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Influx Press is to publish Hold Tight, a book about black masculinity and Grime music written by Jeffrey Boakye, in July 2017.
Celebrating more than 50 defining songs of the genre, Boakye explores the origins of the music and why it has such resonance in the UK. Boakye also examines the representation of masculinity in the genre’s output, and in the media that covers it. Both a “loving critique” of Grime and an investigation into life as a black man in the UK today, Hold Tight explores its seminal tracks—including Glamma Kid’s “Moschino”, Danny Weed’s “Creeper”, Tempa T’s “Next Hype” and Skepta’s “Too Many Man”—and situates the genre within the wider underground music scene in the UK.
“Insightful, very funny and stacked with sentences you’ll want to pull up and read again, Hold Tight rolls deep, giving a context to Grime that hasn’t been given before. This is an electrifying and wonderfully confident début from a music and culture critic with a very bright future ahead of him,” the publisher said of the book, to which it holds world rights.
Publisher Kit Caless added: “I’m incredibly excited to have signed Hold Tight and Jeffrey Boakye to Influx Press. Hold Tight is an exceptional book, like nothing I’ve read before. Boakye is a genuine talent and I couldn’t be happier launching his career.”
Boakye said: “Influx is a perfect fit for Hold Tight. It’s a publishing house with a proven commitment to innovative non-fiction and, importantly, an exclamation mark sense of humour. My book is funny in every sense of the word; Influx, I think, saw this as a virtue. ‘Hold Tight’ is a great title, incidentally, because it’s such a bumpy ride. Influx appreciated the energy this comes with and could feed it back into the project. It also helps that Kit is such a big Grime fan.”