Waxing lyrical
Natalia Sheppard has made a lifelong habit of doing things people told her she couldn’t. She became the country’s – and one of the world’s – first female drum and bass MCs when everyone said it was impossible. She shrugged off small-town beginnings to become an internationally acclaimed artist and, when Covid-19 all but annihilated her touring schedule, she turned her attention to an old album and a new film instead.
DnB (drum and bass) fans will know her as MC Tali, whose debut album Lyric on my Lip recently turned 15. To celebrate the milestone, it has just been rereleased for the first time on digital platforms. It’s accompanied by a documentary, available to watch on YouTube, about Tali’s rise in the music industry, comprising old tour footage and interviews shot on cell phones during lockdown because she’s simply the kind of woman who finds a way.
“Lockdown actually was hugely productive for me. I was really creative,” she says. “I started working on new music, and my husband [Benn Rolls-Sheppard, who she married in 2010] and I
