout single 'B£E', twisting bleak stories of Northern British nihilism into Space Afrika's widescreen beats. And after a promising industrial drill EP with Rainey Miller and a collaboration with conceptual artist Richie Culver, Heyes released "And Salford Falls Apart", a noisy statement of intent that assures his place in the canon, exploding William S. Burroughs-influenced wordplay into gritty productions that connect the dots between Unknown T and Muslimgauze.