Calling The Tune
Everton Magazine|August 2016-17

New signing Yannick Bolasie is hoping to prove himself a big hit with supporters following his move from Crystal Palace, out to prove that his old school footballing upbringing can continue to keep him one step ahead of the opposition.

Calling The Tune

Yannick Bolasie is talking Skepta, Stormzy, grime and MCing. “A lot of people are getting to know grime music,” he says in a soft, north London accent, the smile that is never far from his face becoming positively evangelical. Music is his passion. “Stormzy has just done a video with Paul Pogba, so if anyone doesn’t know what grime is, it’s that. I’m a fan of Skepta, too, especially his new album, Konnichiwa, which is really good. I listen to grime before games. My missus has been known to get annoyed sometimes with me rapping.”

Grime rapper and producer Jammer picked up on his talent for MCing and featured him with his pal and former Plymouth Argyle teammate, Bradley Wright-Phillips, now with New York Red Bulls, in the DVD Lord of the Mics 6. “I might make a couple of lyrics now I’m here at Everton,” Bolasie says, laughing, his vocals attracting an evergrowing audience on his own YouTube channel. “Let me hit the ground running and then maybe I’ll start. First I want to let my feet do the talking.”

Bolasie’s articulacy in the language of the beautiful game is testament to a freedom of expression nurtured in the shadow of Wembley’s arch on the estate in which he grew up in Willesden. “There was a park outside my house and I just remember playing football with loads of people there,” he recalls. “It could be 10, 20 guys kicking a ball, I would look out of my bedroom window and I’d be downstairs in a flash and out playing with them. I’d come back home and be out again in no time if I saw another group with a ball. I just liked to play football. Raheem Sterling is from close by – he was in my sister’s class at primary school – and he was the same, playing on the streets and the parks.

This story is from the August 2016-17 edition of Everton Magazine.

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This story is from the August 2016-17 edition of Everton Magazine.

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