![]() She was invited to featured on the debut album of Sway (MOBO AWARD WINNDER) co-writing and performing the single 'Back for You'. From the wider awareness throughout the UK created by this mixtape the following winter in what was a deserved escalation of her stature, Ny was approached to feature as writer and performer on top 20 album projects for three of the UK’s most well respected artists. Unbeknown to Ny this 'do it yourself' approach would soon start a trend encouraging other UK unsigned female performers to ignore gender or genre orientated barriers and put out there own material independently. Through tracks like 'Fire', 'Embrace', 'Haters' and 'Moody', Ny started to receive plaudits attracting wider acclaim and airplay support particularly from specialist radio DJs on national and international stations like BBC 1Xtra, Radio One, Kiss and Choice FM as well as from major label artist like, The Streets (Warner Brothers). However the significance of the mixtape was more profound than just the sales and it subsequently became somewhat of a 'make or break' moment for Ny. In the end Split Endz Vol 1 sold in excess of 3000 copies which for an UK RnB unsigned mixtape independently distributed by Ny herself at the time was unprecedented. Taking into account the success of Johnny Rockstars, the very fact that he was happy to provide his complimentary services and music for her mixtape was a resounding and emphatic endorsement of her talents. In an almost unprecedented step and testament to Ny’s talent, the widely acclaimed Johnny ‘Rock Stars’ (Sugababes and All Saint’s Album producer) provided the track 'Moody' which he had recorded for Ny especially to use on this underground mixtape. Just some of these featured artist and producers include Sincere, Wiley, Professor Green, Plan B, Sway (Mobo Winner), and Sweetie Irie (Gorillaz). Prior to recording the tape, Ny was relatively unknown beyond artistic circles but this did not deter some of the UK’s most prominent heavyweight producers and artist who were all more than willing to contribute to this pioneering project. ![]() It was also entirely self funded and managed, by a then unemployed or should I say as she likes to put it 'self employed' Ny, and contained 100% original material with some specially selected high profile guest contributions and features. But Ny insured that the mixtape through, many of the ballads and other more vocally led tracks, still retained the soft RnB and soul element in keeping with her signature sound, ensuring that the final product would appeal to both underground and more mainstream, as well as female and male listeners in equal measure. It included tracks taken from the rough and ready, dark and rapidly popularizing so called UK Grime and Hip Hop underground scenes. The mixtape was heralded as being the first ever 'Rhythm and Grime' compilation of its time coining the phrase 'RnG'. Aimed at the burgeoning inner city urban underground scenes, with which Ny has a profound and deep connection, the mixtape comprised of 20 original tracks. And so later that year Ny released her debut and pioneering mixtape which in keeping with her mixed race heritage she would go on to name Split Endz Vol 1. Instead Ny decided the most organic way to develop both her artistic talent and career, was to undertake the ultimate act of self confidence and decide instead to create her own hype! By putting out her own underground compilation mixtape. A determined Ny now just 18 and fresh out of college and various music courses, was not willing to wait or expect a major label to knock down her door and simply offer her a recording deal. Well for that we would have to go back to January 2005. ![]() However if you had to, you would say Ny is best described as a supremely gifted vocalist who possesses a soulfully unique voice, effortlessly combined with her highly respected songwriting skills, which she first acquired through her early teenage years while writing poetry and spoken word. Ny’s natural infectious personality which can not to be limited within culturally or socially specific boundaries or stereo types also presents itself artistically in her music and due in large part to her dynamic and diverse talent and so Ny is almost impossible to pigeonhole. Contrary to any preconceived and unfair expectations of so called grime artists, Ny is a committed vegetarian and self confessed animal lover, and is as comfortable in such open green spaces as she is among the tower blocks and concrete housing estates around which she proudly grew up, and with which the largely misrepresented urban music scene is so closely associated. ![]() Nyomi Gray aged 22 who performs under the name of Ny (Pronounced Nie), proudly reminds me that she was born and raised just down the road from here in Kentish Town North London. ![]()
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