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Loyle Carner On How Fatherhood and Hitting 30 Shaped His Indie-Inspired New LP: ‘I’m A Person I Never Thought I Could Become’

Loyle Carner discusses his upcoming album, ‘hopefully !’; fatherhood; and Glastonbury Festival in a Billboard UK cover story with the rapper.

On “Hate,” the scorching opener to 2022’s hugo, the south Londoner starts by offering to “let me tell you about what I hate.” He rages against racial profiling, the limited opportunities for young Black men, the pitfalls of his own success and his relationship with his father, concluding: “I fear the color of my skin.” Debut LP Yesterday’s Gone(2017) was a love letter to the rap that supported him following the death of his stepfather and earned him a nomination for the prestigious Mercury Prize; his sophomore record, Not Waving, But Drowning(2019), spawned a number of streaming hits, including the jazz-tinged “Ottolenghi.” Across the record, he ruminated on his mixed-race heritage (Carner’s mother is white; his biological father is Guyanese) and his place in British society, enlisting esteemed poet John Agard for a spoken word meditation on “Georgetown,” produced by Madlib.

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