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STOP THE PRESSES: The Guy From The "Cheeky Nando's" Video Was Also In "Junior Spesh"

We tracked him down to find out what it's like being in the two most seminal chicken shop rap songs of all time.

Breaking news at Noisey towers, yesterday we published an interview with the guy who made the "Cheeky Nando's" video. It got us reminiscing about the original chicken shop grime track, "Junior Spesh". For those that don't know, "Junior Spesh" is a Channel U masterpiece from 2007 about the great value kids meal at SFC in Canning Town, East London. Here is the original Vice interview with Red Hot crew, the Junior Spesh squad and here's the video.

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Noisey associate editor Joe Zadeh had, horrifyingly, never seen this audiovisual masterpiece. I sent him the link and waited for his reverie. Instead the first thing he said was, "I'm pretty sure that's the same guy from 'Cheeky Nando's'".

A few googles confirmed that yes, Klayze from Red Hot crew is the same Klayze Flaymz from Peri Boyz. This one man has been in the two most important chicken shop anthems of all time. Hear that? That's the sound of your mind being blown.

Obviously we had to Klayze on the phone to find out what it's like to have basically invented the chicken-shop rap genre.

Noisey: Klayze! It's an honour to speak to you. I feel like I've done some real sleuthing this afternoon. Do you feel like you've cornered the market in comedy chicken shop songs?
Klayze: I guess so. I am trying not to be that chicken shop guy but I keep ending up being that anyway. As well as "Junior Spesh" and "Cheeky Nando's" I did a programme for an Asian where I stole a Nando's black card - it was shown across the whole of Pakistan. Then we did a thing for Channel 4's show Chicken Shop, we did the promo for that. I'm sure there's been other chicken-orientated things too. Maybe I'm getting typecast.

Did you get your spot in the Cheeky Nando's song because of your chicken past?
No not really. People kept tagging me in those posts about Americans not knowing what cheeky Nando's is. That's proper my kind of humour. So when David asked me to be in it, I was up for it.

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How's everyone doing from the Red Hot crew? Do you still see them?
Yeah, I see Jaxor all the time. He's getting paid way too much money working in IT now. Terra is still doing music, he's a family man now too so he's busy. Ray is still playing football and working. Everyone's good.

How comes things never took off after Junior Spesh?
I think if we'd been a bit more proactive on it back then we could have capitalised on it a bit more. If we'd showed up to any of our bookings, that would have been a plus. We had no management, we were just a group of friends. We were just trying to do music and it kind of got interrupted by "Junior Spesh" which we didn't really care that much about. No one was in charge. Everyone was not listening to everyone else. There was no order.

That sucks, but seems like you've all done alright anyway. So final question - has inflation taken its ruthless toll or is a Junior Spesh still £1.50 at Canning Town SFC?
It is! I went there about a month ago. I was waiting for someone so I thought I'd pop in there. The guy's friendly with us, sometimes he'd give us free stuff - so I just popped in there for some chips. But I checked the price and it's not called Junior special anymore.

WHAT?
Yeah man. It's just called Kids Meal 1.

Oh mate. I'm heartbroken.
I know, it's not got the same ring to it.

You can follow Klayze Flaymz on Twitter here. He's doing an improv show at Rich Mix in East London on Thursday - check it out.