Bashy

Early life

Thomas was born in Chiswick, West London, the first born of a Jamaican mother and Dominican father. He attended St Mary's of the Angels RC Primary School. At age eleven, his family moved to Kensal Rise, northwest London and he attended the Cardinal Hinsley High School. Thomas attended The BRIT School for Performing Arts as a theatre student.

During the release of the Chupa Chups Mixtape, Thomas was a struggling independent musician and worked for Royal Mail as a postman. He worked there for a year to save money, then left to pursue a music career full-time. The money was soon spent, as his music career did not take off as envisaged, it was during this period that he decided to become a bus driver.

Black Boys

In 2007 Thomas released the song "Black Boys". It was this track that propelled Thomas into the nation's consciousness, catching the imagination of a country suffering from many incidents of violence amongst its inner-city youth.

With frequent reports of shootings and stabbings on news bulletins, and with the media continually focusing on the lack of role models in certain communities, he felt that the nation's inner city youth needed a reminder that they had a number of positive role models they could look to for inspiration. His début single provoked controversy, as some people called the track racist. This prompted the governing body Ofcom to investigate. Rumours soon began to circulate that the track had been banned from TV. Certain sections of the black community were outraged; groups were set up on the social networking site Facebook in order to fight the ban. Racist videos were put up as responses to the track on YouTube, in which men dressed as Ku Klux Klan members would hurl abuse at black people, with the track playing in the background. This prompted people of many races to get behind and support Bashy, in a united stand against racism. It was as a result of this publicity and grass roots action that Bashy was invited to perform at the Love Music Hate Racism Rally in 2008 at Victoria Park, to a crowd of 100,000. He was asked to take the main stage alongside Damon Albarn. Bashy persuaded various British artists to share their views on the subject. Skinnyman, Ty, Big Narstie, Tinie Tempah, Wretch 32, Chipmunk, Swiss, Durrty Goodz, J2K, Skepta, Sincere, Akala and Scorcher featured on the track.

Adulthood

Thomas soon found himself working on Adulthood. Noel Clarke, director and star of Adulthood first encountered Bashy when he was passed a copy of his earlier mixtapes, which contained samples from Clarke's previous Kidulthood film. Clarke was impressed by what he heard, that his thoughts soon drifted from copyright protection to how to get Thomas involved in the follow-up. He asked Thomas to submit a track to be included on the soundtrack, and Thomas delivered "Kidulthood to Adulthood". Thomas also delved into the grime scene and gathered music from other artists for Clarke to listen to. Clarke then asked Thomas to act as assistant music supervisor for the entire film.

Catch Me If You Can

Thomas released his debut album, Catch Me If You Can, on 1 June 2009. Hiphop.com rated the album 'good' and cited, "Catch Me If You Can is a debut album that perfectly encapsulates how hip hop has become the world's local music. With vocal accents, lyrical references, swagger and varied production styles that will take a minute for the non-Brit to get their head around, much of this likeable and well-intentioned set still deserves wider attention."

Acting career

Although initially starting out as an actor Thomas landed his first role in 2010 as Rager in British flick, Shank, An independent action film set in a decaying future London. He then went on to feature in Noel Clarke's 4.3.2.1. that same year.

In April 2010, BBC Learning launched Off By Heart Shakespeare, a recital contest for secondary school pupils. For the project, he took on the role of Shylock from The Merchant of Venice and delivered one of the character's most memorable speeches; "To bait Fish withal".

Early in 2011 he signed on to play the lead role in The Man Inside, opposite Peter Mullen, David Harewood and Michelle Ryan. Later that year, he was part of an ensemble cast in Cockneys vs Zombies, taking up the role of Mental Mickey. The Metro newspaper described Thomas' wild card performance as "Brilliant".

Thomas' first television role came in the winter of 2011, in the Emmy award-winning series Black Mirror by Charlie Brooker for Channel 4 as Judge Wraith in the episode "Fifteen Million Merits". The Guardian cited "All the performances are good – especially Ashley Thomas as Judge Wraith ...". Thomas' next film was My Brother the Devil which received critical acclaim, winning awards at both the Sundance Film Festival and Berlin Film Festival.

After being strongly considered for the hit Channel 4 TV series Top Boy season 1 in 2011, Thomas was included in season 2 as Jermaine Newton in 2013.

Early in 2015, Thomas guest starred in the BBC series The Interceptor. Thomas' next TV appearance would be as Gil in the short lived fantasy drama Beowulf: Return to the Shieldlands for ITV in January 2016. Thomas signed up to the ensemble cast of A Hundred Streets released the same year.

Early in 2016, it was confirmed Thomas would appear as Calvin Hart in the HBO limited series The Night Of directed by James Marsh and Steve Zaillian.

In March 2016, it was announced Thomas was set as a lead role in the 20th Century Fox Television reboot of franchise series 24 as Isaac Carter.

Mixtapes/EPs

Guest appearances