The Boy Who Played The Harp – Dave’s Most Important Album?

Dave has long been the saviour of UK rap. With his immediate and seminal third album, he breathes life into a scene that’s recently flirted with stagnancy.

The Gabriel Moses-shot press image for Dave’s third studio album, shown above, sees the Streatham born-and-bred rapper sat, accompanied by the elegant harp, and staring acutely, intently, off into the distance. He’s searching, observing, looking through the present, beyond the past and into the future. It’s a fitting visual language for the thematic circumference of The Boy Who Played The Harp, a record that asks all the right questions – and finds most of the answers.

From his BL@CKBOX to his spellbinding debut album, from his star-studded sophomore to his mainstream plight in coalescence with the UK rapper who finally broke America, Dave is comfortably in a coveted category of British musicians with a completely untarnished reputation. He’s widely considered to be among his generation’s most paramount musicians, and this new body of work only furthers such a reputation.

The 27-year-old manages to talk on personal and societal issues in a vivid way without ever sounding self-important or overly preachy. It’s a bones-and-all, dirty washing portrait of fame, of society, of masculinity. It’s impressive how little ego he writes with.

Dave produces or co-produces nine of the album’s 10 tracks – this is his vision, holistically, sonically, spiritually. But that doesn’t mean the work’s pantheon of collaborators doesn’t augment the runtime. James Blake’s fingerprints are all over the record, whether in his haunting vocal contributions on opener “History” and “Selfish”, or in the production choices; the album fashions a deeply immersive, richly atmospheric soundscape, built from shards of vocal samples, hypnotic piano and snappy percussion, that is cohesive but never comes off as one note.

Kano’s contribution to “Chapter 16” is one of the best performances of the year. The track in general being a glorious and touching back-and-forth rap ballad between the apex talents of their respective generations. Jim Legxacy – whose third mixtape “black british music” has taken him from underground favourite to spearheading the future of UK music – offers a glistening, heartfelt hook on “No Weapons”. Elsewhere, Grammy-winner Tems sounds as serene as ever on “Raindance”.

There’s countless colourful splashes on this sprawling canvas of self. You leave, much like with his debut, Psychodrama, feeling like you really know Dave. He’s a flawed protagonist, a self-admitted anti-hero, refreshingly imperfect. Any bragging feels factual. The storytelling? Razor sharp.

It is a vastly significant moment in UK rap. We haven’t had an album that has both charted and is a critical classic in what feels like years. An album to take the scene forward, a body of work to cement Dave as one of London’s most provoking creative forces. Take notice.

Listen below…