Holy Moly

Album: Youth (2017)
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Songfacts®:

  • This braggadocious track finds Tinie Tempah really letting his guard down and telling listeners just how he feels about his successful career and the stick he gets from haters. He told Zane Lowe on Beats 1:

    "That's my unapologetic side. That's just the unapologeticness in me, the tension that's built up all along these years. Constant recording, touring, record deal situations, people talking my name… I've always just tried to be the artist that just tries to bring from my culture a little bit of positivity.

    But within our culture, especially within England, not only just a global show but I'm talking to you about what we've had to go through in England. Like our scene and our sound is always the one that has been uninvited, it hasn't been one that was welcomed. So for us to even get to this place now where we at which are these global interviews where we are able to be on global platforms. There's been a big fight man and I feel like one of the biggest fights in my respect isn't to only be that belligerent MC but just trying to blaze the trails and try to get my culture in to the environment that it wasn't always necessarily welcomed in. And that isn't always easy, people know that I'm a real person, I go through real life stuff. But MCs have this certain kind of stereotype that painted a certain type of picture. In England 8 or 10 years ago if you wanted to do a certain kind of show your show's getting shut down by the police. It wasn't easy and so there's a lot of tension that sort of has built up in that.

    And now that I'm at the third album, there's a lot of rappers globally, not just form the UK, that don't even get an opportunity to make that first record. I was definitely feeling free, I was definitely feeling very confident in myself and I was feeling like I just really need this one moment to tell it out how it is and that moment is 'Holy Moly' for me on the album."
  • That's fellow Disturbing London labelmate and close friend G Frsh giving Tinie Tempah a pep-talk on the intro.
  • The beat was supplied by London based house producer Shift K3Y, whose best known for his UK Top 3 hit single "Touch." Shift K3Y started his music career remixing the likes of Tinie Tempah.
  • "Holy Moly" is an exclamation in surprise or dismay, which was popularized in the mid-20th century by its use by the comic-book hero Captain Marvel. The phrase is essentially a jocular euphemism for "Holy Moses," an oath that, at that time, might well have been offensive to some people. Some belief it could also be a reference to the "moly" plant, the name of a magical herb in Greek mythology. (Captain Marvel's extraordinary powers to fight evil are ascribed to mythological sources).

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