Raye is gaining her power back. Not just from the industry that made her feel “mediocre” for so many years, but over past traumas she kept bottled up for a long time.
“Some of my closest friends didn’t even know some of the stuff I’m discussing on my album,” she tells Sky News. “It’s probably the most honest I’ve been. It’s deep and it’s real.”
Raye, real name Rachel Keen, is only 25 but already a music industry veteran; a platinum-selling performer and a songwriter with credits for everyone from Charli XCX and Little Mix to John Legend and Beyonce.
She was just 15 when she released her first song and 17 when all her dreams came true, in the form of a four-album contract with record label Polydor. But after years of what seemed to be a successful career as a vocalist collaborating mainly on other artists’ dance hits, in 2021 she posted a string of tweets claiming the label was holding her back from releasing her own album.
“I’m done being a polite pop star,” she wrote, her frustration and anger palpable. The singer says after years of “trying to make it work”, she had reached the point where she had nothing to lose. “You get to that breaking point, really.”
Shortly after her tweets, it was announced she and Polydor were parting ways, with the label saying the decision had been “amicable and mutual” and wishing her “all the very best for the future”.
Image: Raye claimed her first number one with Escapism at the beginning of 2023. Pic: Official Charts
Fast-forward 18 months or so and Raye is in a very different place; now an independent artist, earlier in January she topped the UK charts for the first time with viral hit Escapism. In February, the debut album she fought so hard to make, My 21st Century Blues, will finally be released. No longer pigeonholed or stifled, this is the real Raye, she says, and it’s been a long time coming.
“The album is discussing a lot of different topics… the deepest depths of really ugly stories about assaults and body dysmorphia and environmental anxiety. I think there’s no limit on what I’ve really spoken on in terms of my perspective on my blues as a woman in the 21st Century.”
‘It’s things I’ve been silent about for so long’
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Always outspoken, Raye is not an artist who sticks to trotting out lines of approved PR-speak when she’s being interviewed, and this candidness is evident throughout her music. “Being real and transparent is really important to me, to skip out metaphors and similes and cut straight to the point of what I’m talking about,” she says. “Some of these things I haven’t also entirely healed from.
“It’s definitely going to be a rollercoaster for sure, but one that I’m making the decision to go on. That’s kind of the artist I like to be, transparent, honest. I think that’s what I’m like in real life.”
One song, Ice Cream Man, deals with sexual assault. “It’s things I’ve been silent about for so long and swallowed for so long and self-managed for so long in non-constructive ways,” she says.
“I’ve written pretty transparently about sexual violence… multiple things that occur in a life that you just bury, bury down, hide in a box, don’t tell anyone. And it just festers and manipulates itself into something quite ugly.”
As with Escapism, a dark electro banger about using alcohol, drugs and casual sex as coping mechanisms for dealing with emotional pain, the album is a contrast of often melancholy or dark lyrics, with beats that will fill a dance floor, as well as a range of genres.
“You’ve got songs with a contrasting sonic landscape,” she says. “I find it really exciting to tell a story and then the music feel the opposite so I think there’s a lot of juxtaposition there.”
Irony in its ‘most hilarious and ridiculous form’
Escapism’s success feels ironic to Raye. “With the previous music, not in a bad way, but it was more about the song than about the artist. The big dance songs or whatever, they don’t necessarily say anything about me as a person. I never necessarily wanted to be someone who did huge, huge hits, but without depth and substance or discussing things I’m passionate about, or breaking a couple of rules.
“Escapism is such a personal story. It’s kind of dark. It’s extremely explicit and honest and raw… I really told myself on the beginning of this next chapter, I’m not creating music with the intent or purpose to sell loads of copies, it’s about integrity and telling these uncomfortable stories that I think are really important.
“I had all the preparation in the world for building a small, steady fanbase bit by bit, and to not expect anything in terms of mainstream reflection. So this is like irony in its most hilarious and ridiculous form, that this is the biggest song of my entire career.”
Despite it not necessarily being the plan, she admits topping the charts does feel like vindication.
“[I feel] like anything is possible and I was right to back myself,” she says. “Never give up on your dreams. For someone who [felt] so, like, mediocre and… such a disappointment, actually, for so long, to just receive all the affirmation in the world that I was right to back my music is just…”
She doesn’t need to finish the sentence. “For someone who puts words together for a living, I don’t necessarily really have the best words to describe how crazy this is.”
‘Fear is the driving factor of secrets’
Emboldened, Raye says artists need to speak out more about the inner workings of the industry. And despite moves to improve diversity and equality making headlines in recent years, she says misogyny is still rife.
“We do need to be telling these stories more,” she says. “I think things that happen in the darkness have so much more power than they do when they’re brought out to the light, you know? Fear is the driving factor of secrets, and truths and stories being withheld. But there is still that very sad view that women need to be guided and controlled and taught and given instructions to follow and meet these requirements.”
She sighs. “I don’t know… I think it’s probably the same for all artists but especially for women, especially for everything I’ve witnessed in 10 years in the industry. I think a lot needs to change, but I don’t think anything will truly be equal and fair until we’ve got the same amount of female CEOs as we do male CEOs, we’ve got the same amount of female staff working a video shoot as male staff, the same amount of female A&Rs, and the same amount of, you know, different ethnicities in these same roles.
“Balance overall is so important, and until we have that, there’s always going to be issues and problems when you have men deciding what they think is best for women.”
Image: ‘Seven years old, wide-eyed with a dream’: The album cover for My 21st Century Blues
Raye is looking to the future. She says she has had little communication with her former label bosses since she left, but wants to make it clear it wasn’t all bad. There were “some great people there who really believed in me… but obviously it came down to the big people making big decisions”, she says.
I ask her about the artwork for My 21st Century Blues; it features a little girl, dressed for the workplace but teetering in red stilettos hanging off her heels, standing atop a pile of instruments and recording equipment bearing the names of her songs, grabbing hands reaching out from inside. It feels poignant.
“That’s actually my baby sister on top of that big structure we built,” says Raye. “But that little girl up there is me, you know, seven years old, wide-eyed with a dream, not realising what the next 10 or 15 years of my life would be like.
“All the different life – in the industry and out of the industry – that I’ve had to navigate, process, understand, learn in my transition to being a woman, to being an artist, to being an independent artist. It’s been a real wild journey.”
Raye’s debut album, My 21st Century Blues, is out from 3 February
Moments before stabbing Ms Maximen, Thibou carried out an “equally horrifying attack” on a man who was backing away from him, the Old Bailey has heard.
He was also convicted of attempting to cause grievous bodily harm to 20-year-old Adjei Isaac with intent, and having an offensive weapon.
At the opening of the trial in February, prosecutor Ed Brown KC told the court Ms Maximen and the group she was with had got caught up in the middle of a “horrifying outbreak of violence”.
At the time, Ms Maximen had been crouched chatting to her friends as they sat on the ground with their children.
She suffered a 12cm deep knife wound, which caused severe internal bleeding in her groin.
‘Pure anger’ in accused face
As jurors were shown police bodycam footage of the incident during a previous hearing at the Old Bailey, Mr Brown KC told them: “You will see pure anger in the face of Shakeil Thibou. This was right in front of her [Ms Maximen’s] three-year-old daughter.”
The “truly shocking” incident happened in just eight seconds.
How did it happen?
The Old Bailey previously heard how a crowd of hundreds splintered on Golborne Road in west London as Thibou and his two brothers, who were on trial alongside him facing separate charges, had an altercation with at least two other males.
Image: Cher Maximen
Thibou produced a “huge” knife, described by one witness as a zombie knife, and lunged repeatedly at Mr Isaac in a “determined, thrusting movement”, the Old Bailey heard.
Mr Isaac recoiled and during the altercation the pair bumped into Ms Maximen who had been crouched chatting to her friends as they sat on the ground with their children.
The knife, the prosecutor said, missed Mr Isaac by “centimetres”.
Mr Brown KC told the court Ms Maximen struggled to regain her footing after being knocked to the ground.
He said: “Cher Maximen in those moments grabbed hold of Shakeil Thibou’s coat, pulled it and managed to get partially to her feet.
“She appeared to attempt to strike out with her hand at Shakeil who of course was still holding that knife in his hand. Cher Maximen took a step towards Shakeil Thibou and at the same time attempted to raise her right leg out towards him.
“It was at this moment, Shakeil Thibou raised the knife directly towards Cher Maximen and deliberately thrust it towards her, stabbing her in the groin.”
Sheldon Thibou was found guilty of violent disorder and guilty of assault on an emergency worker, PC Oliver Mort.
Shaeim Thibou was cleared of violent disorder but found guilty of assault on an emergency worker, PC Mort.
The family of a mother who was fatally stabbed as she attended Notting Hill Carnival with her three-year-old daughter has said “the feeling of loss is overwhelming, but so is the feeling of rage”.
Cher Maximen, 32, was stabbed at the west London carnival’s “Family Day” on 25 August last year.
Shakeil Thibou, 20, has now been found guilty of her murder, by a majority jury verdict of 10-2, after a trial at the Old Bailey.
“I’ve lost my parents. I’ve lost my brother. Nothing has felt like this ever,” Ms Maximen’s cousin Lawrence Hoo told Sky News.
“It is the cruellest thing, it truly is.”
Image: Lawrence Hoo
Ms Maximen died at a carnival she had been to so many times – she barely missed one.
On the day, Ms Maximen and her three-year-old daughter arrived at Europe’s biggest street party with a group of friends and their children. They’d been sitting and chatting when she was knocked over by some men who had started fighting.
News of her stabbing came almost immediately. Mr Hoo remembers receiving the call. “When I first heard that she’d been stabbed, I know it sounds silly, but I thought Cher will be alright. Cher’s strong, she’ll get through this.”
Ms Maximen was taken to hospital and underwent a number of emergency procedures before being put on life support.
Mr Hoo immediately headed to London to be at her bedside.
“I can remember being in the hospital being sat there with her, with other family members and that’s the last time I saw her. It still doesn’t feel real. There’s still disbelief,” he said.
“It’s the most senseless act to someone who had so much life and so much to give.”
Ms Maximen died from her injuries six days after the incident.
She was a vivacious young woman who grew up in Bristol and then London, finding her feet working with people in music and entertainment.
Ms Maximen was described as a “people person”, which for Mr Hoo manifested in her being “a bright light” in the lives of her loved ones.
He said: “It’s just this energy she had, she lit up the room. If you walked into a space, you’d know that Cher was there. Her energy itself would fill the room. She was a very bright light.”
Her life changed three years before her death when she became a mother in her late 20s.
Her daughter became her life’s work, she poured her love and energy into creating a person her family describe as her mini-me, “she’s Cher 2.0” Mr Hoo said.
Image: Cher Maximen pictured as a child with her uncle Ty
Ms Maximen was stabbed just metres from her daughter on that day.
Mr Hoo said the idea of the toddler witnessing her mother on the ground punctuates the sadness the family feel with anger.
“The feeling of loss is overwhelming, but so is the feeling of rage,” he said. “She [Ms Maximen’s daughter] is aware that on that day, something happened to her mother.
“She saw her mother drop to the floor, and then she saw her mother bleed. That’s the daughter’s last living memory of her mother. And to live with that, knowing that that’s happened, that somebody did that. That’s why it’s so hard and that’s where the rage comes from.”
The family is now rallying around the little girl who is growing up without her mother.
Mr Hoo said the attack “will be a memory that will recur” for Ms Maximen’s daughter, adding “that is why it is so painful and hard to try to live with”.
“I think the trauma is going to be there, and trauma will raise its head when it chooses to come up. But we’ll be there for her,” he said.
The family held Ms Maximen’s funeral in October, and dozens came to remember a woman who loved to spread joy.
Mr Hoo said their focus is now Cher’s daughter: “It’s difficult to say how do we celebrate this life that was taken so prematurely. But I think it goes into her daughter, and it’s to give her daughter the best life and love, and tell her who her mother was.
A domestic abuser who murdered her “frail” husband and buried him in the garden has been jailed for at least 22 years.
Maureen Rickards caused her husband “unimaginable pain and suffering”, said the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).
She was found guilty at Canterbury Crown Court last month and today got a life sentence with a minimum of 22 years.
Jeremy Rickards, 65, was found wrapped in bin bags inside a hold-all at the couple’s property inSt Martin’s Road, Canterbury, on 11 July last year.
He had five stab wounds to his chest – two of which pierced his heart.
There were also non-fatal injuries sustained about 10 days before his death, as well as other wounds thought to have been weeks old.
Grass cuttings were put over the body in an attempt to hide it, but the judge said police were alerted by an “overpowering odour” that “made them feel ill”.
Kent Police believe he was killed a month earlier and his corpse stored in an attic room cupboard before being moved.
Rickards, 50, told their daughter he had gone to Saudi Arabia for work, but police had no record of him leaving the UK.
The daughter became concerned by the style of messages she received and asked her mother if she’d taken over his phone.
She eventually reported him missing.
Image: Jeremy Rickards: Pic: LinkedIn
The last record of Mr Rickards being alive was when he topped up his phone on 8 June.
CCTV showed his wife of 27 years using his bank card a few weeks later, with the judge saying the cleaning products she bought were probably to clean up the killing.
Rickards was initially arrested for fraud – but officers searched the property and found the body.
The murder weapon has never been found.
Police said the victim was also seen with bruising on his face a few weeks before his death, telling a pub staff member he had been in a car accident.
But video found on his wife’s phone showed her shouting at him and the sounds of her beating him.
Mr Rickards briefly moved out of home in early June and was seen with numerous injuries at the property he stayed in.
His wife did not attend sentencing, but judge Mr Justice Kerr directed his comments towards her, saying: “Your videos also clearly show you threatening Jeremy, abusing him, using violence on him, and expressing an intention to kill him.
“He was in frail health and largely defenceless against you.”
Detectives said Rickards has never expressed remorse for the killing and tried to blame others.
“This was a horrific murder of a man who we believe had been a supportive husband to his wife, despite her violence towards him,” said Detective Inspector Colin McKeen.