Stormzy, Gang Signs & Prayer

★★★☆☆

Download: First Things First; Cold; Mr Skeng; Blinded By Your Grace Pt. 2

With even the boys in blue beating a path to his door, Stormzy is clearly on the verge of becoming the next grime crossover success. As the title suggests, Gang Signs & Prayer follows Stormzy as he tacks between the attractions of notoriety and righteousness – indeed, in “Mr Skeng”, he claims the youthful temptations of guns have since been supplanted as his weapon of choice by the Bible. The usual bouts of brusque dissing rub shoulders with love songs, fond tributes to his mum, and a fulsome, swaying devotional hymn “Blinded By Your Grace Pt. 2”. But it’s the engaging sense of vulnerability and self-deprecation that brings depth and charm to Gang Signs & Prayer: recounting his litany of problems in “First Things First”, Stormzy’s brave enough to rhyme “recession” with “depression”; while in the brisk, Latin-flavoured “Cold”, he muses drolly on his meagre success: “I’ve been cold the whole season/I should call my next one Freezin’!”.