Juice Menace was in a lecture at college when she got the message that changed her life. It was a DM from someone who claimed to be a talent scout at Warner Music UK. She assumed it was fake. She knew up-and-coming rappers could be discovered on SoundCloud, but this felt too surreal, too "random".
After all, why would the music giant be interested in an amateur rapper from Wales? A teenager from Bridgend who was still studying music technology at Cardiff and Vale College, who had only put out a handful of freestyles and remixes online?
And so she ignored it. But the A&R (artists and repertoire) representative was persistent. He emailed her, but she ignored that too. He had also messaged on SoundCloud, where Juice had posted a couple of audios - but she didn't see it. "I didn't even know you could message people on SoundCloud," laughs Juice, now 22.
Read more: The Cardiff recording studio taking Wales' hip-hop scene by storm
After mentioning the messages to a fellow singer, Juice discovered she had been wrong. This was, in fact, the real deal. The talent scout eventually got through to her when she was at college. She had to step out of the classroom to take the call.
"He said: 'I've been trying to get hold of you for ages' and I was like: 'Yeah, sorry about that!'" recalls Juice. "He said: 'I think you have something here - you have a lot of potential. If you're happy to take this seriously, I would like to bring you to London next week and get you in the studio. Let's make this a real thing.'
"For me, having somebody who was actually in a music scene, in a music industry, thinking that I could actually do it. I was like, okay, cool - you don't have to tell me twice. I'll be on the next train. And I literally went to London the next weekend. I'm grateful for the fact he was persistent, otherwise I might not be here now."
"Here" is a hugely exciting time in the young rapper's career. That Warner Music talent scout has since become her manager. She has released her first single, dropped an EP, been featured on BBC Radio 1 and Spotify’s ‘New Music Friday’, and performed at BBC Radio 6's Music Festival, Leeds Festival, Berlin's Splash Festival and Glastonbury.
Most recently, she was asked by the Football Association of Wales (FAW) to write an exclusive track, 'For Her' for the Wales women's team ahead of Cymru’s key 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup qualifiers against Greece and Slovenia.
Juice, whose real name is Destiny Jones, was born and bred in Grangetown, Cardiff, before she moved to Bridgend aged 16. She grew up with music all around her - her mum was a "great singer" who loved R&B - but she hadn't always envisioned she would make music herself. "That wasn't something that came to me until I was older, when I was about 17."
As for rapping, she thought local MCs were "cool" but admits she "never saw myself as being the type of person that was capable of doing that". But as she got older, she developed a love for literature - especially poetry and spoken word - and she started to get more creative in college with photography and visual art.
"Music just accidentally happened...everything came together at the right time." She posted two rapping freestyles on Instagram, just to test the waters. She got honest feedback from friends - "It's not amazing, but not awful," they said and urged her to keep trying.
So she started posting on SoundCloud. At this point she dropped out of her A Levels - promising her mum she would go back to college and study music technology instead. "Because I wanted to do music. I had a MacBook, but I didn't have no idea about how to record, how to put a song together, how to produce...I used to record holding my MacBook in my face. It was a really crunchy audio."
She had tried to get her foot into Cardiff's hip-hop scene, but found it difficult. "I was reaching out to a few of the Cardiff artists, but I don't think people thought I was that serious. People weren't really trying to get me in the studio."
The college course - which would give her full access to a recording studio - was the perfect opportunity. "I was like, 'two birds, one stone' - amazing. I could start this thing properly and keep my mum happy because I was pursuing education."
Juice made her intentions clear to her tutor who was "so supportive". After being picked up by the Warner Music scout, she immersed herself into lots of studio sessions and "put in the work" to improve herself lyrically and get used to recording.
"When I first started recording, I literally used to rap in like a horrible American accent. It was bad. I was just finding my feet and everything. I was still very much a rookie. From 2018 to 2019, I was just practising, learning about the industry, finishing college."
Juice dropped her first single 'Hardly' in July 2019 - her "first industry standard move" - and performed her first show in XOYO nightclub in London, opening for rapper AJ Tracey. "It was a good introduction to being an actual artist - instead of just being an artist that exists back in my bedroom...I was so nervous," she says.
"I was performing all unreleased stuff at the time. I think it was two days before my stuff actually dropped - so nobody knew who I was, nobody at all. But that was one of my favourite nights ever."
She has consistently made music ever since. At first, her entire network was in London - mainly because that's where her manager was based and where the opportunities were. However, she admits she also had a chip on her shoulder about working back home. "Because I thought nobody was really trying to work with me in Cardiff, I was kind of like, 'I'll just do everything in London.'"
But over time, she realised she couldn't ignore Cardiff's burgeoning rap scene. "I started spending less time in London and more time in Cardiff. When you go to London, you see that every borough has their established scene and little groups.
"It makes you realise this is still something that is really emerging in Cardiff and I didn't want to miss the opportunity of being a part of it...I wanted to get to know who the artists were here in Cardiff. I was always curious if there were any girls here that rap, all the artists that came before me."
Juice recorded her EP 029 at Silkcrayon, a recording studio based in Butetown, in 2020. The studio, which opened that year, has worked with more than 300 emerging artists and has taken Cardiff and Wales' rap scene by storm. "When I started, it was a shot in the dark, I didn't really think it was going to go anywhere. I'm from Wales - how many people have crossed that barrier? I wish Silkcrayon existed when I was 17."
The FAW collaboration came after a fellow Welsh rapper, Sage Todz, recommended they work with Juice. Sage had worked with the association to write a World Cup soundtrack - 'O Hyd' - for the men's Wales team.
FAW asked him to write one for the women's team as well, but he passed on the opportunity to Juice. "I got a DM on Instagram from FAW in August and it just said: 'Hey, we'd be interested in working with you. Can we speak to you about it further?" recalls Juice, admitting it was a "crazy moment".
She admits writing the World Cup anthem in two weeks was a "major challenge" which required lots of research about the players and the game. It focuses on the FAW message 'For Us, For Them, For Her' used throughout their campaign. "I'd never had to write from a different point of view or a different perspective than my own...I wanted to make sure that I got it right.
"I wanted to appeal to everything FA Wales has built and stands for on their own, everything I stand for as an artist, and then everything in between that we're hoping to influence and we're hoping to inspire.
"I'm not necessarily a crazy football fan. I didn't really do it for the love of football - I did it more because of what it means to be a woman in sport, what it means to represent a national team and to work with FA Wales.
"I was nervous as well, because I remember thinking: 'What if I send them a song and they don't like it?' But they did, thankfully. They invited me to the Wales v Slovenia Game. I got to perform at the conference.
"I got to hear myself playing through [Cardiff City Stadium]. That's a stadium I've visited many times...if you told me back when I was in Year Five that one day you're going to go down the road and your song is going to be playing in the stadium - that's mental.
"My grandparents are major Welsh [football] fans - Welsh bluebird fans. My nan got to see me on TV for the Wales v Slovenia game - that's a big moment. That's a pinnacle moment for me."
Juice recognises the opportunity has opened lots of doors for her - and is thankful to FAW for taking a chance on her. "I'm still very much finding my feet as an artist, proving myself - so for them to take a shot in the dark and give me this opportunity means a lot. That means a lot.
"They didn't have to. I think a lot of the older Welsh platforms can sometimes go with a more traditional approach - something that they know is going to suit the audience that they've had for many years, years before I was born. But the fact that they are interested in appealing to a new demographic and a new audience is something I'm very grateful for.
"It's not every day you get the opportunity to support a national team. This plays into the fact that Cardiff is emerging and being built. If I was from London, or if Sage was from London, would we have had the opportunity where we are as artists right now to work for the premier league or to be a part of something like that?
"No - but in Wales, everything is still being built, everything is emerging and people are really coming together - we're getting to build this together with major platforms and smaller artists. I think that's something that bigger cities like Manchester, London and Birmingham, they don't necessarily have that. And that's so exciting."
She adds: "It's just been so nice to be a part of something that exists for the whole of Wales - not just for me, not just for Grangetown - this is something that exists for the whole country. Knowing that I've played a part in that and genuinely inspiring the younger generation, speaking on behalf of women, speaking on behalf of a country - I can't be anything other than grateful."
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