The rapper known to her parents as Louise Harman possesses decep¬tively simple skills on the mic. Lady Sovereign's rhymes sound easy and fun, recalling the formative years of hip-hop when a call to the dancefloor and a few celebratory incantations were enough to make a side. But her much-downloaded track "My England" exposes the Pandora's box of Sovereign's lyrics, here on behalf of Brits who "ain't all posh like the queen."

"It's directed at anyone who just thinks they live in a perfect world," Sovereign says of the song. "A lot of people outside of London or Eng¬land have this perception of us drinking tea and eating biscuits... I don't even drink tea." She's quickly rising to the forefront of a U.K. grime/ga¬rage scene that's exposing a rougher side of England and, now, a 5'1" female MC who proudly embraces her ghetto roots and seems willing to take on any comers.

Still, the council-house kid from northwest London isn't totally un¬shakable. During her recent trip to New York to meet Def Jam label chief and MC emeritus Jay-Z, Sovereign lost her cool a bit. "Oh that was mad," she recalls. "It was quite surreal just being in a room with Jay-Z and Usher, and then L.A. Reid walks in ... I'm not going to lie, I was nervous."

With Vertically Challenged, her EP due mid-November, and an LP in the works-scheduled for early 2006 release-Lady Sovereign will flood an already Sov-saturated U.K. market. And if the Def Jam connection foists her on to the uninitiated American audience? "We'll see what hap¬pens," she says. "I'm not going to get my hopes up for anything." How pragmatic-but where's that attitude? She continues, "I just wanna get out and do my thing and [laughs] bring more prisoners to America." There it is.