The award-winning British-Ghanaian rap artist Sway DaSafo has died at the age of 44. He was the first unsigned rapper to win a Mobo Award in 2006, and scored a top 10 hit in 2012 with the single Level Up. The news was first shared online by the Mobo organisation, and confirmed to the BBC by the musician's friend Kash Ahmad, who said he died at his home in Ghana.
Sway was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma in 2010 and went into remission later that year. Sway was born Derek Andrew Safo in London, albeit accidentally, while his mother was on a stop-over between Amsterdam and her native Ghana. After a brief period in her homeland, he was raised in north London and honed his craft on pirate radio.
He credited the BBC's radio station 1Xtra with providing him with his first break in 2002. Emerging during the first wave of grime, alongside artists such as Dizzee Rascal and Lethal Bizzle, he stood apart for his witty, literate style. The positivity comes out in my music," he told the Guardian as his career took off.
"I don't go round holding guns to people's heads so I won't rap about holding guns to people's heads." Despite widespread interest from the music industry, he remained independent - releasing music on his own label, and selling mixtapes at markets and independent record shops. He made headlines in September 2005 when he was named best hip-hop act at the Mobo awards - defeating US heavyweights such as 50 Cent and the Game. The following year, he released his debut album This Is My Demo, accompanied by the top 40 single, Little Derek, which celebrated how he had "ended up in HMV instead of HMP".
Although the album stalled at number 78 in the charts, it earned him a nomination for the Mercury Prize, alongside acts like Arctic Monkeys and Muse. In 2006, he supported The Streets on a UK tour and appeared alongside frontman Mike Skinner on the Mitchell Brothers' single Harvey Nicks. But in 2010, DaSafo was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma.
"It felt like I had been dropped in the middle of the sea with no lifejacket," he later recalled. "I didn't have time to think about how I was going to get to the other side, I just had to deal with it." After receiving chemotherapy and radiotherapy, he went into remission, releasing his biggest hits Still Speedin' (which sampled Black Box's Ride On Time) and Level Up (featuring a verse from Kano) in 2012. He enjoyed further critical and commercial success with albums including Deliverance, and Verses from the Vault; and collaborated with artists like Mark Ronson, Ed Sheeran, Akon and Childish Gambino.
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