9. 702Star

I wouldn’t even say this qualifies as a favourite album because the second half of it’s shit. Track 11 to track 16 or 17: bollocks, don’t ever listen to it. But the first ten? Incredible mate! I wanted to tip one of those early 2000s R&B albums. I could’ve said Missy Elliott, Miss E… So Addictive which is an incredible album – well, there were loads around then – but this, it isn’t one of them. I discovered it a bit later on but, mate, the first ten tracks on this are fucking incredible. There’s a really underappreciated Neptunes beat that never got released as a single, a tune called ‘I Still Love You’ which is so weird and so moody and there’s a couple of beats by Shakespeare, who did like ‘Pop Your Collar’ and ‘Bugaboo’ and bits like that. It’s obviously very popular sounding and it’s not a controversial thing to say but growing up in a certain area and at a certain age this sort of music was ubiquitous, y’know? Especially when you’re trying to get into girls it’s like, "I need me some R&B".

The album bombed but the first ten tracks are really, really strong. It’s several different producers but it’s a testament to those beats that it works because none of these girls can really sing that well and really, the first ten tracks are like a producer mixtape in a way. I wanted to refer to it because as much as I can’t make it to save my life, early 2000s R&B is obviously a massive influence on all the music we’re talking about here and most things that have come afterwards with grime and everything and a lot of those early sets in 2000/2001 are as much based on pitched-up Timbaland things as they are original grime beats or dark garage or whatever.