Volume (UP): #21
“Can anything good come out of Nazareth”
TL:DR: This issue will be significantly dedicated to hero-worship et al. DO NOT skip the yarns but add this episode’s playlist (Spotify, Apple, Deezer). Alternatively add the biweekly updated list (Spotify, Apple, Deezer, Youtube Music). Please sign up for our newsletter down below. Love ya 😘.
S: … Picture this: Random day circa 2011. The sun slowly creeps back to its quarters. In a nondescript vehicle is a young man. Absent-minded, he heaves and haws through the Oil Mill traffic, to the outskirts of PH city where he must meet up with another fellow. The entire evening will depend on the proud don sitting confidently in his trunk. As I pass my neighbour generator. Back in the driver's seat, the driver’s (trippy) mind bounces carelessly off his love and passion for his city, the girls and his grandiose plans to take over the world. HUBRIS. Both of them glass-eyed and delusional will work to give us the BURN Series (Touch your Toes, Firewood, Trumpet). An audacious and gritty pack of songs that will find their way to my dorm room (and Blackberry 😉).
I can still remember how I felt when I first heard Burna Boy. I would tell my friends, who were uninitiated, that this guy could bridge the gap between western pop and what we would later call AfroBeats.
T: Man I’ll let Seyi tell it cos if I speak I might sound like a fanatic. Cos to go from the way he felt to ….
S: Fast forward: It’s 3 am on a Sunday morning in 2018. I am listening to the new album “Outside”. The songs have fascinating and new in the same way it was some 7 years ago. Then Track 7 starts, besides myself, I listen the first time and repeat it so many times I never get to finish the album. Ye came at such a special time for both the industry and burns himself.
Wizkid had just given the biggest song of 2016 to Drake a couple of years back and between Davido and Wiz, we had begun to an intentional and concerted effort to ship Nigerian music abroad. He couldn’t have released a more precise album. and then providence in the image of Kanye West naming his album “Ye” gave him a push. He would go on to release African Giant to address calling out Coachella 🤯.
T: “Anything wey better require planning”
You can say what happened, with Ye blowing up, was by chance. But what came after it was a well-thought-out plan and it was executed almost to perfection with African Giant. He didn’t get the Grammy for it but the intent was clear for everyone to see. There was a clear effort to go for something even though it wasn’t sure. He was ridiculed for his aspirations but he kept GOING. And that’s the koko for me sha. He didn’t let this country happen to him. I personally understand that fear of not trying cos you’re afraid if you want something so bad, you’ll end up not getting it. But he kept GOING! Bro, I find that so inspiring.
S: It’s truly surreal what can happen when you put a huge dream, masterful talent and a controversial persona in the hands of intentional and expert management. It’s been a career of community, grit and hubris, the winning cocktail against this country’s bull**** I am ecstatic for what this means to Nigerian Grammy hopefuls.
T: This Grammy is the best way to crown a run of Outside, African Giant and Twice As Tall. I don’t think we’ll ever see anything as unique as this. He had a run with ALBUMS ffs. The man is so special.
S: In this episode, we can’t help but scream. Burna Fucking boy. Won a grammy this weekend for original work. BRUH !!! Big thanks to Leriq, Peedi Picasso and Victor Isokari for bringing us Burna. I feel good to have known he was the one, and I feel a lot better knowing I can be anything I want to be if I …
