AWATE is a Camden-based rapper, and an active member of UK rap’s underground scene. AWATE was born in Saudi Arabia and grew up in Eritrea before arriving in the UK as a refugee. He grew up in Camden facing violence and discrimination and the institutional racism that upholds it.
“If people need my music, they’ll find it…”
AWATE was significantly inspired by 50 Cent’s studio debut album Get Rich or Die Tryin’, and began turning the poems and stories he had written as therapy into rap, connecting his lived experiences to the bigger picture of the ugly truth of society. A pivotal moment in his journey was his discovery of Mos Def’s studio album Black on Both Sides.
AWATE dropped his debut album Happiness in 2018. A critically acclaimed Eritrean rapper, AWATE explores sounds from around the world, expressing the stories of human migration in his 2020 music piece for the British Library, The Unearthed Odyssey. AWATE’s most recent project is Fear, which offers a different feel to his previous works. It showcases his personal reflection of what it means to be an artist in modernity; making and performing art, and how anxiety and the constant reminder of mortality has shaped our everyday lives.
Image (c) Earth Agency
