At the beginning of the 1980s, as identified by the Scarman Report, tensions over unemployment, racism and poverty exacerbated by racist policing culminated in the street events now known as the 1981 Brixton riot. Grant, horrified and enraged, wrote and composed a song in response to these events.

"Electric Avenue" is a reggae song released by Guyanese singer Eddy Grant on his Killer on the Rampage album in January 1983. It is a reggae, synthpop, new wave, and disco song. Grant wrote and produced the song himself.

Heart attacks aren't supposed to be on the agenda for teetotal, vegetarian, sports-loving twentysomethings, but on New Year's Eve 1971 that's exactly what happened to the man born Edmond Montague Grant when he found himself in intensive care, having suffered a massive coronary.

Electric Avenue is a street in Brixton, London built in 1888. It was the first market street to be lit by electric lights. Today, Electric Avenue contains national retail chains (Boots, Greggs, and Iceland), plus various local food and housewares retailers.