Devlin: Bud, Sweat & Beers – review

Devlin is a sharp-tongued young rapper from Dagenham, Essex, who figured on numerous "ones to watch" lists at the start of the year. Does his debut album justify all the hype? Yes and no. The 21-year-old is a fiercely talented vocalist, capable of delivering complex, rapid-fire rhymes with casual precision. (He gets through his life story in under three minutes on "1989".) When he focuses on the grit and grind of council estate poverty, Devlin hits home hard, but what the album badly needs, on tracks such as "London City" and "End of Days", is a touch less earnestness and a jolt of humour.