Blast of fresh air

In the past year, there has been no more compelling pop talent than Ms Dynamite. In an exclusive interview, the Mercury Prize winner talks about race, rap... and big booty

It has been a momentous week for British urban music. On Tuesday night, 21-year-old Ms Dynamite won the coveted Mercury Music Prize. As she collected the award at the Grosvenor House hotel, beating hot favourites The Streets and David Bowie, her delight and surprise were obvious: 'I haven't got a clue how I came to beat David Bowie. It's an incredible feeling.'

Twelve months ago, Ms Dynamite was virtually unknown. Apart from recording a track with notorious garage band So Solid Crew, few people outside the industry had heard of her. Since Tuesday her win has been hailed as a giant step for British black music, which has long languished in the shadows cast by American stars. As the media rushed to analyse the significance of her victory, it became clear that Ms Dynamite's success had altered the musical landscape.

I met Ms Dynamite - aka Niomi McLean-Daley - backstage at the Urban Music Seminar. It was two weeks before she was to become the first black female and youngest-ever winner of the Mercury Music Prize. As I waited in a rear hallway for my interview, I stood and watched her as a steady procession of well-wishers and autograph hunters stuck their heads into the dressing-room. She greeted them all with a hug and a wide, committed smile. Unlike most female rap stars, I noted - Missy Elliot, Foxy Brown and L'il Kim - Ms Dynamite didn't dress outlandishly in furs, sequinned tops or diamonds. She wore a plain T-shirt, jogging bottoms and trainers.

Before Ms Dynamite, British hip-hop wasn't really 'about' anything at all. British rappers, for the most part, have had whimsical names; wore whimsical clothes and their records have been filled with whimsical claims. That stereotype was broken, earlier in the summer with the release of Ms Dynamite's solo debut album, A Little Deeper. Clocking in at over 70 minutes and 15 tracks the record has made her the hip-hop equivalent of Ella Fitzgerald.

Ms Dynamite's lyrics are strident; defiantly female and well-articulated. 'Tell me who wants to know/ What when who where/ Or how you do your ho?/Certainly not me/ Cause baby personally/ I like to be challenged mentally/ I've heard it all before/ Gangstas pimps and whores/ Quality is poor/ A girl like me needs more'.

To the casual observer, it may not be immediately obvious why one rapper is considered better than another. What for instance, distinguishes Eminem from Dr Dre? Ms Dynamite says modestly: 'I'm not much of singer or rapper, really.' But, like a previous generation of fans who have dissected Bob Dylan's lyrics and scrutinised the mumbled deliveries by Joe Strummer, rap fans scour hip-hop magazines for arcana, and squabble over the lyrical prowess of artists online.

A Little Deeper addresses urban poverty ('When we were young, life was so unjust/ At times I felt it was just us'); drug addiction ('Fuck powder, fuck pills, see me'); deadbeat fathers ('He don't even know how 2 b honest/ All he know how 2 do is false promise'); and black-on-black violence.

While her music is undoubtedly modern - sharp, clipped beats and lustrous keyboard tics - her subject matter does have a historical resonance. Her pseudo-political approach lends the album a dial-an-issue currency, a fact that undoubtedly influenced the Mercury judges. In the often testosterone-driven world of hip-hop - most rappers unsentimentally compare themselves with basketball players such as Michael Jordan, and their rhymes to three-point shots - females are often relegated to the role of molls or escorts.

Ms Dynamite came into rap music almost by default. She originally wanted a career as a teacher or a social worker. 'It was something I really wanted to get into; I love working with children,' she said. She grew up in Archway in north London, born to a Jamaican father and Scottish mother. Her father, Eyon, split from her family when she was two years old.

Her early years, she remembers, were marked by financial hardship, as her mother, a primary schoolteacher, fell ill with cancer. She was left in charge of three siblings. 'It was a difficult way to grow up. My mother was ill. And I felt I was given the responsibility of raising a family. Suddenly, I became the parent figure.'

She struggled at school for most of her teenage years, although she later achieved three A-levels and nine GCSEs. 'I went to a really multicultural school. And there were people in my class who were getting straight A grades. They had tutors after school; they had tutors at the weekends. And the teachers paid them lots of attention. I couldn't do that. I just wasn't interested. It's not that I didn't want to learn.' She pauses to chose her words: 'No one ever sat down to take the time to explain things to me. I think teachers sometimes don't pay enough attention to the kids that need it. That was my experience.'

Frustrated, she eventually left home to live in a hostel: she remained close to her mother throughout her absence from home. 'I was living in this grubby little hostel,' she says. 'It was a horrible place. And I think I was depressed, because I started to smoke and drink. I was smoking all the time. I'd go to school, come back, and smoke. I'd hardly ever leave my room. I think the experience taught me to be independent. I was more focused after a while.'

On A Little Deeper, she describes these experiences in devastating detail: 'I'm the same little girl that grew up next door to you/ Went through all the things a teenage girl goes through/ Hangin' out all night breakin my curfew/ When my daddy hit the door I gave my mumma the blues/ Used to spend my time blazin' lazin' days away./ Thought I was grown left home at 15 didn't want to obey/Had to get my act together couldn't take the heat.'

She had always been involved in drama and music at school. And, after turning down the chance to study for a a degree in social anthropology at Sussex University, she turned to music. She was offered an occasional guest slot on a pirate radio station. The stint led to an appearance on So Solid Crew's breakthrough hit 'They Don't Know', and a one-off solo single, 'Booo!'.

Released as a precursor to A Little Deeper, and initially leaked to underground dance clubs, 'Booo!' introduced Ms Dynamite as a powerful female lyrical constructionist. The song was an immediate hit. It had a unique music and vocal delivery that rarely relies on strict metric conventions. She often pauses when she shouldn't; laughs in the middle of a line; and verbally thinks something through on record. It gives her music a sense of intimacy and a diarist's introspection. 'I'm not technically great,' she admits. 'Purists probably think I have my faults. But there are things I want to say. And by sheer force of will that seems to come over.' Her narrative skills, all delivered at breath-taking speed, set her apart from other, more demure, female black British vocalists such as Des'ree and Gabrielle. It also causes problems: 'Don't you know there's no such thing as superstars?/ We leave this world alone.'

'I witness a lot of ignorance in the music industry. In music, if artists are black women, record companies are more ruthless. As an ethnic, urban or black music artist, I think record companies across the board, can be patronising. They say, "We'll agree with you now, but when you get to it, we're going to change you". That's how the industry works. I hear things like "Wow! You went to school and you're very intelligent". I'd never think Atomic Kitten, or whatever, were being asked those questions. I don't get mad at those people - it's just that they're bombarded with stereotypes.'

While most rap is undoubtedly concerned with themes of avarice, as a recent record by the American star Jay-Z put it simply when he boasted: 'What y'all about to witness is big business, kid', Ms Dynamite gives the impression that hip-hop is merely a stepping stone. On her album, she raps: 'Now who gives a damn/ About the ice [diamond] on your hand?/ If it's not too complex/ Tell me how many Africans died/ For the buggettes on your Rolex.'

Talking about her rapid rise she admits: 'For me to come from what I've come from in such a short space of time, and get that kind of recognition, is a real big thing for me. But kids, young people just saying "I wanna be an MC, you've inspired me", that is what keeps me doing what I'm doing. That's my reward. Money can't buy that. Children are the future, and I'd like to work with them.'

Her broad appeal is undeniable. This year she has enjoyed a brace of Top 10 singles and seen her album sell almost 150,000 copies in the UK alone. At the Urban Music Seminar, 12,000 paying customers, most of them teenagers, debated the fortunes of black British music with the industry's leading lights at the event, held at the Royal Festival Hall on London's South Bank. For the most part, the audience and the panellists (the speakers included well-known British luminaries such as Radio 1's Tim Westwood, members of the So Solid Crew, and Mercury Prize nominated rapper Roots Manuva) burdened themselves with the conventional issues that dictate any debate on urban music. Is black British music becoming too American? Are the So Solid Crew adequate role models? Is 'speed garage' dead?

On the second day of the event, however, the questions from those attending took a delightful turn. During a session on 'how to succeed in the music industry', a slightly overweight girl with heavy-rimmed glasses took the microphone and directed her question at Ms Dynamite. 'I really want to get into the music industry,' she said. 'But I know I'm considered too ugly. Is there any hope for people like me?'

'You're beautiful,' she replied. 'Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. There is a problem with the music industry, where labels dictate what female artists should look like. But look at me: I'm not particularly good looking. I hate the size of my arse. So don't let anyone tell you that you're not pretty.' She proceeded to invite the girl onstage where the duo shared a hug.

Niomi McLean-Daley's honesty, I thought, was indicative of the frank Ms Dynamite persona she projects in her music and in her videos. She is, perhaps, the most autobiographical rapper ever to have emerged from the ranks of British hip-hop. 'You have to be honest,' she told me. 'People see you as a role model. It's important that you respect that. You have to be able to relate to people. After all, they're the people who put me here.'

She blushed as she often does, perhaps embarrassed by her own honesty in front of strangers, and concluded by talking about October's Black History Month: she often returns to the importance of education in her interviews. I proposed she chose her own black heroes, luminaries whose history she would have appreciated during her schooldays. Her response, delivered in her usually candid manner, could have arrived from any one of her records:

'I think we should have a black history year,' she pronounced. 'And an Asian one. And an Aborigine one. Whatever... to me, the key for getting over racism is to learn about other cultures. When I was at school, we did only one week of black history. And there was another thing; when we learned about the Holocaust, we went into all the details. When it came to black history, I was told I was a slave. I was never told that black people contributed anything important to the earth. I was never told about the ancient Egyptians and the pyramids. That was it. It gives you a sense of inferiority: and it meant I had to learn for myself. It also means that people don't really get to know about different cultures.'

She worked her way carefully through her list, agonising over each choice. 'I'd have to pick Nelson Mandela, because he's someone who made history and is still alive. I would have to choose someone who was important as a scientist. I think that's very important. You don't get to see a lot of black scientists, especially in this day and age. I wasn't told of any when I was at school. And I think lots of black kids would want to be scientists, but they never get examples of someone who has done it before. I think of Malcolm X in some ways, because of the whole civil rights movement. Martin Luther King, I think, stood for compromising. So for me, personally, I'm more like a Malcolm than a Martin. And Rosa Parks. Because she was a woman, and she was strong-minded and stuck to her guns.'

She smiles, and with a handshake, Ms Dynamite was off next door for a photo shoot. As I milled around the corridor, catching the last guests and autograph hunters, I spotted the young girl who had broken down on stage earlier. Her eyes were still puffy from meeting her role model. 'I met her,' she was telling her friends. 'And she was nice.' She grinned from ear-to-ear: 'I'm going to do it. I'm going to go for an audition.'