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Charlie Sloth is the kingmaking BBC rap expert and self-styled “best-looking fat guy in the universe”. As he launches new multimedia show The 8th, he explains why success was never in question
In July 2010, hours before his first ever Radio 1 show, Charlie Sloth went up to the station’s then resident hip-hop don Tim Westwood and told him, point blank, “I’m coming for your job.” There’s footage online of a wound-up Westwood introducing Sloth on air for the first time. “Here’s this new guy at the station,” he says. “I better crush him and destroy his career.” On the surface it’s all pantomime fighting talk, but Westwood was right in saying, “You might be the person who replaces me on Saturday night.”
Three years later, that’s exactly what Sloth ended up doing. He took Westwood’s daily 1Xtra show and his weekend Rap Show slot. Now he’s heading up Radio 1’s late show on weeknights, The 8th With Charlie Sloth, debuting November 6. He’s credited with helping kick-start the careers of Skepta, Stormzy and Wretch 32, and he’s been a launchpad for emerging grime acts such as Dave and Avelino.
Ten years ago, however, Sloth was scraping by in London, living in what he calls a “shed with no sanitation”, raising his son between jobs. Way before then, aged 14, he was already DJing for pirate radio stations such as Rinse FM and “lying about my age” so he could play residencies at haunts such as Camden venue Dingwalls.
He soon tired of pirate radio (“I just didn’t feel like I was really getting anywhere”) and tried MCing, producing and making videos for other artists, but by 2007 he was broke and almost out of options. A surprise move to vlogging turned his fortunes around. He wrote and produced a show called Being Charlie Sloth, playing seven different characters involved in the hip-hop scene, including a manager, a street team and…
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