Ticketmaster has published the first academic study on the genre in their State of Play report
Ticketmaster’s extensive report on grime reveals that a majority of 58% of grime fans voted for Labour in the last election, with 24% saying that the Grime 4 Corbyn campaign influenced their vote. In the run-up to the General Election in June, a website named Grime 4 Corbyn emerged, and encouraged visitors to register to vote to be in with a chance to win a pair of tickets to a secret grime party in London.
Reflecting his meteoric rise in 2017 with the release of his debut Gang Signs & Prayer, Stormzy was named as grime’s favourite artist by 47% of the genre’s listeners. Dizzee Rascal followed as second with 26%. The top live grime moment of 2017 went to Wiley’s performance at NME Awards, at which he received the Outstanding Contribution to Music Award.
2017 cements this year as a breakthrough for grime, as streaming of grime tracks has more than doubled, with London’s Harrow highlighted as the area that streams the genre the most. While 45% of grime fans aren’t concerned about the genre becoming more mainstream, 25% of the report’s sampling feel that the genre’s rise is alienating true and original fans.
On the controversial Form 696, 57% thought it was a good idea but that the risk assessment should be extended to all genres.
Furthermore, grime has been likened to punk with its outsider perspectives. Mykaell Riley, director of the Black Music Research Unit at the University of Westminster speculated, “… grime continues to defy industry assessments of its potential. Which is why it still could provoke the most disruptive cultural transformation of the British music industry since punk.” As shown on the report, people find out about grime events through artists, particularly through their social media accounts. Record labels rank as the lowest in terms of spreading the word on events.
You can find the full report here.
