Stormzy songs tend to fall into one of two camps: choral, heaving and heartfelt, all hefty sentiments and soul-bearing, or puff-chested flexing, replete with yachts, Yacht-Masters, and MC masterclassing. But Mel Made Me Do It – his first solo outing in nearly three years – manages a rare trick, slotting somewhere in the chasm between those two modes without becoming completely lost. The beat – spare, with a fleck of choir here, pluck of harp there, chugged along with the woody rattle of what sounds like a goat’s bell and the stomp of a size 12 kick – provides the kind of space that an MC might emote in. For the most part though, there is boasting. Just shy of seven-and-a-half minutes of it, no less.
While Stormzy’s last album, 2019’s Heavy Is the Head, ruminated on the perils – and responsibilities – of acclaim, Mel Made Me Do It finds him comfortable with a crown atop his head. The opening line – “I’ve been the GOAT for so long, I guess it’s not exciting when I win” – is disarming to the extent that it predicts, and nullifies, exactly what a critic might say of an artist’s long-awaited return. “To make a classic, yeah, it takes ages,” he goes on. Well, touché.
