Meet Ceebo, the London rapper with a razor-sharp state-of-the-nation edge
With his latest mixtape Bloccstar, the rapper moves from social commentary to learning lessons from Macbeth as he wrestles with career integrity over commerciality
Ceebo’s 2025 breakout mixtape Blair Babies was a major turning point for the south London rapper. Displaying an intellectual curiosity and academic rigour few young rappers could compete with, it spotlighted the social, cultural and economic strains placed on Brits born under Blairite rule. With cold, piercing, grime-inspired instrumentals and politically incisive spoken-word pieces, the project cut through with rap fans across the UK.
The rapper’s previous release, LAMBETHNOTLA (2024), had gone down well with the underground, but not so well that he could leave his day job. “Being myself and getting paid for it definitely feels like a longer road at times, but I don’t really have time to not be myself,” he reflects. “It’s fulfilling enough that that doesn’t matter, and all of the noise, all the numbers and the things you’re told you have to care about, prioritise, is ultimately out of our control.”
Thanks to Blair Babies, the 24-year-old now makes a living from music. Given his often-complex subject matter, which draws firm, logical lines between Thatcherite economics, Tory austerity, social media burnout and Gen Z hedonism, that’s some achievement. Now, disillusionment rears a new head.
Ceebo’s latest mixtape Bloccstar, released in September, deals with the fallout from his career progression, taking inspiration from the narrative arc of Macbeth to deliver a gripping tale of advancement with a sharp, satirical core. Across 12 tracks, he drops listeners into meetings with out-of-touch record execs and bombards us with lyrics dissecting the internal conflicts and psychodramas that ensue when an artist aims to garner mainstream success while retaining the integrity and values that made them an interesting voice in the first place.
Read our interview with Ceebo and listen to his music via our Play Next playlist on Spotify below.
Tell us about the concept behind Bloccstar.
The project is a satire. As a lyrical rapper, you’re faced with two choices at a certain point. Either you stay underrated and respected by your peers, but you don’t get to reap the rewards of your influence, or you make creative compromises in order to secure financial security, and you come under a lot of criticism for that. So, it’s kinda damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
The project follows the story arc of Macbeth, where I go through the motions, starting as an ambitious rapper willing to make concessions and do whatever to reap the rewards of the work I put in. I make songs that are more shallow, less dense than what fans know me for, and I get what I want from it, but what I want is not what I needed, and there’s a profound emptiness. The climax is me having an interaction with a fan that radically leads us to the resolution of the story, which I won’t spoil ahead of time because I’ve got a flair for drama. It’s super ambitious. I don’t think I’ve had to approach a project thinking about music in this way, so it’s been a mad interesting challenge.
You’ve identified your track ‘Macbeth Soliloquy’ as the project’s thematic core. How did the Shakespearean tragedy influence you?
After he killed King Duncan, Macbeth had lots of soliloquies about the fact he’d done this unspeakable evil for ambition, and he immediately realises it’s not worth it. This project is the same thing: the unspeakable evil being compromising musically, compromising on my approach to art for ambition and success, then getting to the mountain peak and it not being fulfilling.
How have you evolved as an artist since last year’s Blair Babies?
I’ve had a lot of time to consider and study music as a craft and commit to the act of improving. Watching endless concerts from artists like Kendrick, Beyoncé, Jay-Z, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say I’d watched 500 hours of footage since Blair Babies. I read a lot of interviews. I wanna understand the artist’s perception of what works, their process, and the social and political climate the project is released in.
Where does your own socio-political vision come from?
Going through life being put in situations and living conditions that were the direct result of cutbacks, austerity, segregation. I studied politics and sociology [at the University of Warwick], so I learned as much as possible about the current economic conditions we live in, how they came to be, and how they affect me and people with my background.
What comes after Bloccstar?
There are certain things I’m just waiting to say when it’s the right time, because I know it’s not gonna be impactful if I say it now. It’s mad easy to be self-gratifying as an artist, but I always wanna make sure I have the most impact I can. Bloccstar is my life at present, but I’m eager to get around to telling more stories.