UK grime MC Skepta has removed the cover from his upcoming single and apologised over accusations the image had antisemitic implications.
ADVERTISEMENTBritish grime MC Skepta pulled the cover art for his latest single, after the photo deemed antisemitic in criticisms online.
The 41-year-old rapper released the cover art for ‘Gas Me Up (Diligent)’ on 9 January, ahead of the song's release on 26 January. The first single of his upcoming album ‘Knife and Fork’, the image immediately drew criticism for its depiction of multiple men with shaved heads, with ‘Gas Me Up’ tattooed onto the back of one man's head.
The cover art, created by Gabriel Moses, was posted to Instagram, where commenters immediately started to suggest it was referencing the Holocaust, where Jewish concentration camp victims were shaved, tattooed and then murdered in gas chambers.
Within hours of the post, Skepta removed the image from his Instagram account. The artist – whose real name is Joseph Olaitan Adenuga Jr – posted to X to explain his vision behind the cover.
“I’ve been waiting to drop Gas Me Up (Diligent) since teasing it April last year, worked hard getting the artwork right for my album rollout which is about my parents coming to the UK in the 80’s, Skinhead, Football culture”, he wrote.
Skepta added that “it has been taken offensively by many and I can promise you that was definitely not our plan so I have removed it and I vow to be more mindful going forward”.
In a further post, he assured the single would be released on 26 January as planned and said: “I can honestly see how my single artwork without context can be deemed offensive, especially in a time like this but again that was not my intention.”
He also clarified again that he wasn’t intending to evoke Holocaust imagery, instead looking to the skinhead culture of the UK in the 80s that was behind many violent clashes with the British Black community. He posted his imagery mood board for his upcoming album ‘Knife and Fork’ alongside the statement: “But after some thought I don’t feel like I could continue being the artist you all know and love if my art is policed, I have to quit if I can’t express my art as I see it.”
It’s a complex topic to broach for the grime artist. While the image did have Holocaust overtones, it was also evocative of the skinhead culture that perpetuated vile racism throughout the 20th century against Black Brits. The phrase “gassed” is also a slang term for excitement. On the face of it, it’s believable that the combination of shaved heads and “gas” was purely an unfortunate coincidence.
Skepta, one of the pioneers of the grime genre since coming up in the scene in the early 2000s up to his Mercury Prize-winning 2016 album ‘Konnichiwa’, will also be keenly aware of the furore that ensued when fellow grime artist Wiley refused to back down over antisemitism accusations.
Like Skepta, Wiley is considered one of the originators of grime’s popularisation. In 2020, Wiley made a slew of posts on X (then Twitter) comparing Jews to the Klu Klux Klan, claiming they run the world and calling them “snakes.”
Wiley refused to remove the posts and was dropped by his manager, though he did eventually apologise.
It would be unfair to claim Skepta is similarly antisemitic for a cover that may have just unintentionally had Holocaust connotations. However, it is an uncomfortable second instance in recent years of antisemitism accusations being hurled at one of grime’s most notable figures.
