Dizzee Rascal has spoken in detail about being stabbed six times in the holiday resort of Ayia Napa six years ago.

The chart-topping rapper was knifed on July 7, 2003 - just two months before winning the Mercury Music Prize with his debut album 'Boy In Da Corner'.

Describing the stabbing as a pivotal moment in his life, Dizzee said: “I always knew it could happen. It had happened to people around me and it was normal.

“But being so close to death - that changed me. Now I just appreciate life. Every day I wake ready for work.”

In the interview with Daily Mirror, the 24-year-old stressed how awful the experience was by adding: “Getting stabbed, it’s not glamorous. It was a bad time. I had internal bleeding in my chest so I was coughing up blood all the time, I was on a drip that was getting on my nerves. It was hot, it was shit. Outside my window was like desert.”

The rapper continued that despite nearly losing his life, the ordeal changed his outlook on life: It puts you in touch with your life force. It made me respect life a bit more. Gave me a harder work ethic.”

“I didn’t want to make a meal of getting stabbed. And 50 Cent had already done it. I didn’t want to compete with getting shot nine times.”

(by Scott Colothan)