‘Like Mike Skinner on nitrous oxide’: the hottest (fake) artists of 2019

Papa John’s Moped Clan

Barnsley hip-hop crew whose forthcoming debut The Chronicles of Ridonk is a likable home brew of no-fi beats and shouty choruses, like Mike Skinner if he’d sustained NOS-induced brain damage – as evinced on house party anthems such as: Piff Gang Sat on My Kangol Hat, The Sesh Grem That Time Forgot, I Appreciate That But Please Put Me Through to Your Supervisor Mr O2 Call Handler and Big Mood (Not Relatable). Watch out for non-talking, non-rapping, non-dancing 6ft 4in member Little Feller on “hypothetical vibes”.

Aetherium

Swedish-Malaysian lo-fi R&B songbird, who dropped out of Massachusetts Institute of Technology to start a kombucha delivery app, before a chance match with Cirkut on Bumble led to an EP and a branded morning-after pill. Embodies the anxiety of the For the Gram nation: “It’s, like, complicated,” she says, “because we, like, have artificial versions of us on the internet. But then that’s also, like, actually not us?” Who could disagree?

Alan Wilson

Big-hearted pop-blues crooner capable of blowing the doors off a Honda Civic at 20 yards. Wilson’s lungs were signed to Columbia/RCA in a deal reputed to be worth £10m each, in response to reports that Universal were developing their own “super-crooner”.

Fedorina

Riding the post-Daddy Yankee reggaeton boom, in comes 21-year-old Fedorina. Her ubiquitously anonymous global hit Faya! says it all: ie nothing. Dating Jake Paul, and tongues are already wagging about the leverage potential of their cross-marketing synergy.

Applicator

Feminism’s snotty teenage face, the Holland Park all-girl trio are not about to take you lying down, Mister Man Person. “There’s still a lot of prejudice against day pupils,” lead singer Iona rails. “Honestly, we get it all the time.” Critics have described their sound as “wholly undifferentiated garage punk”. And the girls agree: “Obviously, we are against differentiation of all kinds.”

sickchick1n

Not only a great wifi password, also the hottest MC of the year. Raised on a south London council estate so authentic that record execs would regularly duff kids up in the lifts for not giving them the names of emerging rap talent, sickchick1n is here to tell Theresa May where to stick her universal credit application forms. “May you? You May not,” he blazes on SE17 1LB. Elsewhere, he turns his ire to the London gang wars and the bloated housing market: “Man dip man, man tip man, man flip man,” he rails. All we can say is: man oh man!