Tiny Boost

In contrast to many U.K. road rappers, south-east London’s Tiny Boost stands out for his sheer productivity, with his raw, gravelly style appearing on at least fifty projects in the half-decade after he relaunched his career in 2018. Raised in Peckham during its pre-gentrification days of the early nineties, he grew up without his father, who departed before the boy entered secondary school. As a member of the Peckham Young Gunners crew, he drifted into criminal activity while still in his early teens and was first detained for robbery. Alongside fellow members Y Lap and Shocks Shot, he laid down several mid-2000s recordings under the PYG name—“Coming Up,” “Gunshot Riddim,” and “Who U Talkin’ To?”—the last of which his mentor Giggs selected for the 2007 SN1 mixtape Welcome to Boomville. Two years later Giggs, recording as both himself and Hollowman, shared top billing with Tiny Boost on the expansive Who Said Dat? project. Shortly afterward, however, a 2009 firearms arrest in Aylesbury led to an eight-and-a-half-year sentence that took him through ten different prisons. His sole musical output during incarceration was the 2015 day-release track “Popping Freestyle,” made with Swaggie Studios.

Once freed in early 2018, Tiny Boost embraced the streaming era by dropping three rapid singles—“Streets Back,” “2 Days,” and “240 Seconds (Pt. 1)”—on Giggs’ SN1 imprint that September. His debut solo mixtape, Strictly for the Streets, followed the next month, and early 2019 brought standalone collaborations with Joe Grind, Frisco, and Billy the Kid. August’s “Feels Good” previewed the second project, Street Dreams, which arrived later that year after a joint single with Lewisham’s Rosca Nini Zullu. Mid-2020 yielded the ASB pairings “Where I Been” and “Get It,” both later featured on the west London rapper’s Prayer, Profit & Progress mixtape. Following November’s “Street Diary,” Tiny Boost linked with the Paperboys Records production team for “Still Here,” “Pandemic,” and “Fresh.” In 2021 he issued self-released tracks such as “Certified” and “Nobody” while also appearing on releases from Sicario, Link Up TV, TruCulture, and Rich Made.

His most active year so far arrived in 2022, when he unveiled the third full-length project Street Paper and recorded for Street Lounge, 23 Formation, JJR, Mxney Szn, and GRM Daily. Early the following year he released “Sharks 2,” the opening single from a joint effort with Youngs Teflon that surfaced as Purple Hearts that June. The album included appearances by Wretch 32, K-Trap, Giggs, and Miraa May, after which the duo toured the U.K. to support it.