Role
Paul Adey is a Lecturer of Music Performance and Music Business within the Nottingham School of Art & Design.
He leads on several research-based modules for the Music Performance and Music Business degrees at NTU. These modules have been developed to help strengthen music artists’ understanding of themselves and their place in the modern music industry through contextual analysis. Paul encourages creative investigation and artistic endeavour as an essential part of all students’ learning.
Career overview
Performing under the sobriquet of Cappo, Paul has practiced hip hop lyricism for over two decades. He has appeared at many of Europe’s premier live music venues, performing alongside artists such as Public Enemy, Skepta, and The Sleaford Mods, and released music on multiple record labels, including Tru Thoughts and Ninja Tune.
Research areas
Paul's current research is focused on countering implicit forms of racism in the music industry (and beyond) by analysing underexplored examples of cultural confluence in autosonic quotation (digital sampling), and reinterpreting them through practice.
This work is interdisciplinary, often encompassing artistic investigation and critical analysis, and focusing on such areas as popular culture, literary and musical concepts (such as intertextuality and allusion), and the semiotic analysis of song lyrics.
The nature of Paul's research is interwoven with rap music and Creative Writing, and utilises critical frameworks such as mad studies, intersectional feminism, and African American popular culture.
Publications
Chapters:
- 2025, ‘An Authorial Introduction to CAPStone: Hollow Victory and Cross to Bear’, ‘Critical Preface: An Artistic Illustration of Intertextuality in Hip Hop Lyricism’, CAPStone (PR&C): https://plague11.bandcamp.com/merch/capstone-hardback-book
Conference papers and articles:
- 2025, ‘“There’s a War Going on Inside, No Man is Safe From”: Representations of Depression through Autosonic and Allosonic Quotation in a Critically Acclaimed Rap Album: An Artist’s Perspective’, DIPM Conference, Paris.
- 2024, ‘Illmatic at 30: How Nas Invented Epistolary Rap – and Changed the Hyper-masculine World of Hip Hop Forever’, The Conversation.
- 2024, ‘Rap Lyrics Can Provide Catharsis – Both for Artists and Their Fans’, The Conversation.
- 2024, ‘How Discovering the Power of Allusion Enabled Me to Write Better Rap Music’, The Conversation.
- 2023, ‘Meaning Through Rhythmic Displacement in Hip Hop Lyricism’, Rhythm Perception and Production Conference (RPP 19), Nottingham.
- 2023, ‘‘Nothing New Under the Sun’: Literary Allusion, Intertextuality, and Lyrical Performative Stylistic Allusion in Hip Hop Lyricism’, PhD thesis.
Pertaining to practice outputs:
- Cappo & Tom Harris: CAPStone Exhibition (NTU/Bonington Gallery, 2025): https://boningtongallery.co.uk/event/cappo-capstone/
- CAPStone: Trilogy Boxset (PR&C, 2025).
- ITO LP (PR&C, 2025).
- Houses Poetry Zine (Designed by Bee Graphics): https://plague11.bandcamp.com/merch/houses-zine-digital-download
- ‘S.T.A.R.V.E.: A Sonic-literary Journey’: Full Album Performance (Directed by Honey JD): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l39ZB1OQnFY&t=18s
- S.T.A.R.V.E. LP (PR&C, 2024).
- Cappo & Mr Brown (Oblique Strategies), Raw Pastiche (WeStayTrue, 2020).
Press expertise
- Hip Hop Culture and Rap Lyricism
- Sampling and Remix Culture
- African American Popular Culture
- Intertextuality and Allusion in Song Writing
- Music and Mental Health
- Music and Intersectional Feminism
- Music Genre and Genre Approaches
- Music and Live Performance
- Decolonial Pedagogy
Course(s) I teach on
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Undergraduate | Full-timeCOURSE
Music Business - BA (Hons)
https://www.ntu.ac.uk/course/art-and-design/ug/ba-hons-music-business
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Postgraduate taught | Full-timeCOURSE
Music Production - MA
https://www.ntu.ac.uk/course/art-and-design/pg/ma-music-production
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Undergraduate | Full-timeCOURSE
Popular Music
https://www.ntu.ac.uk/course/art-and-design/ug/ba-hons-popular-music