The Rapper Who Grew From Concrete
On a Wednesday afternoon under typical London weather, I met with Kitch, a rapper, sound engineer, and producer from Walthamstow. Not so long ago, the east Londoner was playing football at a semi-pro level. Yet, destiny had decided otherwise. After dropping out of his school, Ritchie (Kitch’s real name) started rapping in his bedroom. As months went by, he started taking this to a more serious level. For three years now, Kitch has been releasing a couple of tracks. His most recent release, ‘Spitting Like’ has attracted more than 2000 listeners. A small win that paves the way for many more to come.
Words & Images by Audrey Damier
When Kitch dropped out of school, he had nothing much to do. ‘I was staying at home, all day every day, feeling down, depressed, and angry’ he revealed to me. With so much time on his hands, one day, he decided to take his pen and write lyrics. Ritchie would train every day and for 8 hours straight. Within 6 months he realized how much he had improved. At some point, he became so comfortable that he started recording on his phone. And, while he had fallen ‘out of love for football’, he fell in love with rapping.
Before taking rap seriously, Kitch was what he would call a ‘bedroom rapper’. ‘I would rap along to my favourite rapper’ he admitted. ‘I never saw rap as a dream’ he later said. Yet, Kitch is a steady student when it comes to rap. While he learned most of his skills and tricks on his own, Kitch took his passion to a next level by enrolling into a music college. A college where he would learn the ropes of sound engineering. His years at his new college gave him the visibility he did not expect. In early 2018, the BBC got in touch with Kitch after seeing one of his live performances on YouTube. ‘When they’ve contacted me on Twitter, I was like no that can’t be real’ he remembered. But yes, it was real. There he was, a few months later, with a short documentary about him on national TV. A documentary that made his friend and family proud. ‘Ever since the documentary, my parents have always been rooting for me’ he told me.
“They tried to get rid of it as if I was speaking wrong”
By the way, he’s so well-spoken you wouldn’t tell. Tell what? You might wonder. You wouldn’t tell that this young man spent most of his life ‘learning how to talk correctly’. For as long as he can remember, Kitch has been battling with a stutter and spent most of his childhood in speech therapy. ‘They tried to get rid of it as if I was speaking wrong’ he recalled. During those sessions, they tried countless techniques but none of them worked. ‘It was something that I physically could not do, and no one was letting me accept it, as if it was a problem that had to be fixed’ he added.
This constant battle built up a lot of anger and frustration during his teenage years. Other kids would pick on him which would result in fights. ‘If I couldn’t speak it out, how was I supposed to resolve it’ he explained. Kitch frustration got to a point where he felt like he was letting himself and his family down. Nevertheless, rap flipped that around.
‘Because of my speech, I never thought I could rap’ he revealed to me. In the early days, he would still stutter on his rap, but Ritchie kept persevering. Day after day, his speech got better, and, realising his improvement, he got a new mindset. ‘Everyone has to find the things that they love’ he told me. And, for him it was rap.
However, Kitch doesn’t want his stutter to define him. A few months after his BBC documentary, someone from Britain’s Got Talent saw it and contacted him. It didn’t take him much time to refuse the offer. ‘Respect is a huge thing in Hip Hop, so I didn’t want to be seen as a culture vulture’ he stated. ‘I want to be known as a rapper for my skills, not as a sob story on national TV’ he then added.
Way before he started rapping, Kitch was already a hip-hop head. ‘I know it’s cliché but growing up the artist that introduced me to hip hop was Eminem’ he jokingly said to me. Though Eminem's lyrics and particularly name-dropping, Kitch would learn about Nas, NWA, or Rakim. Some of Hip-Hop finest lyricists still inspire him to this day.
My influences are more of the lyrical, old school era’ he admitted. So much that growing up, he never really cared about the new music, as he was too busy focusing on learning about the ‘old stuff’. Although his influences are mostly from the US, Kitch also has many UK sources of inspiration. He quotes rappers like Dave, Stormzy, Benny Banks, or Devlin as examples. ‘I love lyrical guys that can rap with a lot of content and consciousness’ he explained.
Kitch is what we would call ‘a rap nerd’. His dedication to his art is undefeated. The rapper would spend his days analyzing and deciphering his favourite artists’ songs but also his own. He plays the song six times to ensure he doesn’t miss out on anything. Highlighting any rhyme scheme, metaphors, or wordplay. ‘If you hear my old songs, I’m just speaking nonsense but it rhymes’ he confessed. With rap, all of Kitch's sort of suppressed emotions were finally released. And, with his emotion out, his confidence skyrocketed. ‘Some of my old first songs are literally me just shouting and swearing’ he said to me while laughing. But now, Ritchie grew out of that.
“ I won’t become great overnight; it takes much practice”
For the past year, the rapper has been trying to formulate a debut project. His idea behind it is to show his evolution. ‘I want to show that I’m not a college kid anymore, I want to show that I’m an artist’ he detailed. Kitch already crafted a couple of tracks, but he doesn’t want to force this debut project as he said himself. He even got his hands-on beat producing. A skill that he had already started working on before and RISE’s online workshops helped him improve.
But after focusing on bettering his craft and artistry, Kitch is ready to come back harder, faster, and stronger. On May 27th, the Walthamstow-based rapper will be releasing a new single untitled ’10 000 hours’. Inspired by Malcolm’s Gladwell theory that it takes over 10,000 hours to master a craft, the song explains why Kitch took time to improve. ‘I won’t become great overnight; it takes much practice’ he acknowledged. The song will be accompanied by a music video shot by a film production company. A perfect way to showcase that not only did his music improve but the video quality as well. ‘As it was made last October, the song still has elements of the old American-sounding Kitch, but my next song will definitely be experimenting with a UK sound’ he explains.
After this 1-hour long interview with Kitch, a poem comes to my mind: The Rose That Grew from Concrete by Tupac Shakur. The poem represents the ways that someone can become something great coming from a place that’s not recognised as great. Dropping out of school, battling with his stutter, and growing up in Walthamstow, all of this could have handicap him. Yet, he didn’t let it get in his way. Instead, he kept ‘his dreams and learned to breathe fresh air’. In Tupac words, long live Kitch, the rose that grew from concrete.
