From youth work on knife crime to performing with My Nu Leng, Dread MC has done it all

Gloucester born, Bristol based artist, Mikel Medley AKA Dread MC understands what it’s like to be busy. He released his debut album, Pressure Drop, last month, after our call he was performing at Thekla that night with My Nu Leng then heading to Slovakia to perform at Uprising Festival and then heading back to London for Notting Hill Carnival.

“I’m always moving, always busy because it’s what I’m passionate about,” he tells Bristol24/7. “I can take inspiration and creativity from anywhere which feeds directly into my music.

“Even this conversation is putting me into that headspace because I get to talk about something I’m really passionate about.”

Medley has a back catalogue of work that rivels the yellow pages, working with a range of artists from Goldie to Shy FX throughout his career. Despite working with artists across different genres, Medley says his primary music taste is eletronic dance music; “I’m a multi genre artist in some ways, but I don’t like to be pigeonholed into a specific category.

“The album is a bass project and then I have drum and bass tracks coming out with other artists. But overall, I would say electronic dance music is my main genre of music,” he tells us.

Pressue Drop features a range of other artists on many of the tracks, including Bristol favourites Try Me and London native Duckworthsound. We spend a bit of time chatting about our love of Try Me (“I think they’re incredible. Like, the energy that they have as well is incredible.”) before returning to his favourite tracks on the album.

The new album features a range of artists. photo: Courtesy of Jukebox PR

“I don’t really have a favourite because a lot of them stick out for me, and it’s not just the tune itself, it’s also how the tune was made and where I was at that time, the process and the work that went in into it.

“It was such a personal project, with the featuring artists, the lyrics and even the artwork [created by friend, Khali Photgraphy] so I can’t really have a favourite because they all mean something to me.”

The music industry comes with certain stereotypes, including categorising and exlcuding artists, but Medley stands out from the crowd in a number of ways. One of them being the work he does alongside his music; “I do lead a number of youth and music projects,” he explains.

“We had young people coming together from Portsmouth, Cardiff, Birmingham and Gloucester, to collaborate on an anti-knife album and that was amazing work to do.”

Another way he stands out is his attitude towards releasing music; “I’m just working on music and some tunes that can take six months or three years before they’re released, and that doesn’t bother me. I’m not trying to make music that’s current right now, the music I’m making has that kind of future vibe, so I’m in no rush to release anything.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/ChraIfUqyqR/?hl=en

With the album being two years in the making, it is certainly a project that is very close to Medley’s heart and one that deserves all the praise it’s currently receiving.

In his own words, the album is “just me being 100% me.”

You can listen to Pressue Drop here: https://open.spotify.com/album/1RmxxPNf3zx6ADyusY2731?si=oJIOV-KOSm-tU47IkQcFlQ

Main photo: courtest of Jukebox PR

Read next:

• Review: Try Me, The Louisiana – ‘Soaked in silliness and non-stop joy’
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• Meet the Trans musician shattering gender stereotypes 

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