‘Did you see what I done, came in a black Benz, left in a white one’. If you sing these 16 words to any one in London, they are guaranteed to sing along with you, which goes to show the nationwide spread of J hus and his music in the last year. I first came across J hus late November 2014 when he released his Link up TV #street heat freestyle. The freestyle is a mixture of what we love about J hus, which is his hard hitting bars, as well as his catchy hooks. Starting off his freestyle with ‘the beef gets cooking, N*ggas start making phone calls…’ and ending with ‘Lord forgive me if I use my tool’. J hus then carried on his buzz on the street with various freestyles from late 2014 into early 2015. These freestyles included an SBTV warm up session, in which Jamal Edwards called him down to showcase his skills, a GRM Rated freestyle, as well as two Bl@ckbox freestyles. Receiving millions of views in the process.
These freestyles got our notice, but as we know, it is very common for musicians to receive a lot of recognition for a couple of freestyles and or songs and never be heard again, and J hus during 2015 carried along his buzz into 2015, with the release of ‘Dem Boy Paigon’. This song blew up, amassing 8 million views currently on YouTube, and millions of more views on soundcloud. This song reiterated what most of us already knew about J hus, that he was different from other artists at the time. He had a structure to his song that we had not seen in recent years, and a sound that was unheard of in the UK music scene at that time. Hus brought an unheard mix of Afrobeats, joined with Bashment, Rap, RnB, as well as other genres into his music. This sound is what made him appeal to fans of UK music, as he was, to put it in his words ‘everything you have heard and nothing you’ve heard at the same time’. In his songs, J hus brings together the hard bars as well as the catchy lines, which is what no other artist in the UK music scene does. J hus then released a body of work in the form of his mixtape ‘The 15th day’, in which he was quoted that it is named after the time period which it took him to produce the tracks. The mixtape showcased a side to J hus in which we had not seen, a more vulnerable, emotional side to him In the form of tracks such as ‘I’m coming’, ‘Guns and butter, ‘Thing for you’, as well as others. This project showcased his skills to music lovers all over, and connected with not just fans of UK music. As the mixtape had a very diverse sound, courtesy of Jae5. Hus also released the very popular song ‘Lean and Bop’, which was a very light hearted and upbeat song, which was created ‘so that his younger brother could listen to something a bit more positive’. J hus buzz then all of a sudden died down, as a result of negative press in which he endured after being stabbed in 2015, followed by a stint of inactivity by Hus as a result of his incarnation in 2016.
Following his release from prison, J hus released three songs, ‘Playing Sports’, ‘Free Up’, and ‘Clean it up’, with all three songs connecting with the streets as well as having a strong replay value. The way in which these songs connected, and was played reiterated how special J hus was. As he had disappeared from the UK music scene for a long period of time, and upon his return his music connected and did more views than his music before his absence. Which showed the connectivity that J hus had with his fans, as well as how loyal fans of his music was. Hus then followed up his hype with the release of Friendly which was signed to Black Butter Records, Hus’ first record deal (single deal) This song done very positive numbers, amounting thousands of sales. Towards the end of 2016 into early 2017, Hus stopped with singles, and was more focused on features, bodying a number of features, from Samantha with Dave to Liar with Mostack, as well as his track with Nines. Hus on all his features singing the hook, which was continuously catchy and left J Hus with the loosely named nickname of Captain Hook.
J hus, who has a very large social media following-g
Photographer: Niklas Haze
Production: Lilian Buechner
Stylist: Kirubel Belay
Hair & Make Up: Asuka Fukuda
