V9

London driller V9 gained instant visibility through his trademark Deadpool balaclava. He first drew widespread attention in 2018 via the hard-hitting track “Charged Up.” Adopting a more direct style than his close Homerton associates KO and Unknown T, V9 cemented his position in 2019 through Kenny Allstar and Tim Westwood freestyles plus the arrival of his opening mixtape, Homerton Sensei.

Raised in Hackney’s Homerton neighborhood, the rapper entered the scene in January 2018 by dropping his first single, “Glide,” via the U.K. rap platform Mixtape Madness. Concealing his identity behind a Deadpool-inspired balaclava while delivering icy threats and violence-laden lyrics, he quickly attracted notice as an emerging force, accumulating hundreds of thousands of views on the late-summer releases “Tiger Woods,” “DMC,” and “Japan.” Breakthrough arrived in September when “Charged Up” surfaced, opening with the stark lines, “Violence and swervings, lean out the ride and burst him/Of course I’m rolling, don’t ask me twice if I’ll burn him.” The cut became his initial major success, amassing millions of streams and popularizing the now-famous “V9 too devilish” sequence.

Operating under the #Homerton banner with Unknown T and KO, V9 supplied the trio’s raw power, favoring stark and vivid imagery over KO’s intricate wordplay and Unknown T’s unconventional cadences. Closing 2018 with the KO collaboration “Andy & Dwight,” he followed in early 2019 with further singles: January’s “Devilish,” which leaned into his signature phrase, and February’s “Get Man Gone” alongside Soze. His debut project, Homerton Sensei, appeared in May and sustained the same forceful drill approach, including updated “2.0” renditions of “Japan” and “DMC” plus features from Unknown T, KO, RV, ST, and Jimmy. Additional Mad About Bars and Tim Westwood TV appearances throughout the remainder of the year expanded both his profile and that of his Homerton circle. The follow-up tape Yudokuna landed in early 2020; featuring KO, Jimmy, and Unknown T, it found the rapper exploring bolder, more experimental drill beats.