From bravado to vulnerability
The use of voicemail messages in rap music can be traced back to N.W.A's 1991 album 'Efil4zaggin', their first (and only) record following the departure of Ice Cube in 1989. The group's rift with their former member was addressed in 'Message to B.A.', an interlude featuring a series of angry voicemail messages from fans regarding Ice Cube's supposed betrayal of N.W.A. Later on in the '90s, other heavyweight rappers like Biggie and Dr. Dre started using answering machine messages to help emphasise their womanising credentials in tracks like 'Fuck You' and 'One More Chance'.
Over the years, as answering machines (a fairly recent invention in the '90s) became less relevant, artists like Kendrick Lamar and Mac Miller continued experimenting with the tool, showing how voice messages can help flesh out deeper narratives and artistic contexts, and cementing voice messages as a hip-hop staple. And here in the UK, by the mid-2000s, artists like Skepta and Wiley were doing the same thing.
By inserting carefully chosen voice recordings at strategic points in their music, UK rappers have been able to expand significantly on their lyrical content; these moments of reality (whether dramatised re-recordings or real life messages) can offer a valuable glimpse into artistic motivations, influential events, personal relationships, family backgrounds, and community challenges.
The effects can be profound. As Abiade says: “The phone device is a way of exhibiting real emotions outside of the rapper bravado gaze, where you have to be tough and present a certain persona."
This concept is central to Streatham rapper Dave's record-breaking debut album ‘Psychodrama’, which uses the structure of a therapy session to explore his childhood, personal relationships, mental health struggles and moral compass. The therapy concept was inspired by the programme completed by his older brother Christopher Omeregie - currently serving a life sentence for murder - in prison. Fittingly, the record's closing track contains two messages from Christopher, expressing thanks for the part his younger brother played in his rehabilitation.
“Many nights, man prayed,” stutters his grainy recorded voice, cutting through a creeping instrumental of soft organs and stirring choral vocal samples. “Someone is gonna help bring me out of this shit… it took a while for man to recognise who [God] was gonna send… I'm very happy to see it's one of my own.” Augmenting those real voice messages, Dave packs 'Drama' with powerful lyrics that flesh out the predicament faced by his family: “Losing dad was big, losing you was bigger / Never had a father and I needed you to be the figure.”
“It brought a sense of reality to it,” says culture writer Aniefiok Ekpoudom, author of Where We Come From: Rap, Home and Hope in Modern Britain. “The album was so vulnerable, but sometimes with music there can still be a bit of a disconnect; you might trust his experience but it's hard to connect if you're not hearing directly from the other people he's talking about. Rap is one of the only art forms that gives a voice to people who are incarcerated."
This was a key concern for North London rapper Avelino when he utilised a motivational phone call with a friend in prison on 2016 track 'Welcome To The Future'. The Tottenham-born lyricist (who released his debut album 'God Save The Streets' last year) is an artist known for his ability to weave complex, emotionally powerful narratives, and voicemail messages have aided him in doing this.
"Rap is storytelling, and that story becomes more vivid when you actually get to hear from the characters being rapped about," Avelino tells The Lead. "Through that medium, the listener has access to a person that they would never usually have access to. You get a little insight into my circle, you get to hear what they sound like, and you understand the nature of the conversations we have."
Amplifying the community
“So much of rap in general is centred around themes of community,” says Ekpoudom. “It's never just about the rapper themselves, it's about everyone and everything else around them at the same time, and voice notes can let you hear from those people, whether it's siblings, mothers, fathers… it helps build this soundscape and this story that they're telling.”
One song that deals with themes of community suffering with heartbreaking lucidity is Newham rapper Ghetts' 'Window Pain', the penultimate track on 2018 album ‘Ghetto Gospel: The New Testament’. In arguably the most powerful, emotive use of voicemail in UK rap to date, the song (produced by Chris Penny and Kid D) begins with a crunchy, softly distorted clip of a mum calling her son - “just phoning to see how you are, I haven't heard from you all day” - before Ghetts' suckerpunch of an opening lyric spits: “Warren died / Guess who they handcuffed for his death?”
He then launches into a passionate and empathetic documentation of the cycles of violence impacting young people in deprived areas of the UK like Newham, demonstrating how voicemail can function as a precise, succinct way of introducing a complex social issue. When the beat breaks down at the midway mark and the anguished voice of the anonymous mother returns, this time saying; “I've been phoning and texting you and there's just no reply. What's going on?” - it sends shivers down your spine.
Outside the box
While voice notes can help add context to moments of deep social commentary, they can also operate in a more lighthearted way. Beyond the slightly clichéd examples of voicemail being used to present a playboy persona to the listener (heard in the lusty note on Knucks' 'Send Nudes' or the angry message from an ex-girlfriend at the end of Skepta's 'Ladies Hit Squad'), voice notes can also be used to structure tracks in a creative, outside-the-box way.
Perhaps the best example of this is another Ghetts tune, 'Pick Up The Phone'. The track's sharp, beefy 140bpm beat is peppered with rhythmically-placed ringtones, landline slam sound effects, and voice messages from various characters in Ghetts' life, creating a rich portrait of the day-to-day conversations and conflicts he navigates.
There's a clip of the esteemed grime producer who concocted the beat, Sir Spyro (“I ain't made a tune in a minute you know, G”"), a memo from his stylist Kiera about the growing mountain of packages she's receiving, and entertaining bars like, “Mum speaks three languages / Jamaican, cockney and real well spoken / And there's other mums just like my mum / It all depends who phones them.”