So Close is the 13th track from Tinie Tempah’s third studio album, Youth. It features Australian singer Guy Sebastian and fellow British MC/rapper Bugzy Malone.

In the song, it can be thought that Tinie Tempah is talking about his relationship with Chipmunk, a fellow MC from London. The two go back ages, having been two of the most successful rappers from the UK since the late 2000’s. However, while Tinie hs propelled to international fame, Chipmunk (now Chip) has regressed from the most popular in the UK (he won Best Hip Hop/Grime Act at the 2008 & 2009 MOBO’s, and earnt a Number 1 on the Official UK charts) to someone who has lost all the mainstream fame, and is only known to the much smaller grime community.

For example, the “best in your area” bar in particular makes sense since Tinie would be comfortable with Chip being king of North London, while Tinie wanted to be much more than the king of his area.

After all, the lyrics in the Guy Sebastian sung chorus say “We were so close”. They were close friends until 2015. However, their relationship turned sour when Chip sent for Tinie Tempah in his second Fire in the Booth in 2015, taking offence to bars from Tinie’s own Fire In The Booth a year earlier.

After Tinie raps his story, Bugzy Malone (a rapper who to add to all this, has had beef of his own with Chipmunk) starts rapping about his come-up into fame, the earlier part of his career and his dark past.