Oyakhire – Feet On the Ground, track-by-track

At the end of July we caught a live show at Sneaky Pete's from Ratking rapper Wiki. On local support duty that night was Edinburgh's Mark Johnson, aka Oyakhire, who you may well recognise as a featured artist on Bemz's SAY Award-nominated record Saint of Lost Causes. In-between his vintage-tinged hip-hop beats, Johnson excitedly told us that he'd just released a brand new album – Feet On the Ground – the week before.

An accomplished record, more of the wavy hip-hop sounds we heard that night can be found in abundance across the record, buoyed by Johnson's confident flow and captivating lyricism. We're delighted, then, to present to you a belated track-by-track rundown of Feet On the Ground from the man himself. Listen to the album in the below player while you learn more about the story behind each of its tracks.

Weight
This song is titled Weight based on the impact I felt when I was recording; we had no actual title for the song and everything felt so heavy during the [recording] process. We had already recorded five or six songs from the project and it just felt like a weight off my shoulders as I was rapping. 'Graduated from blowing fat zoots to pushing weights / Now I salute to the absolute strength that I execute in the booth' alludes to just feeling really heavy in the booth as I was rapping.

Balance
This is the lead single from Feet On the Ground. It's covering a lot of issues on this record, but what I hope people resonate with most is the overall feeling of hope and happiness expressed. You can hear it on the chorus. You can hear it all through the song; I need balance. It's really important for everything we do in life and so when I say 'Balance on my mind running from the sinners', I really mean running from your toughest problems and finding peace at the end. This was the first thing I made when I originally conceived the whole idea for the project, so when it turned out like this in the studio from just a rough idea of loose notes, [that] was awesome.

Dig a Little Deeper
This track came about through a direct message with the collaborating artist [Directs]. I hadn't ever featured with someone outside of my local pool of artists so when the opportunity arose I felt like I had a big responsibility. I mentioned Edinburgh in this track because I wanted to set the contrast in styles from Derby in England, where Directs resides, to where I'm from, and in the end it creates a blend exploring our lives we live on a regular basis.

Blind (Freestyle)
So this track really was odd, I wrote it in two parts. When I first started writing it came to me early one morning as soon as I woke up, hence the [line] 'Maybe I'm blind as a bat, I just woke up and I had to figure out where I was at'. The fun thing about this record is it's talking about keeping your eyes open and not being blind to everything. I enjoy the storytelling aspect of music and so finishing this off in the studio really felt special.

levels
This track I had to sit on for a long time. I didnt have a plan for the lyrics which originally were for another song which didnt make the project. I just felt like I was speaking with so much passion, and I ended up going for it when I say things like 'Let me sketch silhouettes as I select the best vocab', or just the beginning – 'Blank page, been a while since I sat down'. The song came about really from nothing. My mind was blank and I kept listening to this beat on repeat until I eventually let loose. There's 'levels' to this game.

MANIFEST
This track can't describe me any better. If you want a clear picture of me then listen close as I take you on a trip of vulnerability, the road of not knowing what the future holds and eventually settling on just wanting to have a listener who can sympathise with what I am saying.

Bird's Eyed
This is a song about seeing things from a bird's eye view and the twists and turns from being conscious of that view.

All Gawd
This song symbolises a lot to do with having faith. It's about feeling unstoppable when you really believe in God. The original versions had a feature from a female vocalist, but this was changed. I wanted the magic all to myself because ultimately it's [me] that wants to feel unstoppable from my faith.

Around
I wrote this song originally as if I was travelling to some destination on holiday. At the time I wanted to wrap up the whole project but I didnt know how to do it, and then I came across this loop which became the chorus – 'Baaahh, bad shit goes around, around, around' – and so it became the theme to talk about wanting to flee from all the bad that's around.

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Feet On the Ground is out now; follow Oyakhire on Instagram @oya_hire