Hailing from South Kilburn, Knucks the creative rap genius has gracefully gifted us with his latest project Alpha Place, a carefully crafted expression of art, in the form of 13 songs including bonus track Los Pollos Hermanos and four official music videos.

Alpha Place takes us deeper into the realm of Knucks as he reminisces on his upbringing and shares his intimate thoughts and feelings about his life journey so far. The heavy influences of Rap, 90s R&B, Drill and Jazz make a perfect canvas for Knucks’ unique storytelling style of delivery on this project.

Inspired by his neighbourhood, and the estate he grew up on, Knucks ensures we begin our musical experience right were it started with opening track Alpha House. If you’ve been listening to Knucks over the years you’ll feel a sense of familiarity as Knucks paints a picture of his early surroundings, a reoccurring image he meticulously creates throughout his music and the visual concepts paired with it.

Our first glimpse of Alpha House was through the official video released in early February 2022, creatively meshed with track three off the project titled Hide & Seek which has amassed over 1 million views, the blend of both songs and videos lure us in as listeners, and leaves us wanting to know more. The transition from the smooth jazz blues rhythm from Alpha House into the jumpy rap energy of Hide & Seek produced by the very talented TSB emulates the balance between Knucks vulnerability and his rugged aura.

Track five off the Alpha Place project, a definite favourite of ours is titled Decisions ft M1llionz and Shae Universe, it truly embodies the essence of the UK urban sound and the amalgamation of Rap, R&B and Drill within this track allowed for all artists to show their true authenticity without compromise, often on collaborative songs artists may adopt the lead performers style in order to blend effectively but the production on this track did all the blending and all that was left for Knucks, M1llionz and Shae to do was bring their absolute A game which they delivered so effortlessly.

The ending of Decisions leads us into the introduction of Leon as we get into track six Leon The Professional, a story about the highs and lows of the streets and a local said to be hitman from the estate. The combination of Knucks’ own personal story paired with the narrative of Leon gives us an even closer look at the hardships of growing up in inner city London, the pressures, sense of community and the dangers hidden with the environments many of us are not exposed to.

Knucks gives us a perfect balance of solo tracks and collaborative singles throughout the project, the biggest collaboration of them all being track ten titled Die Hard ft the heavy hitter Stormzy. Dropping the video just one day before the release of Alpha Place was a genius move and the joining of forces made for an exceptional performance.

As the project begins to draw to an end we’re given one last insight into who Knucks is, where he is from and what he’s about with track 12 titled Three Musketeers where Knucks pays homage to his childhood friends and reflects on their memories created together, struggles faced and challenges overcome.

Through the stories he tells so effortlessly and the visuals he pairs with his rhymes there’s no doubt that Knucks is proud, opened and willing to share a piece of him with the world if we’re willing to listen and with this project I sure hope everyone’s ears open wide, the anticipation was high and the expectations were even higher for this project, and ultimately Alpha Place gave us just what we were hoping for and more.