On The Rise: DC

“I make a move and then they hit me on the telephone / They keep on hitting me like Richie man you better blow.”

These are the opening bars of DC's single “No Manners”, spat over the reworked piano hook from Fat Jo and Ashanti's “What's Luv?”. Their predicition – that the South Londoner is on the precipice of stratospheric success – is a solid one, with a spitfire mixtape just released, hot on the heels of a stand-out performance on last year's COLORS session.

“I shouted Kilo, my manager, a while ago about doing something with them. And then months and months later he came back saying 'I got you a freestyle' and I was like 'what freestyle?' and it was COLOURS. I was like 'whaaat??'” He laughs. “I'd wanted to be on COLORS for ages. One of my favourite sessions was Gunna's. And IAMDDB's was sick. I knew that it was a different space if you're doing anything slightly out of the ordinary.”

DC's new mixtape, Under the Influence, showcases the rapper's precise yet oh-so-casual flow, a voice that sets him far apart from other more in-your-grill MCs on the UK rap roll-call. Its production features cuts from long-time collaborator Nostalgia among others, a sweet-and-spicey mix of bass music that spans dancehall, trap and more low-slung R&B.

In person, DC is a little shier than the high-rolling, slick-talking character who features in “No Manners”. He also means business, with references to a tight work ethic and a punishing practice schedule littering his mixtape. This perhaps explains the delay in its release – since touring with JHus in 2017, the artist has been remarkably quiet, bar a smattering of singles last year. “Really and truly, I just needed to sort out everything around the music: videos, plans for remixes...” He says. “I don't like or dislike the admin – but I wanna know what's going on. I'll let people do their jobs but I also wanna be involved as much as I can.”

In his wordplay, DC fronts like a hard-grafting muso and sometime-lothario, but one subject remains a constant – his pride for his home borough of Grenwich. Recent single “Dock City” paints a chillier picture of his experiences growing up there, and the tension between the possibility of artistic success and the pull of criminality (“You could either get down with the shooters / or you could hit the net, find some producers.”) In the video, DC is dwarfed by the borough's looming tower blocks, as cutaways show women lifting up jumpers and jackets to reveal scars from stab wounds.

“It's only looking back that I realised it was difficult growing up there.” He says. “When you're living in it, you don't know anything else. It's only now I'm like, 'Oh … that shit was kinda run down'.” DC recalls the places on his home turf that shaped him. “Going to school in the area affected everything: who my friends are, how I speak, the way my music sounds. My school in Thamesmead was actually really important to me and my music... Some of my most memorable experiences were between secondary school to College, getting in trouble and … whatnot.” He smiles. “And an area called Charlton – also in Grenwich Borough. I feel like I made a lot of mistakes there and I'd say it's also where I learned the most about life.”

Still only 24, DC's new mixtape seems to mark a shift towards more openness and introspection. I ask him if this was a deliberate move. “I didn't intentionally try to be more serious.” he admits. “But I'm older now. I've gone a lot deeper on the tape, sharing another side to my character and my personality.” He gives the record's opening track “Overdraft” as an example, which opens with a bitter bar about university debt and the 24/7 grind of trying to hit the big time. “I was just being real – I don't think I've been that real in my music before, been more open about things. Normally I'd just be trying to write a sick freestyle, not really touching on how I feel.”

The new video for single “Hustla” also flags DC's desire to think more critically about the world he inhabits. The now coupled-up MC is a little coy about the track's sexcapade bars: “It's kinda hard to erm.... pinpoint what it's about because I was, erm, single, living my best life, etc when I wrote it, you get me?” He laughs. “I was having … a lot of fun”. But for the video, he worked with artistic director Kevell Black to juxtapose its lyrical content with a statement about the objectification of black women's bodies in rap videos. “I'm not a big fan of how black women are portaryed in music videos... how they're sexualised. That's one thing we wanted to tackle. We used this picture of Nigerian artist Fela [Kuti] surrounded by loads of women – where they don't look sexualised – as inspiration.”

DC was also keen to subvert people's understanding of the word 'hustler'. “We wanted to show another aspect to its meaning. When you mention the word 'hustler', lots of people think 'oh, drug dealers, gangs', something to do with the streets. But a mother with her baby – she's a hustler.” I ask if there were any strong women in his life who'd inspired this particular take. “My mum definitely. I'm an only child. That's one of the reasons why I wanted a lady with a baby on her back in the video. She's been really supportive of me from the beginning.”

Asked to pick a favourite track from Under the Influence, DC stumbles. “They're all my favourite!” he laughts. “'Cosign' is great – it's bouncy. That's the more the fun side of the tape. 'OG', the outro, balances it out with some seriousness, but again it gets you moving.” After such time out from the non-stop whir of shows, press runs and radio spots, is he nervous about being thrown back in? “Not at all. To be honest, it's been hard to wait this long for everything to be just right. Now it is, I'm just excited to share it with the fans, and get back on stage as soon as I can.”