3. This is the Place



Title: This is the Place
Written by: E. Fox
Genre: Grime/rap/underground
Vocals: Foxxxy, Ms.ile
Synth/Decks/Drums: eXo.sEtt

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This is the Place is the third song on the debut album from Foxxxy, and represents the first time in the record that the flame haired rap maestro has taken the chance to apply her foot to the break a little. While the album began at a ferocious pace, which was continued throughout the second song, full of rhymes about personal success, triumph over the negativities of other people, and the violent mood sings and retribution that comes from a break up, the third track is a far more downbeat and slower prospect. Exceedingly emotive in nature, and seeking to hit a nerve with people it is aimed at, Foxxxy addresses issues which the 18-year old sees as being far too close to home and far too prevalent in modern youth culture. The track displays a range of emotions, from sadness, desperation, exasperation and despair, as Foxxxy shows yet another side of her almost chameleonic talent and skill in the modern era of mainstream rap and grime.

This song was written by the 18-year old as a way of expressing her distress at how the youth in some areas of her home city turn from innocent and happy kids, into bands of teenagers whose only intention in life is to patrol the areas they see as their own, and causing injury and even worse to anyone that crosses them, or happens to live in the wrong side of town. The track's slow and steady pace almost signifies a slow meandering through life that can be drawn from the pointless deaths of numerous young people far before they should have passed away naturally. Foxxxy said that everything from the lyrics down to the style and the beat was measured and tested perfectly to ensure that the mood was captured in a way that reflected her sadness over her own home town. "As a young girl in South London, yeah, I remember there was crime and shit, know, but it was all like in the adult world largely, you get me? Dudes would steal and like fight and shit, but us kids, we were happy yeah? Now, fam, fuck I look back at my own hometown, the area I grew up in, and I see like killings and gang culture in among people my own age and shit you feel me? I mean, I grew up wiv some people who in't even breathing anymore, know? All because they walked into the wrong area of the town. Dis track had to reflect my pain and heartfelt sorrow over dis man. Dis is my Toy Soldiers by Eminem know? If it stops one gang member from takin' a knife to school, or lifting a pistol from a tool shed, then I'll be happy. I hope the song reflects my own mood accurately. We did everything to make it sound sad, horrific, and like, make the whole idea of gang life seem...pointless."

If one thing has epitomised the start of Foxxxy's album, it has been the way her music is always so dynamic, and how her focus can change and adapt to fit all new themes and styles whenever appropriate, another important aspect of This is the Place that means the song is yet another that stands out from the crowd and shows Foxxxy to be the true talent that she is, now that she has been allowed to let the ideas and way of life that being given the power to put your music out there can give. While mostly all of the other songs that anyone has heard from Foxxxy to date has been centred around the flame haired hip hop star and her own emotions and feelings towards other people, This is the Place is the first time that we feel empathy from Foxxxy rather than for her. As listeners, we are no longer thinking, "damn, I know how she feels, that must be awful/amazing," and instead we feel her emotions projected onto something much bigger and more important. "When I sat down to write this flow, innit, I think it was the first time in my life that I ever did so and thought "This does not need to be about me." I started to write about how it tore me up and stuff, but then I found myself deletin' and replacin' dem lines, and bringin' in like parts where I ask how other people feel about it, and look at how it can affect community and ting. I'm glad I wrote dis song though, it made me learn a lot, about culture, about violence, and even about myself. I feel like a much more sympathetic and sad person about all of this after having written this track alone."

In terms of the physical sound of the track itself, This is the Place is very much a slower song than listeners will have heard from the first two offerings on Foxxxy's album. It runs together from the almost whining nose that emanates from the end of Missin' You, translating into a sombre background synth noise, before a slow and sad style keyboard comes in, playing a few spaced out notes to give a notion of a calmness that only seems to exist around death. The verses of the song are slow and fairly quiet affairs in terms of music. Foxxxy raps far slower than she has in te past, yet still manages to deliver each line of the rap with the sort of flow and style that everyone is used to, delivering a very polished and fantastic sound that her fans will automatically recognise as her own. The skill and grace with which Foxxxy delivers such a poignant and emotional message is sure to win her praise from yet more critics and fans as a result of a maturity and skill that belies her teenage years. Overall, in the verses, the aura that is portrayed is of Foxxxy marching through the town she used to live in slowly but surely, in the pouring rain, sadly drinking in everything that has become of the place where she started not only her life, but her rap career; a place and a people that influenced her more than any others.

In terms of the choruses on this track, fans of Foxxxy are in for a shock. While previous songs from the flame haired hip hop princess have only ever seen and heard her rap, this one brings another style out of Foxxxy, with a soft, almost whisper-like singing being brought out of Foxxxy to plead for sanity and peace in her old town. The singer visits a style that is out of her comfort zone, but does so with a sort of style and grace that means fans, while surprised, will not feel that it is out of place at all. Those less familiar with Foxxxy will even question their own judgement over where they have ever heard Foxxxy rap before, such is the ease with which she enters such a different and alien style of vocals. The chorus is haunting and tearjerking, and Foxxxy delivers it with a haunting yet sweet voice that no one would have expected her to possess. Backup vocals, setting the tone and just annotating the track, are provided by Foxxxy's friend Ms.ile, her voice high and haunting, and reminiscent of something from European trance music.

"Yeah, bruv, you can catch me singing on this song for the first time ever. I was well nervous and ting though, innit, because it is like well a change from my normal and that know, you feel me? I felt like I wanted to do it though. The fact that it took me out of my comfort zone shows how like I need to show that this is not a comfortable situation, no one in that area I come from ever feels safe, or that they have like a place they can go to get away from it all. They all have to step out if they comfort zone every day and into the danger. So as well as the fact that it fits the song very well, know, I also wanted to portray that type of theme, just so that people know, innit fam?"

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Yo, the rains are lashin' down and I'm standin' in this once familiar maze
But I in't gon' run for cover, got no way to escape this haze
Over the water the bright lights shine, creatin' a beautiful sensation
This is the place, my hometown, it's my only permanent destination
Yeah, see we're proud of where we live, at least we are when blood don't flow
From shanks and shooters, more lights out, every life lost such a blow
It's like a fuckin' movie here, I swear my life's been written by Scorcese,
He only walked down an ill-picked street and now he's pushing up the daisies.

Was this what you wanted?
To make our streets just another dumping ground
I get these chills and I'm haunted,
Every day waiting for another kid to be found
Was this what you always dreamed of?
To have our streets running red with lives of the pure
It's more than just letting steam off
It's like a dark epidemic but we can't find the cure

Movin' down from the Thames to the south from the bright lights,
Dey ain't no tourism here, just blood, crips and knife fights
You see every time you lift the steel and go out wiv it in your pocket,
Someone else is closer to bein' just a face encased inside a locket,
You just children, none of you should be confined to the end of a chain,
Your life frozen in youth, an existence that ends in fear, hatred and pain,
Just look around at what bred this, concrete blocks of poor dejection.
No one has to choose the Thug Life when they own life offers just rejection.

Was this what you wanted?
To make our streets just another dumping ground
I get these chills and I'm haunted,
Every day waiting for another kid to be found
Was this what you always dreamed of?
To have our streets running red with lives of the pure
It's more than just letting steam off
It's like a dark epidemic but we can't find the cure

Every time I turn around, the rain's made of lead, there's bullets droppin'
But yo this ain't the matrix, you aint Neo, you ain't got the power to be stoppin'
What will it take to make them say no, to stop the fingers squeezin' triggers,
Fight depravity and hate, cos in this place it only figures,
I don't wanna live in a town where murders are common like the rat,
it's a sad way to behave, when the poverty you crave is oil and fries and fat.
We feel like pawns in this crazy game, yo we ain't askin to be queens
Not even kings and knights and castles
We just wanna have the chance to leave here why is it it seems,
That we just ain't worth the hassle.

Was this what you wanted?
To make our streets just another dumping ground
I get these chills and I'm haunted,
Every day waiting for another kid to be found
Was this what you always dreamed of?
To have our streets running red with lives of the pure
It's more than just letting steam off
It's like a dark epidemic but we can't find the cure

This can't be the only way of life, can't you break them from this fear?
I know you're thinkin', yo that chick knows drugs and cash and beer,
But listen fam, I ain't no snob, I know there's problems from where I hail,
Don't hate on me for gettin' out, my career is like my bail.
The chance is there to walk away, what happened to takin' on the high road
You only 17 you got a family, don't be tellin' them goodbye though.

So walk away, walk away fam,
Just let it go and turn over a new leaf,
Walk away, turn your back and go, man,
There's anuva life that's that's free of grief,
So walk away, just turn and go, now walkaway fam,
You don't need Hollywood to be your own star,
Just let it go, you've done enough, man,
Just pack a bag, and I'm beggin' you to get in that car.

Was this what you wanted?
To make our streets just another dumping ground
I get these chills and I'm haunted,
Every day waiting for another kid to be found
Was this what you always dreamed of?
To have our streets running red with lives of the pure
It's more than just letting steam off
It's like a dark epidemic but we can't find the cure

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