Kate Tempest started out when she was 16, rapping at strangers on night buses and pestering mc’s to let her on the mic at raves. Ten years later she is a published playwright, novelist, poet and respected recording artist.

Her debut album Everybody Down has finally hit the shelves – real and virtual – to ubiquitous acclaim. And it’s not just the press. Kate played a one off, intimate gig in London to celebrate the release, and Rick Rubin and Frank Ocean were amongst the wowed audience along with The Guardian who awarded it a stunning 5/5 review.

Seeing Kate Tempest perform live enhances everything you hear on the album. She is earnest, urgent, savvy, streetwise, warm and most of all, riotously talented with words. She’s no simple showboat MC, revelling in speed alone, but someone who uses her staggering command of language to create music with narrative, themes, character and meaning in a way unique to her genre. She’s a rapper who makes poetry out of rap music.

• Rap & Hip Hop