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Layth wins Vauxhall UK Beatbox Championships 2010 South East Heat

Layth has won the South East heat of the Vauxhall UK Beatboxing Championships and earned himself a place in the finals for the second year in a row since defeating Reeps One in the same heat in 2009.

Words: David Barros

Layth wins Vauxhall UK Beatbox South East Heats The Islington Academy Bar reverberated with the boom of eight hopefuls competing for a place in the Vauxhall UK Beatboxing Championships in June.

Seeing off a host of new faces in the regional preliminaries, Layth out 'boxed his competition with combination of throat clicks backed by encouraging audience support. Pikey Esquire came in second place, and Beatfox has also earned a place in the final thanks to the new wildcard rules to the competition.

"I take my hat off to you sir, for last night I had your mum!"

- Pikey Esquire

Stig of the Dump played host for the night, shooting down everyone with his one-liners (see box, right) in front of a sold out crowd.

Beatbox Championships heat up

This year's beatboxing championships were noticeably more competitive than last year, with tricks being pulled out like Marv-Ill drinking from a bottle of water while beatboxing and Beatfox’s R2D2-like cricket noise.

The ultimate put down was Pikey Esquire's "I take my hat off to you sir, for last night I had your mum!" leaving Beatfox with a very displeased look on his face.

Pikey Esquire at Vauxhall UK Beatbox South East Heats

The most noticeable attribute of Layth's win included his musicality - keeping his tempo consistent when changing tunes, making it easy to follow while tapping your foot along to.

Learning from last year's experience, as we discussed in our interview with him before last year's championships final, Layth has expanded his musical repertoire to include more styles.

If the London heats set the standard for what to expect in the finals, the competition will be a lot closer than last year.

Last year’s champion Reeps One is expected to contend for his title again in one of the qualifying heats later this year.

Stig of the Dump's top putdowns:

"Up next: Noise Engineer. And look, he actually looks like the sound guy!"

- on Noise Engineer's choice of clothes

"It's Hollyoaks versus Skins!"

- on Kadi and Pikey Esquire

"Next up is a good friend of mine. Well, not really a friend, we're Facebook friends. He writes on my wall and I put up with it."

- on Marv Ill

"You think your scarf is better than mine. Mine is just covering chocolate stains." Then later: "I shouldn't have made fun of your scarf. I should make fun of your open finger gloves!"

- on Azim's swag

Path to the final:

(winners in bold)

Noise Engineer v Layth

Azim v Marv-Ill

Kadi v Pikey Esquire

Phillipic v Beatfox

Semi Final:

Layth v Marv-Ill

Pikey Esquire v Beatfox (TB)

Wildcard qualifier:

Marv-Ill v Beatfox