In 2019, Digga D’s “No Diet”—lifted from debut mixtape Double Tap Diaries—became a defining anthem of London’s sweeping drill sound. Armed with its explicitly instructional hook, the track stormed viral charts and workout playlists and looked set to pull the rapper a chair up at UK rap’s top table. This was all despite a 2018 order requiring him to receive police permission before releasing music, and forbidding the usage of certain lyrical terms and references. Life would get more complicated, however, soon after the success of “No Diet”. “I’m in jail—listening to all of these new rappers, thinking to myself: ‘They all sound like me!’” he tells Apple Music. “I’m hearing my ad-libs, and even my lyrics. That was happening.” Made In The Pyrex sees Digga D mount a defence of his status, celebrate his freedom and toast an insatiable creative drive. “I could be in the middle of anything,” he says. “If I find the right stimulus, I’ll write.” Stimuli are in no short supply here. He fires out vivid, street fantasies (“Woi”), cleans up online dating rumours (“Toxic”) and lays subtle jabs at challengers for fun (“My Brucky”). Fuelled by a desire to finally express himself clearly despite his eventful rise, this second mixtape presents Digga D in his purest form. “We’re in the right place, right now,” he says. “We’ve even got Drake on drill now—it’s global. And it’s only gonna get bigger.” Below, Digga D talks us through his Made In The Pyrex, track by track. Intro “People have been saying I need to rap more, so I wanted to drop a lil’ verse with a funny chorus, just for them. It feels important to say that, too, that about half of this mixtape was written in jail.” Bluuwuu “‘Five jails in one year’—that line is all facts. I think I wrote this track when I was in [HM Prison] Pentonville. This one is for the streets. I tried to be a little playful with the approach but it’s still definitely for the streets.” Chingy (It’s Whatever) “This one’s a simple vibe, really. I guess I was brought up listening to all kinds of music and that included lots of old-school rap. Well, old school to me, and one I definitely remember hearing was ‘Right Thurr’ by Chingy. So, we decided to sample that. It’s a really, really catchy track, and now it’s my chorus.” Bringing It Back [Digga D & AJ Tracey] “Working with AJ just felt natural. We have different ways of going about our crafts, though. I’d say I’m less methodical than he is, but when we put it together it works well.” No Chorus (feat. M1llionz) “When I heard M1llionz was close by with his guys, we all linked up. The studio was right around the corner, so it all made sense. Now we’re sitting down. thinking of how we needed a sick chorus, and said, ‘Bun this. We don’t need no chorus.’” Woi “I made this in a cell with Unknown T last year. I could tell it was a vibe from T’s reaction, and everyone else’s after. From that I knew this would be my fresh home track.” Clout Is Killing My People “It’s like the title says. It’s as simple as that, literally. I did want to make this into a longer track but that would’ve caused a lot of mess that I didn’t want to get into.” Folknem (feat. Sav’O & ZK) “This one with Sav’O and ZK [fellow members of the CGM hip-hop collective] represents how we’ve been together in this game for so long. We actually met a youth club. We all bring individual styles and a bit of our cultures to the table. You’ve got Moroccan, Trinidadian and Jamaican culture, all mixed in one group of musicians.” My Brucky “When I was in jail, I had the G-Unit album [2003’s Beg for Mercy] with me and I would play ‘My Buddy’, over and over again. I guess it was stuck in my brain from there. So when I sampled the track, I wanted this to be a rap beat too.” Gun Man Sound “I’m just expressing myself as best as I can. All the crazy ad-libs and extras I think of at crazy times—like when I’m playing [Call of Duty:] Warzone. Inspiration for rhymes can come to me at any time. Even if I’m playing Warzone, I’ll jump off, write it down and I’ll get back to it later.” Window “I was going through beats and this one stood out straight away. I have to find the right kind of beats that I’m looking for because sometimes it feels like no-one will ever know the right sound for me. Sometimes I don’t even know myself. I don’t even know sometimes so how can anybody else? I feel like this has taken me so far, so I’ll keep doing whatever I want. If you wanna rock with it, then you can.” Trust Issues (I’m Joking I Trust My Mum) “This was a deep one. It’s something I really wanted to speak on too, just to be the one to shed light on what’s really going on out here. I have trust issues, and a lot of us do. In fact I think my trust issues have gotten worse!” Toxic “This track came about because somehow, I just kept ending up on the blogs! You know which ones. And then, I’d have girls hitting me up saying: ‘You’re toxic! You’re toxic!’ Constantly! So I’m feeling like it’s just easier to own it. Like, ‘What now?’”