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Meet 21-year-old JaeSwift: raps lyricist laureate, the MC’s MC, the street poet who knows it, a pirate frequency all of his own amid the scramble of the national hiphop airspace. A key member in Lancashire’s reigning M.O.B Crew, he has talent, credibility and vision coming out of his pores.

And there’s time for a lot more, beginning with headline billing as Most Requested spitter on Hot FM’s underground circuit – for further details, just check the posters adorning any traffic lights near you. With not one but two alternative careers – he trialled as a goalkeeper as a schoolkid, and then cruised through graphic design courses on the back of his GCSES. Music’s gain is very much academia and sport’s loss. He is native and resident of Oswaldtwistle in far-East Lancs, where rap is less a sounds than a way of life. And today Jae is ready to roll out his new single ‘Mother Of Misery’ and forthcoming album alongside a whole new mode of expression that threatens to leave the competition looking decidedly one-dimensional.

In the magnificently unblemished flesh, JaeSwift is affable, assured, unhurried, unafraid. He smiles at girls as they walk past, but holds his tongue. For someone who’s making career out of hyperspeed chat, he’s surprisingly quiet. Where others front, Jae reflects. His timing is nanosecond perfect. As a schoolkid he didn’t approach Rap with the blind zeal of the evangelist. Get this – he ‘eased into it.’

‘It was a mess-about really,’ he says. ‘Most of my friends in the playground would be battling each other. I started in writing lyrics and making tapes in my bedroom, and started making beats on my computer, and then made a couple of songs.’

Neither did he have to look too far from his ends to find the music that best expressed how he felt about the world he was growing into. Jae’s radio buzzed with the sounds of East Lancs pirate. There were no pictures of Tupac or Biggie on his walls. Instead his tastes mainly fell into Indie and Rock.

He still reflects a lot, a personal characteristic that defines Jae’s lyrical themes and vocal style. Far more than a mere hype man for whichever DJ is rocking the rave or torching the local pirate station with 20 of his mates, Jae’s agenda edges rap towards a far more ambitious level of articulacy. It’s been said that he comes over as the quiet kid… ‘…But I’m just thinking,’ he notes. ‘I’m thoughtful. I’m quiet more than I speak. I got a lot of tunes with inside thoughts. It’s thinking about what I’m getting into, if it’s too late to turn back, if this is really what I want to do. That’s the kind of person I am.’

Swift says. ‘The MCs were just hyping up the crowd, but now the MCs have got a lot to say. Basically spitting verses about what’s going on rather than just hyping the crowd. There are tunes to make you dance, but it’s more about listening to the MCs.’

‘Fame would piss me off, I reckon,’ he concludes. ‘I bet Eminem wishes he could sell as many records but not be so famous. Your face is just blatant and everyone knows who you are. It must be a nightmare… I’d probably stay indoors a lot. Some people get into this for the fame. I don’t. I just want to do it for the music.’