Derek B

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Derek B (born Derek Boland, 15 January 1965, in London).

When he was 15, he started DJing in a mobile unit around London, before joining local pirate radio stations such as Kiss FM and LWR and finally starting his own station, WBLS (not to be confused with the radio station of the same name in New York).

He joined Simon Harris' Music of Life as the closest thing they had to an A&R man. When a planned compilation of U.S. hip hop called Def Beats 1 (Music of Life, 1986) ran short of tracks, Boland stepped in to record a track called "Rock the Beat". He co-produced the track with Simon Harris, rapped on it under the name Derek B and also did his own DJing under the pseudonym DJ EZQ. "Rock the Beat" (Music of Life, 1987) was released as a single, and followed by two more - the most successful of which was "Good Groove" (Music of Life, 1988) which reached number 16 in the UK Singles Chart.

Derek B was the first UK rapper to achieve pop success, appearing on Top of the Pops at a time when the only other rappers who had appeared were Break Machine and Doug E. Fresh. He never received much respect from the British hip hop community, however, who at the time were very concerned about the idea of "selling out": in the eyes of the serious hip hop fans, money and pop success compromised an artist's integrity and were not to be openly courted. This attitude is summed up by the story of rapper Kamanchi Sly winning a Tim Westwood rapping competition and throwing his prize money into the audience shouting "It's not about money but about art" - ironic considering that it was watching this performance that led Derek B to put Sly in touch with Music of Life, and put his group Hijack on track to become arguably one of the most successful British hip hop groups. He also received criticism for rapping under a ridiculous American accent, something which was popular in the early days of British hip hop, but soon abandoned as more and more British artists started to become sure of their own identities.

Following his chart success, Derek B was signed up to Rush Artist Management and released singles and the album Bullet From a Gun (Tuff Audio, 1988), which continued to be successful and were also popular in the U.S. - something which was rare for British hip hop. One of the other British artists to achieve any success in the U.S. was Monie Love, who also assumed an American accent when rapping.

Derek B was also successful as a producer and remixer, working with the Cookie Crew and Erik B and Rakim.