They can fucking arrest us! How does this work?
How does that work? How does that work, man?
Tryin' to get a buzz off me Like, lad
I ain't give a fuck About your man
Tell BBC, then RTE
But enough about me Where the fuck was your team
For the past 12 months Had enough of the scene
Without mentioning me As one of the three
Looking at things That I'm deeming as me
So I'm crowning myself King of the northern scene
Seems that SoundCloud Cloud fizzled out
No doubt I've been what I'm about
Been to the south They seen what I'm about
Lookin' at me Like the man on the town
I'll take what I want I ain't fucking around
Start runnin' your mouth Ah, I'll walk out
What's my name? HYFIN
And what's your name? Writin'
Good luck to the lads…
Get off that, lad.
What do you mean? Why are you watching this, lad?
Jordan-Lee Brady-James, aka HYFIN,
was born in a city with two names:
Derry, Londonderry.
It crossed Jordan's mind
how his home was soaked in voices.
If it wasn't words painted on walls,
it would be someone somewhere with a mic.
Lad, I want boys here to have something
they can look up to
besides drug dealers and everything else, lad.
The fact of the matter is, we're not living
in that day and age now.
We need to, like, make us known
for something other than the Troubles.
And that's why, like, it's good to see people
go out and try to make Derry known for something else,
like you going out and doing this rap.
I grew up wanting to be a rapper, lad,
but there was nobody here to, like, look up to.
There's boys over in England that have
all the big names, lad.
There's boys over in America that have all the big names.
There's nobody here with a big fucking name.
Jordan knew even people from Derry
who said Derry accents can't rap.
But his best friend Shimmy never doubted that HYFIN
would be the city's first professional rapper.
I think the lack of purpose, lad, is
there's nobody really giving any direction to anybody.
The bonfires happened every August
on the Feast of the Assumption,
a Catholic holy day.
Jordan never really knew when or why they started.
Ever since he can remember,
it was just something young people did.
On this feast of Mary,
this feast of harmony,
we are being called to look again into our lives
and to examine our minds.
What do we feed our minds with?
What do we allow our minds access to?
And this is the decision
that we have to make every day.
There can be no peace
if the body and soul are not in one,
working together.
Everybody's mindset is that there's fuck all here,
that anybody who's trying to do fuck all for themselves,
"Catch yourself on, you're from fucking Derry."
What do you mean?
Lad, fuck off! Wait till you see what I'll do from Derry.
So they ask Where the fuck I'm from?
I said D-E-double R-Y
Sledging on my accent Right, man, I knew it
It's my Irish, bub I can't let you off
Let me show you my madness
Let me show you my size
You should stay a while
Wild, it's guaranteed to get
She want to ask Where the fuck I'm from
I said D-E-double R-Y Why?
Said she love my accent Right, I knew it's my Irish
Little babe, Let me show you my madness
Let me show you my size
You should stay a while
It's guaranteed to get wild
It just makes you move, lad! I'm telling you!
I want to hear some different type of drill.
Let me hear something else, let me hear your mindset.
What's happening next,
let me hear about the actual shit.
It was in quieter times
when Jordan would get excited about the thought
of recording his first ever EP.
But many in the studio didn't know that his dream
wasn't always to be a rapper.
At 16, Jordan was on track to be
a professional swimmer.
One morning, en route to the pool,
those dreams came to a screeching halt
as he lay twisted inside a crushed car.
After the crash, his mind turned to music.
In this period of recovery,
HYFIN was born.
As HYFIN was working on the set
of his new music video,
the bridge brought back memories of a friend
he had lost to suicide.
The river was taking friends away from people
nearly every month.
Escape this world.
For me, lad, music was the only other thing.
When I had swimming, lad,
and I was talking about, when I had my head down,
I had time to think and I was looking under the water,
that was time for me.
That was time for me to work on me
and work out who I was.
Same with music, lad.
Music helps me find out who I am.
I can see who I'm becoming.
The flow is just different, bro.
You know what I'm tryin' to say? So…
You know what, when people force that drill lifestyle
and they're not really doing drill so much.
They're not shanking people in the neck.
You know the craic, lad.
I can't be chatting about me stabbing up your man
when I'm not stabbing up your man.
And that's why I like you
'cause you keep it mad real, fam.
Jordan knew how OJ was feeling.
OJ had left London
after a close friend was murdered.
The murderer turned out to be another person OJ knew.
He found a new community
and sense of peace in Ireland,
but was never quite sure about its hidden tension.
The organised crime here is too much, bruv.
You know what I mean? But I think it's actually…
it's a gift and a curse.
The reason I say it's good in a way, yeah,
is because you don't have young kids running around
trying to shank each other.
How many friends do you know that's been killed?
I don't have a friend that's been killed, like, no.
How many friends do you know that's been killed?
None, lad.
I've got about three, four friends
that's been killed, bro.
-Fuck. -Opened up.
Like, so saying all of this stuff you're saying,
be glad it's still organised.
Bro, have you seen the suicide rate here?
I don't know nobody that's, like, committed suicide.
That's actually mad. Do you know anyone?
-Two, lad. -Two people?
One was 19 and the other was 17.
How did they kill themselves?
Jump the bridge, lad. One hung himself.
-Fucking hell, bro. -It's a madness, lad.
What about you, fam?
I know three, like in my community, in my area,
like, in Belfast, West Belfast in particular,
who've killed themselves, like, within the year.
Bruv!
Like two.
-Two as well? -Yeah.
But bruv, you know what it is, yeah?
It's just pain, pain, pain,
but just put in different ways.
Lad, I'll tell you, like, I had a whole fucking bad…
like, a bad run, lad, I was fucking bad on drugs, lad.
working in a shitty job.
Lad, I got robbed and all at the same time.
It was a madness, lad.
Like, the whole world was coming down on me, lad.
And I was feeding this to myself, going…
"Sweet, it's all going this way anyway.
I might as well go."
I don't want everybody to go through
what I went through to get what I got.
If somebody can just get that spark that just goes…
that wakeup call to go,
"Ah, it's a flick in the mindset, lad."
Do a deep breath, bro, right?
Go! Let's go.
Big deep one. Big deep one, bro.
Nobody had a way out More than options
Success just came With a process
Y'all can't tell me about a Lack of substance
We're at A-grade What d'you want then?
I used to hate They had accent, no hun
Under the same lads Had 'em buzzing
Say it loudly Who you sortin'?
See to that chap But they must be
1.5 for the 2.0
3.5 for the 5.0, damn
The car was HYFIN's original studio
and one he always returns to.
Late-night drives through the city
would map out his mind,
roads to revisit lyrics and run thoughts past friends.
But he always gave time
to hear what they had to say.
For a good while, like, my head was melted
and I didn't say nothing to anybody,
I just kept it to myself, like.
Two years ago,
I took an overdose and tried to kill myself
and woke up two days later in hospital.
And, like, since then,
I've got the help I needed.
I started doing a degree,
started fucking… brought my life back together.
I've got goals, I'm achieving my goals, like.
I've got things in the works that are coming, like,
and I'm happy.
And I'm so glad that I'm here now,
so I can keep making it right that I didn't do that.
Death, I think about maybe on a weekly basis.
You know? I don't think about death in a bad way.
I think about death in a good way.
I think about, like…
I want to do all these things before I die.
I don't think, "Fuck, I want to die."
Do you know what I mean? I think, like…
I've got limited time.
It could be now in five minutes before I go.
Am I doing enough before then?
It could be in 12 years,
but am I doing enough before those 12 years are up?
Death shouldn't be a thing to fear.
I think it should be a kick up the ass
to be, like, you've only got limited time here.
What are you gonna do with it?
HYFIN was born from an accident.
But Jordan knew it was only a matter of time.
Ready when you're ready.