Last night, I went to the Hackney Picture House to see Hyper: The Stevie Hyper D Story. Stevie Hyper D was a pioneering British MC whose life was tragically cut short in 1997 at the age of 31. This documentary has been 12 years in the making, a labour of love created by Director Jamie Ross-Hume and Darrell Austin, Stevie’s nephew. I spoke to them back in September 2024 before the film’s release, so I was looking forward to seeing it on the big screen. 

It’s a powerful story, beautifully told, an emotional rollercoaster that had the audience in fits of laughter and floods of tears. Stevie’s story is the Jungle story: London’s rich melting pot of cultures that merged reggae, hip-hop, and rave music to create something fresh and unique- a genre that defined an era in British music. It’s about raves, pirate radio, tape packs and record shops. But it’s also a story about family, loss and grief, mental health and neurodiversity, the demands of the music industry and the pressure that musicians put themselves under to achieve success. And how sometimes, even the greatest, hardest working and most worthy, are never recognised for their true potential. It’s a love letter to an era of music that has not been celebrated enough, and some of the archive footage is absolute gold (those '90s Jungle Raves were something else!).

The great thing about this particular screening was that the audience was full of proper old-school Junglists and the vibe was bubbling throughout, with people singing along to Stevie’s lyrics and chiming in for the crowd's response: “Junglists are you ready?”  “Bo!”

There was a panel Q&A at the end with the film’s creators Jamie Ross-Hume and Darrell Austin alongside associate producer Uncle Dugs, Kenny “Sting” King (founder of legendary 90s Jungle Rave Telepathy and pirate radio station De Ja Vu) and Andrew Bravin, author of the book ‘Step In Time: Conversations with Kenny ‘Sting’ King'. They discussed the film’s impact, Stevie’s legacy and their optimism at the response that the film had received so far.

The film’s initial launch has had an incredible response, with sold-out screenings at Cinemas across London including the Odeon Tottenham Court Road for the premiere and a subsequent 170+ screenings across the UK, glowing reviews and a huge response from their online campaign and Kickstarter. When someone in the audience asked if they would be making the soundtrack available, Ross-Hume tentatively responded that music licensing rights had been one of the biggest barriers to the film’s release so far. There was a beautiful moment at the end when Kenny, after some cajoling, performed a live rendition of one of his classic Telepathy adverts that many audience members shared were memorable features of the highly sought-after Telepathy Tape Packs.

Though Hyper is not currently scheduled for release to stream online any time soon, the producers assure us that this is only the beginning, because having put so much work in to get this far, they are determined to make sure the film gets the recognition it deserves, even if that takes a little longer. 

Find out more about Hyper here: https://hypersignup.com/ 

Listen to our Reggae Roast Jungle Mix: