Nana Baah

We're closing off 2021 re-sharing some of our favourite pieces of the year. In October, we hung out with AJ Tracey at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. After a year spent avoiding crowded public places, a packed football stadium is pretty strange. Walking through an empty one is even stranger. Usually thousands of fans fill the seats at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in north London, but today: no one. There are no crowds, nor are there any footballers about. Instead, there’s just a groundsman tending the pitch surrounded by a sea of 60,000 deep-blue empty seats. But in one room, deep in the bowels of the stadium, some of that matchday chaos is brewing. In the eye of the storm There’s a flurry of arms surrounding AJ Tracey. His hairstylist takes over from his barber, expertly retwisting his locs; his make-up artist appears from nowhere, swooping in to place two gold under-eye masks on his face. It’s like rush hour. We’re in one of the ground’s luxe family and friends suites. Complete with big-screen TVs, plush chairs and a mini-fridge, it usually plays host to players’ mates, partners and kids during games. Today, though, it’s been turned into the dressing room of the London rapper and Tottenham fan as he gets ready for his Time Out cover shoot. It’s covered in jackets, tracksuit bottoms and Tracey’s very own personalised Spurs shirts. Despite the mayhem, the 27-year-old seems at home. He’s been in the stadium more times than he can count. Armed with a season ticket, he watches every