Wait, back up.

All the way to the year 2006.

There was a 20 year-old English boy from Wimbledon called Jamie T. Jamie T put out a single called “Sheila.” The song was very good.

Jamie T, in case he’s unfamiliar, is the one, along with Plan B, Day One, Just Jack, and Audio Bullys, who is part of the small, Mike Skinner-inspired movement of male British hip-hop musicians that’ve been born not from miming the American mainstream, but from eddying in and out of the black dance music scenes of U.K. garage, drum ‘n’ bass, and grime.

“Sheila” was his first song.

Essentially three different and connected stories, “Sheila” is 1.] about a girl who drinks herself into the Thames, 2.] a boy with an out-of-control gang, and 3.] a daughter addicted to her brutal father. The music is a wall of rapid-fire, slurred speech, chopped-up acoustic guitars, these bent hip-hop beats, and one lone shimmering and somehow playful acid house keyboard bit that contradicts everything.

I love the way the chorus starts it all. Which almost never works.

I love the samples. Which hurt like wounds. “It’s over, man, it’s over.” Or, “Good heavens, you boys — blue-blooded murder of the English tongue.”

I love the details, the recurring “London!” scream, or, right before the second verse, the segue of Jamie’s “Bluh!” Or the way the words spit out like piss.

I love how the video has Bob Hoskins singing the whole thing.

I love the language. “Sheila goes out with her mate Stella / It gets poured all over her fella.” Or, “Behave young scallywag! / A fine young Gal I Had.” Or, “Her lingo went from the Cockney to the Gringo / Anytime she sing a song the other girls sing along / And tell all the fellas that the lady is single.” Or, “She been buckle-belt, beaten from the back like a brat / Dunno where she’s going, but she know where she at / So, Georgie, it’s time to chain react,” and then, “But the truth is, you know, she’ll probably fall back.”

While a couple of the other singles — such as the drunken, swaying, sped-up, classic ska of “If You Got The Money,” and the soft and warm-breeze-from-a-fire of “Calm Down Dearest” — show there’s more to Jamie T than a single idea, Panic Prevention, the 2007 debut album, failed to come together and only brings out his worst flailing and can’t-be-bothered, pub-damaged habits. It needed more time.

“Sheila,” though, yes. One of the starkest and most addictive songs of the last twenty-four months — gorgeous, harrowing, and extraordinarily well-written. Music for a lost Mike Leigh film.

And unlike most music of the time, it remains vital and full of color two years later, despite the hype.

One day, he might be able to pull it off again.