Nightlife has always had its own economy. Money changes hands behind the scenes, careers are built in packed rooms, and entire communities can form around a particular DJ, promoter, venue or party. For Ayinde Castro, understanding that economy has meant occupying nearly every side of it.

The Harvard Business School grad and former LinkedIn product professional first entered the events world as the founder of Elevate Social in 2022. What began in the Bay Area as a community for Black professionals and creatives grew into a multi-city events platform, eventually reaching 14 cities and more than 50,000 people. Castro also taught himself to DJ, moving from early sets at his own events to prime-time and closing slots. The closer he got to the machinery of nightlife, the more clearly he could see the gap between the cultural sophistication of the industry and the informal systems supporting it.

That observation led to Nocturne, a platform bringing contracts, invoices, payments and tax documentation into one place for DJs, promoters and venues. More than 100 DJs and promoters are now using the platform alongside four venues.

Castro continues to produce Elevate Social events and use Nocturne within them, keeping him close to the people and businesses he is building for. He is now taking that experience into the next phase of Nocturne, building at the intersection of nightlife, technology and culture.

In conversation with Deeds, Ayinde Castro talks NYC nightlife, the business behind the culture, and what he’s building with Nocturne. 

Stanley for Deeds: You were already DJing and throwing events before Nocturne. Take me back to that period – what were you seeing firsthand that eventually made you think, “There’s a business that needs to be built here”?

Yeah, so I started an events group called Elevate Social in 2022. I was living in the Bay Area, and the whole inception of it was that there wasn't really a community for people of color to meet up and fellowship. So I started doing brunch events for people who worked in tech and creative industries.

People at LinkedIn, Google, and other companies would come and realize, “Oh, there are other Black people in the Bay,” because San Francisco isn't very diverse. I wanted to build that community while also curating a space where people could hear music they were familiar with. We started with hip-hop, R&B, Afrobeats, amapiano and dancehall, and that really resonated with people.

We started doing it in different cities – San Francisco, New York, D.C., Boston, and eventually 14 cities to date. As I scaled Elevate Social, I started DJing myself. I wanted to curate the sound, so I taught myself how to DJ and started booking myself for the early sets, then eventually prime time and closing sets.

I got four years of experience DJing, and what I realized in the event industry was that, at times, you don't get paid on time, and the process of getting booked and getting paid is very antiquated. I'd text owners to reserve a date or send things over email. When it comes to taxes, you're just scrambling to figure out how much you got paid and where that money is. Sometimes you'd realize, “Oh, I didn't get paid for this gig.” So I wanted to come up with a company that could alleviate that back-end stress and allow people to focus more on creating music and creating events, as opposed to all the logistics that go behind it.

When you're actually putting on the party, you're probably not thinking about contracts and payment infrastructure – you're thinking about getting everyone in the room. What were some of those behind-the-scenes headaches that kept coming up for you?

For me, events are not a very professionalized industry in the sense that, for most things, you should have a contract, or you should get paid within a certain number of days. If I'm getting booked for an event, someone might just text me, and I'll put it in my calendar. Afterwards, I'll say, “Hey, can you send this payment?” There were many times when I'd be booked for a gig and it would be two weeks before I got paid, and I'd have to follow up via text.

Or I'll be booking events and a DJ cancels at the last minute. If I had a contract to support that, I could have avoided those headaches. I was seeing this time and time again. There's a great industry with a lot of growth, but the basics behind it in terms of what business should look like aren't enforced across the board.

And you've been in New York nightlife for a while now. When you look at the scene in NYC today compared with when you first got into it, what feels different to you?

I think when I first got into the New York scene, there were fewer themed parties and events. Now we're seeing a lot more people starting to DJ and throw their own events.

It's not that I think there's an oversaturation. I think the market is larger for DJs and event organizers. Before, there was a smaller group of people doing events. Now, for Black and brown people, it's dispersed across a lot more groups and a lot more DJs.

So there's a lot more variation. I've seen an influx of events. Before, there'd be one or two places that everyone would try to go to, but now there are multiple venues that people are interested in and multiple party groups. There's a lot more optionality now. And with all that extra optionality, there's more supply, and that supply needs the infrastructure layer to help support those events.

Do you think people are approaching nightlife differently now – whether that's how they discover events, build an audience, or even think about making a living from it?

Yeah. I think a lot of people get into DJing because they really appreciate the music, but there's a real business behind it. A lot of people are taking more gigs and charging for their services nowadays. Most people that I know who are in this space, one, love the music, but two, see it as a business.

I've seen a lot of people move from doing this part-time to doing it full-time. A lot of DJs I know have even moved to New York just to DJ full-time. So I'm seeing more and more people, as they get ramped up, taking it more seriously. Some DJs I know had a job before and then chose to pursue this full-time.

There's always been this really informal side to nightlife – texts, DMs, handshakes, spreadsheets, somebody saying they'll send the money tomorrow. Do you think that informality is part of what makes the industry work, or has it ultimately held people back?

I think it ultimately holds people back because there just needs to be increased trust within the event industry. Just because something's been the same way for many years doesn't mean that it should be. There are a lot of things that we get used to in life, but we all know that they're not right. So it's about who's going to be the person that changes the culture of what we deem acceptable versus not. 

That's what I've been trying to do – a paradigm shift in the way that we think about how business should be conducted. If you're a lot of people who are just used to getting paid when they get paid, it should instead be that you get paid within a certain number of days, or at least have an agreement about when that transaction is going to go through.

It's about changing the mindset, and that will just help people in general.

And I guess that's really where Nocturne comes in. How do you bring more structure into nightlife without taking away some of the spontaneity and relationships that make nightlife what it is?

For Nocturne, it's having a software layer to build more transparency and help centralize things. For example, if you're a DJ with Nocturne, you can quickly send the contract through the platform, have them sign it, and then, for payment afterwards, you can send one link where they can put in their invoice amount and you can pay them through that.

It's easier in terms of transparency and the ability to do things. The process to sign up takes a couple of seconds, and once you've done one event on the platform, you have your W-9 and all your finances tied to it. So if another promoter or DJ books you, all you have to do is click one button to share. It's pretty easy. You have a one-time setup.

I'm curious about what has changed for you, being on both sides of this. You came into this as a performer and saw the struggles people go through, and now you're creating a platform to streamline the process. Has seeing all of that from the other side changed how you think about the people actually working in nightlife?

Yeah. I think, in general, there's a lot of money going through the event industry and there's a lot more financial literacy. People increasingly want to move their hobby into a business. For example, creating an LLC allows you to write off some of your expenses.

There are also a lot of DJs who are famous who still use their Social Security number instead of setting up a business structure.

If you pay someone over $2,000 in the U.S. a year, you need to file a 1099-NEC because they're a contractor. Not a lot of people know about that. The platform helps you do the business stuff and formalize things because, as of now, not everyone is handling things properly. What I'm seeing is that people are becoming more financially literate and want to free up time to focus on their creative pursuits, as opposed to worrying about when they're getting paid and the logistics behind things.

Then you have this completely different experience from working in product at LinkedIn. What did you take from that world into Nocturne, and was there anything you had to unlearn when you started building for nightlife?

I wouldn't say it's something I had to unlearn. It's more so the different things that I learned from LinkedIn. I worked on the media team at LinkedIn and I also worked on the payments team, so I have a lot of experience with customer interviews, understanding what people need, building a product roadmap and building products.

I had an engineering internship, but I coded most of the website myself. I studied computer science in undergrad, so I'm bringing all the stuff I know about how to build, but also how to build the right products. That's what I learned from LinkedIn – how to understand payments and media, talk to people, understand their real pain points and then build a solution that fixes that.

I saw that Elevate Social is still doing events in New York – the recent one was August 29. How does that fit into your life now that you're also building Nocturne? Do the two sort of feed into each other?

Yeah, it complements each other. I'm still doing Elevate Social to curate events, and I think it helps as I'm building the company because I work with a lot of DJs and we use Nocturne for our events. Whenever we go to new markets, it's a way to get more people understanding the platform. If I do something in New Orleans, for example, everyone that I book for that event will at least understand what the product is because they're getting paid through it. 

So it's helped in terms of credibility. We're one of the big brands in the U.S., and it helps us do different events. We even have two events at the moment – one in Boston and another one. I've been able to still do that on the side, and it helps me understand the problem statement more because I work with all these different venues and DJs. I understand their problems and can build off of that.

You've talked about helping the people who drive culture build more sustainable businesses. When you say “sustainable,” what does that mean for a DJ or promoter? What changes for them?

What makes it sustainable for them is having systems in place to make sure that your business grows, that you're on track with your finances, and that your liability is minimized through the contracts we offer and payments. This is supposed to be for people to handle the operational side of things. For example, if you're a bigger act, sometimes you'd have a manager to help manage all this stuff. But if you don't come from the finance world or understand business and you want to focus on your art, this helps give you a framework and ways to manage all that stuff for you, as opposed to paying someone for help on that.

Speaking of finances, there's a bigger conversation around Black people creating so much of nightlife culture and being at the forefront of it, but not always having the ownership or economic power that comes with it. Is that something you're conscious of when you're building Nocturne?

Yeah, I think in general, with Nocturne, the goal is just to level the playing field in terms of what people can access and understand. In some places, depending on where you studied or what you've studied, you might be more attuned to understanding finances. If you didn't go to college, you might just not understand that side of things.

The whole point of Nocturne is to provide, across the board, a level of understanding of how you should be conducting business within nightlife and entertainment. We're giving people the tools so they can drive their own ships – making sure that they're not held liable through these contracts, making sure that they're paid on time, and making sure that they understand how to file taxes if you're paying those people.

It's about providing everyone with the toolbox universally. The whole goal is to democratize access through the software so that everyone can chart their own future. Now you have all the tools to succeed in handling your logistics in that way.

We've talked a lot about what you want Nocturne to change for people in nightlife, but what does success actually look like for the company itself? Are you at a point where you're thinking about scaling the business, bringing in investors or strategic partners, or is the focus still on proving the product and building the network?

I think we're past that. It's more so looking at investors now and also scaling more densely within New York and other markets. We have four venues on board, and we also have over 100 DJs and promoters on the platform. So it's more so about continuing to scale.

The goal, what success looks like for us, is to help change the narrative in the entertainment business around how you should conduct business.

That's the goal – having a paradigm shift and a mindset shift around how things should be done. If I can play a part in that change, then I'd be happy.

Cover Image by Migiani Piciato

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Nairobi had another reason to step outside recently as Peaches & Cream made its debut at Ngong Racecourse, turning the grounds into an open-air celebration of soulful African sound.

Starting in the afternoon and stretching into the night, the inaugural event brought together music, food, lifestyle and community in a setting that felt deliberately removed from the usual nightclub circuit. The idea was simple: good music, good people and enough room to let the day unfold.

And the music delivered on that promise, with a lineup that brought together a strong mix of Kenya’s R&B, Afro-pop and alternative scene, with performances from Nikita Kering’, Xenia Manasseh, Njerae, Kethan, Bridget Blue, Ochiko and Watendawili. Each brought their own texture to a bill that felt distinctly Kenyan while still leaving room for a wider African sound.

From the smooth R&B tones they have become known to belting some of their fan-favourites, the stars with their own blend of alternative and Afro-fusion sounds together with the crowd took time to indulge in the moments. In the course of the evening, the energy shifted naturally from live performances into the dancefloor-ready sounds of DJs including Bune, IV, Darkfruit and Smolls.

Then came the international pull. South African singer Shekhinah and Afro-house heavyweight Sun-El Musician gave the debut its biggest continental moments, bringing the sounds of Southern Africa into a lineup otherwise rooted firmly in Nairobi. Their presence also underlined the event’s wider ambition: to create a space where Kenya’s emerging and established voices could sit comfortably alongside artists shaping African music beyond the country’s borders.

But Peaches & Cream was never just about standing in front of a stage. Set against the open grounds of Ngong Racecourse, the experience leaned into the social side of a typical Nairobi Saturday – people arriving with friends, dressing for the occasion, moving between performances, food and drinks, and making a day of it. The event’s format allowed the atmosphere to build gradually, moving from sunlit afternoon sets into the warmer, more energetic hours of the evening.

There were, naturally, a few unscripted moments along the way. During Watendawili’s performance, Charisma took an unexpected tumble on stage but continued singing from the floor before eventually getting back up and carrying on with the set. The moment quickly made its way online, becoming one of the lighter reminders that live music rarely goes exactly according to plan.

By the time night settled over the venue, Peaches & Cream had made its introduction: a music experience built less around a single headline moment and more around the feeling of spending an entire Saturday surrounded by sound, style and people.

For its first edition, it’s a fitting celebration of Kenya’s increasingly diverse musical landscape – soulful, social and very much in its own lane – and one can only hope this is the beginning of many more editions to come. 

COVER CREDIT: kibi.chii

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When Black Sherif joined the virtual call, his earpiece was already plugged in. By the time we spoke, he had released Sun Sherif Vol. 1, a six-track project accompanied by sunflowers and a handwritten note. When I told him the note felt personal, he agreed. “Yeah, it was very personal. I did the writing myself.”

Born Ismail Sherif and raised in Konongo Zongo, somewhere within Ghana’s Ashanti Region, Black Sherif started making music in his final year of high school in 2019. Since then, he has used music to document his life, dreams and fantasies, describing his approach in terms of melodies, rhythms and frequency.

Music and fashion have always been closely connected for Black Sherif. He spoke about dressing with the familiarity of someone describing an interest he had long before music became his career, tracing it back to childhood, when he was old enough to choose his own clothes without his mother’s help. His appearances at London Fashion Week with Labrum and his Paris Fashion Week debut with Off-White reflect an interest that has been there from the beginning. “It's been with me,” he said. “With some unconscious intentionalities and consistencies.”

Even if he had never made music, he explained, dressing would still have been a hobby he paid close attention to. His interest in clothes was tied to his relationship with music, from listening to records to following the artists whose work he admired, long before he became an artist himself.

‍Sun Sherif Vol. 1 follows Iron Boy, an earlier project marked by a darker, more deliberate intensity. When I asked what had changed between the two, Black Sherif described the new EP in a way that stayed with me. “I won't say Sun Sherif is less deeper. I think it's the same as deep, but it's softly deep.” He spoke about approaching life with aggression as an experiment, a response to what he had experienced, and then wondering what it would mean to try the opposite. Sun Sherif Vol. 1 came out of that curiosity, allowing him to explore softness without abandoning the depth that has characterised his music.

The six-track release was also a deliberate choice of format. Black Sherif was clear that he considered it an EP, not an album, and the idea had been on his mind for years. “Somewhere 2020, I tweeted that I wanted to make one of the best R&B projects I'd heard,” he said. “And for some reason, unintentionally, I just did it this year.” His albums have typically run to thirteen to fifteen tracks, but this time he wanted a shorter project that could hold a particular experience without extending beyond it. The result is a more concentrated expression of what he had been exploring, delivered across six songs.

Jolie is the EP’s most devoted song, and the one Black Sherif chose as his personal favourite. When I asked how he writes with such vulnerability without revealing too much, he said, “I just write every single piece of mind. It's really just unfiltered. It's really just raw. Sometimes I'm not even intentional about being deep or vulnerable. That's just what comes out of me.” The feeling begins without much filtering, but the finished song still has to be shaped. Through ad libs, harmonies and the arrangement itself, he gives those thoughts a form that other people can sit with.

As Black Sherif’s music has connected with young people in Ghana and across the diaspora, the expectations around what he makes have grown. I asked how he manages that pressure without letting it dictate his work. He spoke about continuing to pursue the things he dreams of and envisions, even when the pressure affects him personally. “For some reason, the vision remains untouched,” he said. “And I can't explain that.” His answer suggested a distinction between the pressure he feels and the direction he wants to take. He returned to this idea of holding on to his own convictions while remaining open to other perspectives. “I do not believe there is one truth,” he said. “There are many truths. And even though I believe in mine and I stand firm in mine, I still make room for other truths.”

Sun Sherif Vol. 1 is the beginning of a larger project. Its sequel is coming, followed by an album, he notes, and he has more visuals planned, including two additional videos before the year ends. He also spoke about returning to the UK, a possible Zama Disco appearance and a trip to Lagos in the first quarter of next year. He has been spending time in the city writing, making music and taking care of himself, with the studio remaining a constant through it all.

Before we ended, I told him that Love Again was my favourite song on the EP, although I kept returning to Sacrifice from Iron Boy, particularly the way he sings the chorus. I couldn't quite explain what it was about the delivery that stayed with me. “The delivery,” he said. Then, warmly, “Thank you. I appreciate that.”

Cover Credit: Black Sherif 

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The P-square's split has been a large part of the conversation in the Afrobeats industry after it was announced in 2017. Before they became known as Mr P (Peter) and Rudeboy (Paul), P-square was a trailblazer duo who released five studio albums and performed at several sold-out concerts across Nigeria and abroad. 

Released in 2007, their third album, Game Over, is honest and a wee political. It reflects their inspiration of international acts like Micheal Jackson, Bobby Brown, and MC Hammer. The album weaves multiple romantic scenarios in the almost hour-long time sequence. One of P-square's biggest marketing values is their performance and Game Over was developed with visuals at its centre. The album had a music video for almost all the songs and this contributed to redefining African music videos for a modern audience. Game Over borrowed musical elements from RnB, hip-hop, and reggae. It is definitely one of their strongest works. 

The album comprises 10 songs. No One Like You opens the record, setting the tone for the romantic sojourn that defines it. Lyrics like, ‘You're the highest/When it comes to rating, you're the lead and No one be like you/Say they cannot replace you, 'cause you are a blessing,’ show the brothers confessing their undying adoration to their lover. The video of this track is almost crossing 70 million views and the song was sampled by Ugandan Reggae duo, Radio and Weasel, for their song Zuena in 2010. 

The title track of the album, Game Over, takes an angsty turn from the loving No One Like You as it explores a relationship on the brink of destruction. The mood of the album picks up in Do Me, a track that would definitely get you moving. The song features vocals from fellow Afro-pop star, Waje. Waje later claimed to not get paid for her vocals on the song. No formal contract was, apparently, signed to protect her copyright rights. This exposes the industry's shortcomings of failing to protect up and rising vocal talents through the right contractual agreements. The song's music video won many awards including Sound City Music Video Awards, Nigerian Music Video Awards, among others. 

Track number 4, Miss You Die, takes a somber detour on longing and romantic regrets. It's one of the songs that shows the group's singing capabilities. Why E Be Say reflects the struggles of the average Nigerian in 2007 but the sentiments that were addressed in the song still rings true for many Nigerians today. ‘In our society make we dey try to live like one family/What a tragedy with our wealth we still dey live in poverty/The wrong thing be said/As poor ones dey hala the rich ones dey hammer yes o.’ These lyrics expertly put the devastating class divide in Nigeria in a language that every Nigerian relates to. It's a tragedy for a nation rich in resources to be experiencing so much financial insecurity. 

More Than A Friend is another track with ambitious romantic storytelling. Am I Still That Special Man? sees P-square questioning a lover's infidelity over mellow RnB instrumentals. Ifunaya follows the same lyrical motives as No One Like You. Stand Up revisits the political instabilities of 2007, eight years after military rule. P-square is nostalgic about the great times of Nigeria and they encourage the common man to Stand Up to the corrupt government. Human Rights Watch published a paper on the 11th of October 2007, detailing Nigeria's worsening political crisis. They wrote that, "Violence, corruption and impunity are not just problems that the government has failed to tackle; they are systemic abuses that flow from the heart of the very same government institutions that should be working to combat them." 

The last track before the outro is Roll It. This is a club track and the lyrics doesn't deny it as P-square sings about admiring a girl dancing in the club. The album got a reissue with two remix tracks; Temptation and Bizzy Body. Both of those tracks featured Alaye and Weird MC respectively. Game Over is one of the timeless bodies of work from an African act, the album has more than 30 million streams on Spotify and is reported to have sold "nearly 8 million copies across Africa and the world." according to Native Magazine. 

Game Over gave us some of the most unforgettable hits of the 2000s. The singing and dancing twin duo released music under their records, Square Records but they have signed multiple record deals with labels, Akon's Konvict Records, Universal Music South Africa and Square Root Entertainment. P-square played a pivotal role in shaping Africa's music and entertainment landscape and as a duo, they've won multiple albums that crossed the continent. BET Awards, MTV Europe Music Awards, MOBO Awards, MTV Africa Music Awards and a couple more. 

Their single career paths as Mr P and Rude Boy continue to play an influence in Afro-pop. Mr P went on to create his record label, P-Classic Records and his 16-track album saw features from his peers in the industry, Tiwa Savage, Simi, Wande Coal,  and more. He won Best International Male Artist at the International Achievement Recognition Awards in 2018, his first award as a soloist. Rudeboy also founded his own label, Fire Department Inc. and he released his album Rudykillus in 2021. The video of one of his bonus tracks, Reason With Me has crossed 300 million views on YouTube. 

We might never get a P-square reunion after Peter's update on the group earlier this year. The update showed the audience how deep the familial disputes ran between the two brothers. Jude Okoye, their elder brother who was at the forefront of P-square's management, received criticism from Peter. 

He accused his two brothers (Paul and Jude) of mistreatment and harassment in the group regarding finances, management and a strong betrayal of their brotherhood. It was the nail on the coffin of P-square's future and it was a disappointment to fans who believed in their reunion. Paul and Jude are yet to issue an official response to his allegations. P-square's career might be over but their Afro-pop legacy is going to remain forever carved in stone. 

Cover Credit via Life And Times Magazine

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Before there was DJ Six7even, there was David Etuk the petroleum engineering student carrying a first-class average through year three, holding two scholarships at once, interning at ExxonMobil, doing the maths and the physics not because he had to, but because he loved it. "I actually loved studying petroleum engineering," he says, without a trace of the irony you'd expect from someone who walked away from it entirely. "I loved the academic work. I loved maths. Physics was my best subject."

DJ Six7even didn't leave engineering because he burned out or lost interest. He left because something else pulled harder. "I would only do what I love, go where I love, be with who I love," he says. The degree wasn't a mistake he's since corrected. It was proof of a mind that finishes what it starts, redirected toward a different structure entirely.

His latest status description, DJ executive, sounds like branding until you trace it back to where it actually comes from. An engineer thinks in systems, load-bearing structures, resource management, how to build something that holds together under pressure. Six7even didn't set that instinct down when he left school. He picked up a different material to build with.

From Haircut to Holding Company

The name itself started as nothing. During a session in his hair stylist's chair, his hair curled up into an unexpected shape, and a random passerby commented that it looked like a pineapple. It stuck the way nicknames do, randomly, permanently, without his input. "My height, I didn't choose it," he says of the other half of the equation, the six-foot-something frame that makes him impossible to miss in any room he enters. "I had to make peace with it."

What he's done since is the part worth paying attention to. In 2026, "Pineapple" stopped being something that happened to him and became something he built. His Pineapple Head Collective is not a merch line or a vanity project, it's a structure, DJs at the center, intertwined with music releases, live events, merchandise, and a pipeline for spotting the next generation of talent coming out of Africa. "It's about building an actual, intertwined, functioning system," he explains, "with DJs in the centre of it."

That word, system, is doing a lot of work. It's the engineer talking. Somewhere between the classroom and the club, he stopped seeing the DJ and the executive as two separate jobs competing for the same hours, and started designing an ecosystem where both roles function without collapsing into each other.

"You know how to manage resources, outsource jobs, network," he says of the mindset he's now building into the collective from day one, rather than learning it the hard way, years into a career, the way he had to.

Even his one unprompted digression, a stray fact about how nearly everything in modern life traces back to oil and gas, reads less like a tangent and more like a signature. The engineering never left. It just became the invisible infrastructure underneath a nightlife brand.

The Sunset Mix
Not a sunset clause.

Six7even has always treated music as something built to bring people into the same room, not just something played at them. That instinct is at the center of the Sunset Mix, a set built around daylight instead of darkness, played between 6 and 7, the same hours baked into his own name. It's less a gimmick than a return to something specific, the daytime energy he's long been associated with, stripped of the usual nightlife trappings and built instead around sun, open air, and Amapiano.

"Amapiano just hits differently when the sun is out," he says, and he's not being poetic about it. It's practically the whole thesis behind the Sunset Mix.

It's a small detail, but it says something larger about how he thinks about his own brand, that "Six7even" was never just a stage name to begin with. It was always a blueprint waiting to be used, the same instinct that turned a haircut into a holding company, now turning a number into a format.

Becoming Six7even

None of the pipeline from David to Six7Even happened overnight. In the summer of 2018, before any of the cities, before the name meant anything, he was sleeping in his car between club trials, doing sets he knew were good, and then waiting on calls that didn't come. "That was the last time I felt unseen, to be honest with you," he says. He kept going anyway, and his breakout moment happened. 

Being seen, it turns out, comes with its own kind of isolation. He describes standing in the middle of a set, 3,000 people losing themselves to the music, and finding himself somewhere else entirely for five full seconds, present in body, gone in mind. "I felt like I was alone in a space of three thousand people," he says. The one constant through both the invisible years and the sold-out ones has been the same friend, Judy, checking in on the person underneath the name on the flyer, not the performance. "Are you okay to play this gig," he recalls her asking, a question almost no one else thinks to ask a man everyone assumes has it all figured out.

The Quest for Stardom 

Ask him what success used to look like, and he'll tell you it used to be smaller and more local, being the biggest nightlife DJ in Lagos, running multiple clubs a night. That version of the dream has been replaced, not abandoned, but outgrown. "The dream got bigger," he says. "It changed to be the biggest DJ export out of Africa."

Underneath the ambition sits a simpler operating principle: being human is the only qualification he requires from anyone, regardless of class or status, and making people happy is what makes the work worth doing. It's a mature worldview from someone whose public image still trades heavily on height and a haircut.

The ‘Hair’ Line

For someone whose entire image trades on being larger than life, literally, he's surprisingly precise about where the boundaries sit. "There's a line," he says, talking about the industry, the crowd, the version of himself that shows up under the lights. "You can dance on it, moonwalk on it, twerk on it. But don't cross it."

It's a small piece of philosophy, delivered almost in passing, but it says more about his longevity than anything about the height or the haircut ever could. He's not interested in shock value or chaos for its own sake, he's interested in range, how far you can push a moment, how much personality you can bring to it, without losing the thing that makes people trust you in the first place. Dance on the line all night. Just don't cross it.

It's the same instinct that shows up in how he talks about people generally, off the decks entirely. Status, class, none of it moves the needle for him. "The fact that you are human already qualifies you as a higher animal," he says, "not just any other animal." Respect isn't earned through who you know or where you're from, it's the baseline, extending the moment two people's paths cross. Making people happy, he says plainly, is what makes him happy.

Put together, it's a quieter kind of maturity than the one the industry usually rewards, less about restraint for its own sake, more about knowing exactly where your own line is, and never needing anyone to remind you where it was.

Strip away the nickname, the stature, the crowd, and what's left is not a mystery, he's already told you. A first-class engineering student who chose sound as his medium and never stopped thinking like a systems builder.

A haircut that became a holding company. A kid who slept in his car in 2018, still building, still executing, still proving to himself that what you genuinely love can be taken all the way to the biggest stages in the world.

Cover Credit; Tomi O'nezer

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The first thing  SPACESHIP Billy, said when the call connected was “suffering and smiling.” He laughed after saying it, setting the tone for a conversation that moved easily between serious reflection and humour. Nigerian-born and London-raised, Billy has spent the last ten years as the official disc jockey for Burna Boy, working alongside the artist through the growth of his career. His role within that world, however, extends well beyond the turntables. 

For Spaceship Billy, being Burna Boy’s official DJ involves more than selecting music for live performances. As he explained, “There's so many conversations that happen in the background.” He hears music before it is released and gives feedback on what he thinks will connect with different audiences, drawing on his own instincts and experience. Within the Spaceship Collective, he said, his opinion carries the same weight as other members of the team. “It's not seen as, oh, this person's just a DJ,” he said. “Everybody's input is taken on and it's seen as equal.” After ten years working alongside Burna Boy, Billy has become part of the wider creative process, contributing to decisions that extend beyond what happens on stage.

Over the past ten years, Billy has watched the stages grow from small clubs to stadiums, with each setting demanding a different approach. He pointed to the differences between New York and Atlanta, and between Toronto and Montreal, where the French influence can change the atmosphere of a room. Playing for a global audience, he explained, means recognising the cultures within it, even when the crowd has come to see the same artist. “You have to understand that although it's one artist and it's one vision, there's different kinds of cultures that you have to try and communicate with.” Years of touring with Burna Boy have given him experience adapting to those differences from one city to the next.

‍Method Man

Billy’s approach to production also depends on listening closely and being willing to change his mind. He described starting with drums, building the melody around them and removing anything that does not serve the track. Sometimes, he returns to a piece days later and hears it differently. “I might listen to the track one day, come back to it again and be like, nah, actually I don't like that bit,” he said. “Or I might have heard something somewhere else which has inspired the way I kind of feel about it again on another day.” What he hears outside the studio can change how he approaches a track when he returns to it, leaving room for new ideas to influence the production as it develops.

Afrobeats’ global rise is often discussed through its performance on Western charts, streaming numbers and international collaborations. Spaceship Billy offered a perspective shaped by growing up with the music long before that wider recognition. “Afrobeats has always been big in its own circles,” he said. During his university years, artists such as P-Square, Tony Tetuila, Magic System, Premier Gaou and Wizkid were already part of his listening, alongside the Fuji music his parents brought from Nigeria to London. “We were listening to Fuji music. I was even listening to Sunny Ade through my mum and dad.” His recollection speaks to a musical culture that was already thriving within the communities around him, even as its international profile continued to grow. When I pointed out that he had answered two of my questions at once, he replied, “Double whammy,” and laughed.

Before he became Spaceship Billy, he was known as Bill Gates -- the DJ name he used in his early career sojourn -- he had built a reputation in his own scene before working with Burna Boy. It made the question of being identified primarily through his association with Burna Boy particularly interesting. When I asked whether it bothered him, he considered both sides. After ten years working with someone, he explained, the association is natural, much like being identified with the company you work for. At the same time, he had his own ambitions long before the partnership. “I was always a DJ in my own entity before Burna Boy. I was always kind of having that vision for myself.” He also sees the association as something to be proud of. “If they say you're Burna Boy's DJ, it's not a negative stance. I think it's more of an identification to greatness.”

Outside his work as a DJ and producer, Billy is involved in event management and the IT operations of the Spaceship Collective, alongside making time for the gym and his family. “It's not just deck one, deck two,” he said. “There's a business side aspect that I'm a part of.” Looking ahead, he wants to spend more time producing music and encouraging younger people to take education seriously alongside their creative ambitions. He sees understanding technology as especially important, warning that without knowing how things work, young people risk missing opportunities. “Things are going to go past you,” he said. “So I think that for me, something that I would like to kind of inspire in the younger generation.”

Over ten years with Burna Boy and the Spaceship Collective, Spaceship Billy has built a role that extends beyond the decks, contributing to creative decisions, production and the business behind the music while continuing to develop his own ambitions. He opened our conversation with “suffering and smiling,” a phrase that stayed with us as we moved between the serious and the funny, the work people see and the work that happens in the background.

Cover Credit: Spaceship Billy

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By blending the soul of R&B with the rhythm and freedom of bouyon, Fallon is creating a sound that’s deeply personal, proudly Caribbean, and entirely her own.

Some artists spend years searching for a sound that feels entirely their own. For Fallon, that journey led her back to her roots. Instead of chasing trends, she found inspiration in the music and culture that shaped her, creating a sound that’s as personal as it is powerful.

Blending the emotion and intimacy of R&B with the infectious rhythms of bouyon, Fallon is carving out a space that feels both contemporary and deeply connected to Caribbean culture. Rather than chasing trends or following a formula, her music is guided by instinct, an honest reflection of who she is and where she comes from.

As bouyon continues to gain long-overdue international recognition, Fallon sees an opportunity not only to introduce audiences to the genre, but to celebrate the culture that shaped her. For her, this isn’t simply about creating music; it’s about carrying a heritage forward while building a new artistic identity.

With a new era on the horizon, Deeds sat down with Fallon to discuss identity, the evolution of bouyon, and why authenticity remains at the centre of everything she creates.

Linda for Deeds: Welcome to Deeds. For those discovering you for the first time, who is Fallon?

My name is Fallon. I’m a singer, and my music lives somewhere between R&B and bouyon. That’s the world I’m trying to create, one where emotion, rhythm and my Caribbean roots all come together naturally.

Your music feels like a meeting point between two different worlds. How would you describe your musical universe?

My universe is really an experience before anything else. It comes from my love of singing R&B, but also from rhythm, energy and movement. At the same time, I wanted to pay tribute to my Caribbean culture through bouyon. Bringing those two worlds together felt completely natural to me because they’re both part of who I am.

My music is where R&B meets my Caribbean identity.

For people who may be hearing about bouyon for the first time, how would you explain it?

Bouyon is a genre that was born in Dominica before spreading throughout the Caribbean. It’s energetic, hybrid and constantly evolving because it mixes so many different influences. What I love most about it is that its essence is freedom. There are very few limits to what you can create with it.

What does bouyon represent to you personally, and to Caribbean culture more broadly?

It’s much more than a genre of music. It’s a cultural movement. Bouyon is about expressing yourself freely, embracing rhythm and energy without holding back. For Caribbean people, it’s part of our identity, and I think that’s what makes it so powerful.

Bouyon is freedom. It’s a way of expressing who we are without limits.

Over the last few years, we’ve seen bouyon reach audiences far beyond the Caribbean. How do you feel watching that evolution?

Honestly, I never thought it would grow this much. Especially when you remember that in mainland France during the 2010s, bouyon wasn’t always well understood or appreciated. Seeing it finally reach new audiences and receive more recognition is something really special. It shows that people are becoming more open to discovering different cultures and sounds.

Are there artists who’ve had a major influence on your own sound?

Not really. I listen to a lot of music, of course, but I don’t try to recreate what someone else has already done. My goal has always been to build something instinctive and personal, something that people immediately recognise as mine.

‍ Is there an artist you’d love to collaborate with one day?

Hamza. (Laughs.) I think our universes could complement each other really well.

Is there one song that best represents who you are today?

I’d say “Normal.” That’s the track where the balance between R&B and bouyon feels the most natural. It’s also the song people connect with the most, which tells me that they understand the direction I’m trying to take artistically.

‍ Where do you see yourself, and your music, in the next five years?

I see myself becoming even more confident in who I am. I want to be more aligned with myself and more transparent in what I create. As an artist, my goal is to keep evolving while staying honest. The more I grow, the more I want my music to reflect who I really am.

Finally, what would you like to say to everyone who’s been supporting you?

First of all, thank you. It means everything to know people are following this journey. I want everyone to know that I’m coming back different. This is a new era for me, with new music and new singles that really represent the artist I’ve become. I can’t wait for people to hear what’s coming next.

Rather than forcing two genres together, Fallon allows R&B and bouyon to exist in conversation with one another. The result is music that feels deeply personal while remaining rooted in Caribbean culture. As bouyon continues to reach new audiences around the world, artists like Fallon are expanding its future by embracing, rather than diluting, the traditions that shaped them. If this new era is any indication, Fallon is only beginning to discover the full potential of her voice.

Credits: 

Artist: Fallon @quiestfallon

Photographer: frederic magalhaes @fredericmagalhaes_ 

Creative Director/ Stylist: Linda Benro @styliddie 

Photo assist: Noé Lalanne Bernagozzi

Art direction & Assistant Stylist: Elliot Morpuss @elliotmorpuss 

Assistant Stylist: Ilayda Gul @ilayda_gul24

Videographer: Marvyn Ngikila @marvyn_07

Production: Sylva Mobali @mobaliprod

Interview: Linda Benro @styliddie

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Teledalase appears in a blue-and-purple patterned headwrap tied high around her head, gold hoop earrings and a gold-toned necklace over a simple black top. Her makeup is understated, with a matte lip, two nose piercings and a pair of small matching pieces sitting together beneath her lower lip. Framed photographs and artwork fill the space behind her. The whole room felt like a memory, a piece of her occupying the entire space. 

As she speaks about her music, she becomes increasingly animated, moving between ideas about culture, language, grief and artistic freedom with the kind of enthusiasm that makes it clear she has spent a lot of time thinking about what she wants her work to say. When asked to introduce herself and her music, she does not reach for a genre or a career summary; she reaches for water. “I would describe my music as water,” she says. “There are many ways that water can exist and be. I can be as deep and vast as the ocean, and then I can still be what you need on a hot day. I can be as redeeming and as refreshing as you going to the river on a hot day to take a bath. It is what it is in whatever context or structure that you meet it, and however you find it is however it's supposed to be.” 

The comparison makes sense when you look across Teledalase’s work. Her music moves between Yoruba culture, personal experience, folk traditions and contemporary sounds without settling into one fixed identity. She is Nigerian-American, with an artistic lineage that runs deep into Yoruba culture. Her father was a visual artist, her mother a dancer and theatre practitioner whose dance troupe, Omitun, gave Teledalase early access to live cultural performance, and her paternal grandfather was a founding member of the Mbari Mbayo Club & Oshogbo Art movement. That inheritance has shaped the way she understands music and language. Yoruba was not simply a language she grew up speaking. She described it as a language capable of expressing things that English could not, particularly through its proverbs and emotional textures, and connected the renewed use of Yoruba in contemporary Nigerian music to a much older tradition carried by artists like King Sunny Ade and Ebenezer Obey.

Her 2024 debut EP, The ones who didn't die, Pt. 1, introduced that foundation to a wider audience. Her contribution to Netflix’s Aníkúlápó: Rise of the Spectre placed her work within a larger Yoruba cultural and spiritual world, while Apple Music named her an Africa Rising artist in 2025. Then came The Bad Wife Has No Tongue, in 2025, a deeply personal project that some listeners could have read as a departure from the work that came before it. Teledalase does not see it that way because, for her, there has never been one fixed version of what her music is supposed to sound like.

“I am just making music,” she says, when asked whether she sees her projects as parts of one larger creative world. “I am so anti-branding — which is very weird because in the music industry nowadays, we're all being pushed to create a brand of some sort. If I have something to say, I'm going to say it in music. The Bad Wife Has No Tongue is a deeply personal project. It doesn't mean I'm going to do a second one. Maybe the next album would be about me being in love, and people will be like, what the hell? Where did this come from?” That unpredictability has followed her through the catalogue. After the Aníkúlápó soundtrack, she released Peace, a song she had written years earlier and which existed in a very different register from the music people had started associating with her. Listeners who had begun to categorise her as a Yoruba artist were unsettled by the shift. Teledalase was not.

“If there's one thing about me, you cannot put me in a box. Life is too short for me to turn myself into this one-dimensional person. Everybody else can package it for you. That is their choice. But because I don't have eternity, I'm going to have fun with music.” For Teledalase, that freedom also comes from a belief that music should have room for subjects that do not always fit into commercial Afrobeats. She spoke about folk music as a space for grief, labour, contradiction and the less polished parts of everyday life. She referenced Taste of Life as an example of a song addressing subjects unlikely to become club hits but still worth documenting. She also spoke about music as political resistance and about existence itself as an act of resistance for Nigerians and Black people living within systems that place limits on what they can become.

“Being Nigerian or Black means dreaming beyond limits despite what the system puts in front of you,” she says. “Music like ‘Shungu’ embodies that - a resilience and an unshakeable spirit.”

That understanding of music has also been shaped by grief. Her father’s death interrupted the creative process she had been building. The EP The Blue Child had explored their relationship while he was alive, but after his death, she found herself unable to return to that material in the same way. Grief, she explained, was still too blurry to turn into music. “Grief must unfold naturally before it can be captured in music. I'm not ready yet.”

The tree that appears throughout her work, and most explicitly in SANGO, IGI NLA, her September 2026 single drawing on Yoruba mythology and the symbolism of the thunder tree, offers another way of understanding that patience. She described Iginla as a female spirit representing “unbreakable persistence” and spoke about finding whatever keeps you grounded, whether that is family, faith, music or community, and holding onto it. The idea of rootedness sits alongside the movement in her music. SANGO, IGI NLA reaches into Yoruba mythology and ancestral reverence, using traditional percussion, chants and an invocation-like vocal delivery, while the rest of her catalogue refuses to remain in one musical or emotional space. The two things are not contradictory for Teledalase. Being rooted does not require staying still.

She pointed to Rema as an artist she respects for the same reason. “Because he has the audacity sometimes to just go against the grain, and those are my people,” she says. What interests her is not unpredictability as a marketing strategy, but the freedom to follow an instinct even when the audience does not know what to expect next. “Today they love you, tomorrow they don't,” she says. “That is not a currency I am willing to bank on. When I take my last breath, I don't want to say at least I gave people what they wanted. I want to leave a legacy that I designed - not based on what people told me to do.”

For someone who describes her music as water, the refusal to stay in one shape is perhaps the most consistent thing about her work. The projects can change, the languages can change, the subjects can change, and the sound can move somewhere listeners were not expecting. What remains is the freedom to follow the next thing that feels worth making.

Credit: Teledalase

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‘The Inner Compass Is EXITECHNO’ 

For what it’s worth, no one might have ever known that the South African producer-DJ, FKA Mash, spent several years creating his latest opus EXITECHNO. He had spent years attempting to make an album, only to abandon projects after four or five songs when they no longer felt right. Then, almost unexpectedly, the project he had been trying to make for years finally came together.

It is a fitting development for an artist whose relationship with music has always been rooted in instinct. FKA Mash began making music at 12 and officially started releasing in 2011, developing a sound that moves through House and Techno while remaining open to the different influences that have shaped his musical life. 

His 2019 remix of Sculptured Music’s, “Sad To Think” earned him Remix of the Year at the Dance Music Awards, South Africa and a South African Music Awards nomination, further introducing his sound to a wider audience.

Since then, his career has taken him onto stages alongside names including Black Coffee, Jimpster, WhoMadeWho and Kerri Chandler, while performances across international electronic music spaces have expanded the world around his music. Yet, beneath the career milestones, there remains a recurring idea: the music has to feel right to him first.

On Friday September 25, that instinct takes the form of EXITECHNO, FKA Mash’s debut album. Named from the combination of “EXIT” and “TECHNO,” the project marks a new chapter for an artist who says he found the album before he even realised he had one. 

Ahead of its release, Deeds caught up with FKA Mash to talk about his beginnings, the evolution of his sound, the journey that brought him to his debut album and what it means to finally let EXITECHNO out into the world.

Sussan For Deeds Magazine: For anyone discovering FKA MASH for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and the music you make?

My name is Mashoto Gabedi Lekgothoane, also known as FKA MASH. I’m a DJ and a House and Techno music artist from South Africa, Soweto, Johannesburg to be specific. I would introduce myself as a musician. I obviously make different kinds of music, but I am known for making House music and Techno. That’s more or less how I would introduce myself.

Deeds: You’ve been making music since you were 12 and you officially started releasing in 2011. When you look back at those early years, what has changed most about the way you approach music and understand yourself as an artist?

So much has changed obviously, and I still wouldn’t say it has changed but I’d say it has evolved, because some of the methods I used when I was 12, I still use a lot of them today because I still believe in those methods. They are methods that have shaped the artist I am today.

One thing that I always try to do when I make music is to go with the feeling. Does it feel right? Does it feel good to me first and foremost? Then every other thing follows. Does it work for the market? Would people like it? But the most important thing is whether or not this feels good to me, and it has always been like that even when I was young before releasing officially.

As your sound began to take shape, your 2019 remix of Sculptured Music’s “Sad To Think” won Remix of the Year and earned a South African Music Awards nomination. What was happening creatively for you at that point that you think allowed that record to connect so strongly with people?

At that time, it was basically, more people were becoming familiar with my sound and there was growing excitement around Deep House in South Africa. There were different waves at different times; Gqom at some point, then Afrohouse, then Soul music, then Amapiano. There were different waves and music that happened at different times, and so with that remix, it was almost like a new wave of music was starting to rise in the South African space.

The other part of it, it just sounded different from everything that was in the market at the time, so people gravitated towards it and they started to think the original was an exciting song. So to have a remix that just sounded different and ultimately earn an SAMA nomination, which is the South African Music Awards nomination, and win Remix of the Year, it kind of connected well. Everything threaded well together.

You’ve performed alongside artists like Black Coffee, Jimpster, WhoMadeWho and Kerri Chandler. What have you learned from sharing the stage with artists you respect in terms of performance, artistry, sound and professionalism?

 The most important thing I learned during those opportunities is how important it is to show up as yourself. Obviously being professional is important. There’s always a way to conduct yourself in those places that will ensure they keep on coming back to you.

The most important thing I took away then and even now, whenever I get to show up on a lineup with anyone I look up to, respect or grew up listening to, is that it is always important to be genuine and show up as yourself. Do not try to be something else, do not try to be like the person you’re sharing the lineup with. Do not try to be anything else outside of yourself. That’s why they brought you there.

After more than a decade of releasing music and performing around the world, why did now feel like the right moment to make EXITECHNO, your debut album? And what does the title mean to you?

Basically, I think it felt right. For the longest time, I’ve tried to make an album and it just didn’t flow right. At some point, I’d stop at maybe four or five songs and not feel the urge to continue making more music for a larger project. And as time went on, I decided to either drop an EP, a single or a remix and just keep that going, which is what I connected most with at the time.

For some reason, when it comes to this album, one morning I’m not thinking about an album, literally a week after I have an album to present to the world. It’s just something that happened so organically that I didn’t even feel the need to force it and build towards an album. In fact, I feel like I had the album before I even knew I had the album.

It kind of explains the meaning and the name EXITECHNO, because it describes where I am and where I was when making the project in life. It is a play on the word EXIT and the word TECHNO. The EXIT is where I am in my life, where I am walking away from a certain way of doing things, living and moving into a new way of doing things for myself. The TECHNO part stands for the music that is carrying that story and journey for me.

That’s why I call it EXITECHNO. It’s real world because I struggled for a long time and out of nowhere, I was like, I’m releasing this album and I had an album. I think it just came from a higher power above me and it just landed.

When you say you struggled, can you give a brief insight?

 I struggled because I am a bit of a perfectionist myself, and one of the things that always dictates how I put together a project is how well it flows and, more importantly, I always try to avoid making the same song more than once.

That also feeds into why I struggled making an album because in order for an album to be cohesive, you have to have like a common thread amongst these songs to make it sound like it follows a particular theme. And what made it difficult over the years was that I am so inspired and interested in music and finding new ways to new sounds that it became difficult for me to stick to one idea to make it work.

And I’m sure if people listen to the album, they would be able to catch that because the album holds a lot of different feelings, emotions, styles and approaches to how I make music. But at the same time, I found a way to thread it together perfectly so it sounds like a cohesive project without sticking to the same idea for too long throughout the project. That was the main struggle that made it difficult to come up with an album.

 The album arrives after years of moving between places like Soweto, Ibiza, Bali and London, while also coming from a South African House tradition with its own distinct history and identity. How did these different experiences and influences come together in the album, and what were you trying to explore on a full-length project that you couldn’t necessarily express through individual releases?

The first thing is that South Africa has always had a strong House music culture for the longest time, and one of the things that made it easy for me to explore different styles and ideas is because I interacted with them before I even started to travel.

So the world of House music from around the world came to us here in South Africa as a culture before I started going out into the world. So I’ve always been aware of what Afrohouse, Soul and Techno from this place sound like.

As a result, when I started to travel and see the music in action in different places, it connected differently and started to make sense to me on how and why it works the way it works. And I think, if anything, this album is going to be a true representation of my interpretation of those experiences as I travelled and what we had while growing up in South Africa.

 As South African electronic music continues to reach audiences around the world, what do you think international listeners sometimes mistake about the culture and history behind the music, and what do you think EXITECHNO allows them to understand or feel?

First of all, I’m hoping that EXITECHNO gives people a different glimpse into what is actually happening in South African music. And it’s not only Amapiano, House or Soul music. There are different scenes within South African House music, especially in South Africa, that exist and are thriving.

Also, there’s a story to tell from that perspective as well. Not to try and politicize the whole thing, it is important that a different perspective of what exists in South Africa is told to the world. I think that’s the best way I can answer that.

You are set to perform at the Amsterdam Dance Event this year. How does performing a new body of work change the way you think about the album compared to listening to it privately in the studio?

Well, it affects how I think about it for sure. If you hear some of the songs in the album, you’d realise that a lot of them definitely cannot be played in the club. That’s very intentional because sometimes, I like to make what I call “the headphone music” which is music you can jam in the most intimate settings of your life. It could be your room, house or very isolated settings, as opposed to some of the other club songs that you will find in the album.

The most important thing about how I make music is that I make music for different parts of my set. So if I realise I haven’t had an intro song in a long time and I am maybe in my DJ set playing other people’s songs, at some point, I would make a version of an intro song or a closing song that represents exactly how I’m feeling, as opposed to waiting for the world to give that to me.

How I make music is always very functional. It’s like this song is for this moment, this song is to live in a moment, and it would live for as long as possible.

 You’ve spoken about growing up around Jazz, R&B and Soul, with Michael Jackson being a particular favourite and influence, while you are also drawn to thrillers and the idea of one day hearing your music in that kind of setting. If you could place EXITECHNO inside a film, what kind of story would you want it to soundtrack, and what would that say about the kind of artist you ultimately want to become?

(Laughs) That’s a tough one because I’m still, even now after so many years of making music, still sculpting the kind of artist that I want to be.

And I’ve always maintained one thing throughout my career: I want to write someone’s favourite song of all time. I think the constant chase to be able to write someone’s favourite song is what keeps me building towards being the artist I want to be.

I feel like that visual or film that I want to place this album in is somewhat a buildup of what my life has become up until now. My life and career has started to grow, meeting all the people that I’ve connected with. It’s just a playing visual of what would tie in perfectly with what EXITECHNO is about because it basically sounds like my life.

I don’t exactly know how to place it, but it feels like if I could take a look back into my life and what it has turned into, it would make a perfect visual for EXITECHNO. It sounds and looks like my life.

‍ Cover Credit: Jon Berry 

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Earlier this year, precisely January 10, a Catholic priest, Fr. Guilherme Peixoto, led Mass at a Lebanese Catholic university. That same night, he played a sold-out set at one of Beirut’s most popular nightclubs. A group of Christian religious figures had petitioned to stop the concert, arguing that it violated Church teachings, but a Lebanese court rejected the request. 

Interestingly, most of the people who showed up were not practicing Catholics, and the man behind the decks was a 52-year-old parish priest from a village in northern Portugal.

Known globally as Padre Guilherme, Peixoto first forayed into electronic music in his early thirties, when he enrolled in a DJ school, reached out to producers and began making his own tracks. He eventually turned his parish into a venue for fundraising parties before the COVID-19 pandemic brought those events to an end. During that lockdown of 2020, he also began livestreaming weekly DJ sets, building an audience that stretched far beyond his parish. 

His connection to music has also followed him outside Portugal. As a military chaplain in Afghanistan, he organised social events for soldiers and DJed for them, and in 2023 he played before Pope Francis’ open-air Mass at World Youth Day in Lisbon. In 2025, Pope Leo XIV appeared at one of his raves and blessed the crowd. A year later, Peixoto performed at Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires to mark the first anniversary of Pope Francis’ death, where 150,000 people attended. 

He has since played festivals and clubs including Medusa Festival in Spain, Dreamfields in Mexico, Hï Ibiza and Electric Forest in Michigan, and has built an Instagram following of 2.7 million. His approach comes back to something Pope Francis often said: “Don’t be afraid,” and that the Church had to go “to the peripheries.” For Peixoto, the dance floor is one of them.

The Beirut controversy is worth examining because it gets at the tension around Padre Guilherme’s work. The Christian figures who sought to stop the concert argued that a priest DJing in a nightclub compromised the dignity of the vocation. Peixoto has consistently made a different case, pointing to the Church’s long history of meeting people where they are. 

In his view, that now includes the dance floor. Most people who attend his sets are not practicing Catholics, and some have no religious affiliation at all. They come for the music, but they also encounter a priest in a setting where they may not otherwise expect to find one. The Beirut court rejected the petition, and Peixoto has continued to perform.

Peixoto is not the only person trying to bring faith into electronic music. Topher Jones spent years building a career in EDM under the name King Topher, earning 200 million Spotify streams, placing tracks in the Billboard Dance Top 25 and playing Tomorrowland, while releasing music through labels including Republic Records, Atlantic, Interscope and Spinnin’ Records. 

Last year, he turned that experience towards Rave Jesus, a Christian EDM project launched through his own label, True Royals, in partnership with Sony Music. The Rave Revival Tour followed with 22 dates across North America and the UK in 2026, including Belfast and the Big Church Festival in West Sussex. 

Its title track, Rave Revival, describes the idea behind the project as “taking the energy of a revival and putting it inside a rave.” Jones entered the dance floor through music and then brought his faith into it. Peixoto started with faith and found his way to the dance floor. Their routes are different, but both are testing what happens when Christianity enters a space it has traditionally stood outside.

In Lagos, the relationship between faith and music already exists on a much larger scale. The Experience, an annual free all-night gospel concert convened by Pastor Paul Adefarasin of House on the Rock, takes over Tafawa Balewa Square each year. Half a million people attended the most recent edition. It is not a rave, but music, movement and a large crowd remain central to the experience. British Gospel artist Muyiwa Olarewaju, who has been involved with The Experience since its beginning, put the relationship between Black culture, Black music and gospel music more directly: “Black culture is at the heart of pop culture. At the core of Black culture is the pulsating rhythm of Black music. At the foundation of Black music, you'll find Gospel music.” The Experience has been making that connection at scale for 18 years.

The Afro-Gospel movement across Nigeria and the diaspora takes that relationship into everyday listening. Artists like Victoria Orenze and Judikay combine gospel with Afrobeats rhythms, making music that works as worship while still carrying the movement and energy of the genre. Gospel playlists on streaming platforms also reach listeners who may not be regular churchgoers, with praise mixes built around familiar Afrobeats tempos and danceable production. The distinction often comes down to the subject of the lyrics and the spiritual purpose behind the music. That is close to the audience Peixoto describes at his own shows, where people can come for the music without necessarily coming from a religious background.

These examples are different in almost every practical sense. Padre Guilherme is a Catholic priest playing in nightclubs, Rave Jesus is an EDM project built by a producer who moved from secular music into Christian music, The Experience is a massive gospel concert in Lagos, and Afro-Gospel is a genre that travels through streaming platforms. 

What connects them is the growing effort to take faith into spaces where younger audiences already spend their time. For some, that means the nightclub or festival. For others, it means a playlist that sounds closer to the music they already listen to. Padre Guilherme is part of that wider shift, and his work raises a question that extends beyond the Catholic Church: what happens when the places where people gather, dance and listen to music become places where faith can also meet them?

Cover Credit: Padre Guilherme

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‍ru. did not plan to make music. In 2024, the young songbird, born Ruth Robert U., recorded I Think I Love You in Abuja, an intimate song drawn from a real experience, and shared it without a strategy or a rollout. 

The song found people anyway. A remake featuring Magixx followed, and between the two versions, the tracks crossed one million combined streams. She credits Abuja’s slower, more reflective pace for the sound she makes, which is smooth, soft and unhurried, a deliberate contrast to the energy of Lagos. 

Her latest debut EP, SILK, takes its name from the qualities she sees in the material: fragile yet strong, soft yet resilient. The five-track project moves through five different emotional spaces. In this chat with Deeds, we talked about her accidental start in music, what it took to be vulnerable on record, and why softness and strength can exist together.

Sophia From Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and your music?

First of all, I'm just a girl, but I'm a girl who deeply loves my craft, who is learning, who is discovering herself and just doing that in front of everybody. I like to tell people that listening to my music or experiencing my songwriting is almost like taking a page out of my diary.  I take authenticity very seriously. I like to make every single time I write from a genuine experience. Sometimes not that I have had directly, but, you know, we live vicariously through other people, through stories we've seen, through the things that inspire us.  But for every time I write or I make music, it's always about a feeling I'm feeling, truly.  So honesty, authenticity, love, fun, life, faith. You know, basically everything that makes me is everything that's in my music. It's very intimate, I would say. 

You're from Abuja - not Lagos, which is where most of the Nigerian music conversation happens. How has that shaped who you are as an artist?

I would say that compared to Lagos, Abuja is. It's much slower. It's chill. Not slow to the point where nothing is happening, but almost like it's right in the middle. It's a very steady pace that you can count on, right? As opposed to the hustle and bustle and quick movements in Lagos.  Abuja is the kind of town that allows you to breathe, you know, really take things in, smell the roses, you know, romanticize your life. I feel like because of that pace, I'm able to apply the same, what should I say? Technique when I'm making music. It's almost like you can breathe when you're listening to me.  It's not the most fast paced and I believe that I still will be able to do that in the future. Maybe I will be. But I would say those are the elements from Abuja that have entered my music unconsciously. That intentionality, breath, you know, just smooth, still, chill vibes.

In Lagos, they don't have a chill. In fact, when I greet people in Lagos, they don't even answer me. I'm like, what do people mean? Is it that bad? Everybody's angry.  Nobody has your time.  There's no time to spare a smile. There's no time to romanticize anything.  A walk to work or a drive to work is literally that. There's no, oh God can interrupt me or something beautiful can happen along the way.  

You said your entry into music was almost accidental - 'i think i love you' started from a real-life experience. What made you decide to share something that personal publicly?

It is. I like to be honest about the fact that it wasn't a dream I had growing up or anything. It was literally a hobby I stumbled into in 2024 and I decided to give it a chance. I've always been the type of person that, you know, goes with the wind.  And if something sparks my interest, I'm going to give it my attention because I do believe that I'm being led a lot of times.  And so I just, I leaned into that and that's how I got here.

Like I said, I feel like I do my best work when I'm telling the truth. Right. So because music started out, or writing specifically started out as an outlet, as a way to express myself, that has always been the case.  So when I'm expressing myself and I'm able to put it into melodies, you know, give it a nice beat or something, it hasn't changed the fact that I was doing just that, expressing myself.  It's honest in that sense. It's why I would tell you're literally taking a page out of my diary, because I've literally put my heart out on the page. I've given everything to you, everything that happened or didn't happen.

Sometimes it's not necessarily that it happened to me specifically, but maybe it happened to someone in my life and I was there and I documented it and how I felt indirectly or how I feel like the person who was the main character felt. It's a lot of storytelling, sometimes it's not directly me, but, yeah, I'm always honest about those things. Well, as much as I can be given the circumstances. Yeah, I think I love you was definitely a personal experience I shared.

SILK is described as a tribute to women navigating different stages of life and relationships. When you were making it, who specifically were you thinking about - yourself, women around you, or something broader?

Yes.  Navigating, growing through those things.  Mostly it's about becoming. It was me because I was writing and sharing some of the questions I've been asking in this era of my life, you know, who is a woman?   From I think I love you to now.  The past few years for me have been a time of self discovery. You know, what is my purpose?  How am I supposed to act?  Who am I really?  What's the purpose of a woman?  Am I an afterthought?  What am I doing here, really? You know, these are the questions I'm asking. How do I deal with love? How do I interact with someone who loves me? How am I supposed to be with my friends? These are the questions that have boggled my mind.

Because then when you're growing into a young woman, you're kind of trying to build identity.  Especially in an industry like this, where it's like who you are is so important because everything you do flows from there.  So that has basically been the philosophy of this era, these questions.  And that's where the music came from. The questions themselves and the answers. I feel like I'm getting so far.

The EP blends Afropop, soul and alternative R&B without committing fully to any one of them. Is that a conscious creative decision or just how the music comes out?

It's literally just how the music comes out. I go with the wind, like I told you. So sometimes you hear an instrumental, you hear a sound, and it kind of tells you where it wants to go, what it wants to achieve.  And I like to think of myself as a collaborator or a partner with the sound. None of us are trying to outdo each other.  Everybody is trying to shine. We just follow each other's leads in our respective strengths, basically. So I like to complement the music as it complements my writing as well and my voice. So I basically just go with where I feel like it's leading me. It's never a conscious decision.

Most times when I start, like, I don't even know what I'm writing about. A lot of times I go to the studio feeling like, oh, I'm sad.  I'm in love today, and I want to write about this. Most times when I hear beats, it reminds me of a story. It takes me somewhere. Some of these instrumentals are so immersive and is why I love the producers I work with. They literally build walls with the sound that are able to draw you in and paint pictures so vivid you can write about them and people can literally experience them with you know?

'Woman' debuted at number 25 on Nigerian radio and was produced by Mr Eff and mixed by Johnny Drille. How did that collaboration come together? 

Mr. F actually came to Abuja. We had a mini camp when I was just starting our music. It was my first recording session ever, and he came here. We made a couple of songs. It was beautiful.  Johnny Drille, there's many things to say about him. After my helper in Jesus, then we have him. He's one of those people who is so genuine about music itself. There's just a lot to say.  I pitched to him. He loved the music and we made it happen. Beyond that, he's given me so many opportunities, you know, I've performed at two JRLs, I think, and he's just someone who has been so supportive, you know, supportive. You know, just encouraging me and telling me how good I am and how there's space for me, and I'm so grateful for him. I know you didn't ask me that, but. Yes, that's just who he is. How did it happen? A friend knew a friend, I guess. I honestly can't tell you because I'm not sure how I did it myself.

SILK as a title is specific. What does it mean to you in the context of the project?

To be honest, I chose that because I thought it was the perfect paradox. I told you I'm discovering myself. I've realized a lot of times that from people's perspective, you know, if you look soft, you know, as a baby, you know, you're maybe you're sensitive, you're soft spoken, they don't expect much from you in terms of strength or how you show up.  But Silk shows you that you can be both at the same time. It's soft to the touch. It's very shiny, sparkly. So you would think, oh, fragile.  But spider silk actually rivals still in strength. It's literally that strong.  So you can be soft, sparkly without, you know, sacrificing strength.  And you can be strong without sacrificing, you know, your softness.

It's almost like you can exist in these two worlds at the same time and still make the most of both, because they are still you. You are still you when you're soft. You're still you when you're strong, you know, and who you are is beautiful, period. I shouldn't have to hide the fact that I like pink or want fluffy stuff or glittery stuff, because I'm trying to show you that I'm strong or I'm mature, you know, I don't subscribe to those things. Silk was basically the perfect name because that is the story I'm telling with the music.

I am who I am. I'm loving fearlessly, I'm discovering the facets of myself. I'm a creative, strong woman, Silk basically encompasses everything I'm trying to say.  It's why it was the perfect title.

Where does the music go from here? What does the version of ru. after SILK sounds like?

Honestly, ru. right now I am just very grateful. ru. is accepting who she is. Sometimes you take these steps even while you're scared. It's not that I wasn't scared to show my soft side or be vulnerable.  I was, but I did it scared anyway. I'm very proud of myself because a step in the right direction, like, I'm getting even stronger. I'm growing so much more. I'm so excited for everything that's to come. The music I've been making, it's almost like I've turned this page and, you know, it just keeps going because there's just so much more. This is a chapter and I also can't wait to see how it unfolds in the future.

Cover Credit: bluenotnice

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Dave's A The Boy Who Played the Harp tour began on February 2, this year, in Munich, Germany, and will end on October 17 at the Wole Soyinka Centre for Culture and Creative Arts in Surulere, Lagos, sparking widespread excitement among his Nigerian fanbase. 

Across 43 shows in Europe, North America, Australia and Africa, Dave has taken the tour through some of the biggest markets in his career before bringing it to Lagos -- the city his parents are connected to -- for its final stop. The venue itself carries its own significance, named after Nigeria’s Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka.

Nigerian music has spent the last decade travelling outward, with Burna Boy, Wizkid, Tems and Davido among the artists who have taken music from Lagos to audiences around the world. At the same time, another part of that cultural exchange has been happening in the opposite direction. 

So many young artistes grew up in Nigerian homes on British streets, carrying both influences into their music without necessarily having to separate the two. Dave, real name David Orobosa Omoregie, is part of that generation. 

For this release, Dave seems to be quite proud of his Nigerian heritage. Wizkid appeared on We’re All Alone in This Together in 2021, not as a genre exercise but as part of a creative world that had already made room for that connection. Raindance, the only single from The Boy Who Played the Harp, features Tems and was filmed in Lagos. It became Dave’s first Billboard Hot 100 entry, with the video shot across Lagos streets in footage that could almost pass for a wedding before it reveals itself as a music video. Dave did not have to go looking for Nigeria. It was already present in the work, in his life and artistry. 

The Boy Who Played the Harp is his third album and his most ambitious project yet. Its title references the biblical tale in 1 Samuel 16, when King Saul summons David, the young shepherd, to play the harp and soothe him when an evil spirit troubles him. Dave draws a deliberate connection between his biblical namesake and his own life, most clearly on the closing track: “My ancestors, my ancestors told me that my life is a prophecy. And it's not just me, it's a whole generation of people gradually making change.” 

The album opens with a church organ and ends with a verse about generational inheritance. In between, Dave writes about religion, guilt, masculinity, sexual assault, fame and what a man owes to the generation that comes after him. Marvellous confronts his own shortcomings, while Fairchild, featuring Nicole Blakk, recounts experiences of sexual assault and abuse rooted in male ignorance and places Dave within that wider conversation about male responsibility. My 27th Birthday asks what he has done to deserve what he has been given. Across the album, the questions are personal, but they keep returning to the people and histories that came before him and the generation that will follow.

Chapter 16 features Kano, bringing together two generations of British rap. Kano brings a connection to an earlier generation of British rap, while Tems on Raindance brings together two artists from the same diaspora whose music developed in very different places. James Blake and Jim Legxacy are woven into the album from the production itself, while Fraser T. Smith, who produced Psychodrama, returns here. The choices feel considered because the album itself asks to be listened to as a complete work, at a time when much of the music industry is built around singles, playlists and the constant demand for something new. The Boy Who Played the Harp debuted at number one in the UK with 73,799 album-equivalent units in its first week, giving Dave his third consecutive number one album.

The venue for October 16 and 17 adds another layer to the Lagos shows. Dave will close a 43-date world tour in a venue carrying the name of one of Nigeria’s most important literary figures, bringing the run back to the country his family comes from. There is a natural connection between the setting and the questions that run through The Boy Who Played the Harp, an album concerned with inheritance, faith, identity and what one generation leaves for another, even if Dave has not presented the venue choice as a direct extension of those themes.

Lagos sent something to London decades ago: families, culture and ways of living that continued to evolve within the diaspora. For artists like Dave, that Nigerian identity exists alongside the British environment that shaped them, rather than separately from it. His Lagos shows bring those two parts of his story into the same place. 

[NB: Tickets for October 16 and 17 are available through Jetron Ticket, ranging from ₦30,000 to ₦500,000. The rear balcony sold out in June, and the tour that began in Munich will conclude in Lagos on October 17.]

Credit: Santan Dave

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The Brothers Breaking New Grounds With Electronic Music-fusion

It was a cloudy Saturday afternoon in Lagos, and I was on my way to FāëM’s studio in Ikeja. Luckily, it didn’t rain. When I got there, I was welcomed by Demii, one half of the fraternal producer duo FāëM. I met his twin sister Oreoluwa in their living space, which also doubles as the space they use for their live shows, before heading into the studio. Fapelo, their older brother and the other half of FāëM, joined us shortly after.

FāëM (pronounced “fame”) consists of two biological brothers, Fapelo and Demii, who people often assume are twins due to their striking resemblance. Their music odyssey began with Fapelo, who had grown uninterested in studying architecture. He started writing a fictional web series in University, without knowing where the hobby might take him. “I was just writing and sharing on WhatsApp, and it was blowing up. I was just writing the series on impulse, while being fully committed to school. I started sharing them, one person saw it and shared it with another, and then it became something bigger.  It got big enough that a bunch of people who came to meet me one day, I still remember it, were like, ‘ Bro, you need to take this up. Forget architecture, forget any other thing.’
“Oh, at that time, I had already started DJing. But it was more of a side thing. A lot of people knew me for music. They didn't even know me for writing.”

FāëM found their feet treading towards the electronic dance music scene they now dominate back in 2015. One afternoon, they got back from school and started watching the popular music channel, Trace TV. That brief leisure time felt like a moment of escape as they got lost in the thrilling BPM-spiked soundscapes of global EDM heads like David Guetta, Avicii, and so on. Soon, what started as discovering new music eventually became something Fapelo wanted to share with the people around him.

“I started DJing because I wanted to share my music with people, not really because I wanted to start a career out of it. My siblings and friends started listening to electronic music. I won’t say it was as a result of us, but more like because it was good music. Then I started hosting events, and my brother joined because we lived together in the same hostel and shared the same music taste. So that’s how it started,” he said. 

Disc jockeying became a career for Fapelo, in 2017, and, for Demii, the following year. Despite House Music -- and EDM, in general -- being a minority scene in Nigeria, the brothers kept playing their special gigs, finding more people who believed in their community in no time. At the same time, they had a constraint. People attending their shows were fast getting weaned off the EDM sound; it just wasn’t sticking. 

Their rescue? Afro fusion. They spun around Afrobeats songs, remixing them with EDM production. 

Sitting inside their cozy, artsy, home studio, they played one of their special remixes, Agogo. I know EDM is already electronic, but nothing best describes that sound piece than electric. It felt the same way to their audience too. It felt even better to them, when they both realized that they had landed a blueprint for a fusion that actually works the crowd. 

“The first time playing Agogo at Group Therapy felt electric because that was the first time we saw our listeners understand what we were doing. A feeling we couldn’t forget. We obviously felt it from the crowd. We are forever grateful for that.”

Their magnum opus, so far, is their debut album, WAWDH -  What Are We Doing Here, released in February this year.  The 16-tracker album is inspired by everyday human emotions, with a special focus on individualism. 

Demi describes the period that inspired the album as an epiphany. “Late 2024, going into 2025, we had this crazy epiphany that we were kind of lost and doing the wrong things. So we had to cut down a lot of our habits and a lot of the things we were doing. We had to retract, basically. 

“And it came with us, taking some time off. We realized we had to close ourselves off for a bit and try to find some reason in that solitude. And through that solitude, the same question kept recurring: what are we doing here? What are we actually doing here?”

The album packs guest appearances from Tsuni, Lunamic and GhostwriterMel, as the soundpiece places greater emphasis on soulful, uplifting and introspective tonal planes. “I would want you to listen to the project and maybe something would catch you off guard,” Fapelo quips. “It’s not necessarily what you would expect from an Afroelectronic producer. Out of all the music we made for the project, there are maybe four songs that you can properly play in a rave. 

“The songs are more introspective. I would say they’re more for listening in the morning, listening in traffic. It’s just more like you, you know, yourself. It’s like a self-theme, because you’re asking, ‘What are we doing here?’ But really, it’s ‘What am I doing here?’ because it was a personal experience.” 

Interestingly, Fapelo and Oreoluwa who's more of a third member of the group as vocalists on 'WAWDH?!' while their manager appears in the intro.

“My sister and myself are on a lot of the songs. A bunch of our friends actually helped us. We also met some of them in the course of making the project. So a lot of the music, even the album itself, is happening right now. The main music videos, the album itself, the live show. Everything is happening right now.”

For the duo, one thing this record taught them is the importance of letting go and not fixating on things beyond their control, they admit. 

For them, they are vocal about making music that they, or anyone, could listen to at any age. Quality is something they care deeply about, and this was demonstrated in their recent project with K1 De Ultimate. Most of the songs on that project had been completed two years before its release, while a few were finished earlier this year. 

Beyond the music, what stays with you after speaking to FāëM is how grounded they are. For all their talk of epiphanies, solitude, and self-discovery, what the brothers keep circling back to is simple: kindness. They believe the world would be a better place if people simply chose to be kind to one another, and it's a philosophy that quietly runs through everything they do, from the community they've built around their sound to the way they speak about their audience and each other. As FāëM continues to carve out space for Afroelectronic music in Nigeria, it's clear their mission isn't just about the sound they're pioneering; it's about the people they hope to reach along the way.
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Cover Credit: Stylish Sinner

Everyone knows the Hollywood flick, Venom. A lot more remember the lead character, Bane. Some others know the actor who played the role as Tom Hardy. And even fewer people know anything about his identity as the rapper Tommy No. 1. 

Before Tom Hardy was fighting Batman or sharing a body with an alien symbiote (for those who have seen Venom), he was a young Londoner trying to break through as a rapper. In his teens, Hardy began writing and rapping, eventually teaming up with his friend Edward Tracy, who went by Eddie Too Tall. By 1999, the pair had made an 18-track mixtape called Falling on Your Arse, with Hardy rapping as Tommy No. 1 and Tracy producing. It was recorded in Tracy's bedroom, rough around the edges and never properly released at the time. Almost two decades later, Tracy found the recordings and posted them online in 2018.

Hardy had already moved towards acting by then, but the music never completely disappeared.

In a 2011 BBC interview, Hardy said he had started rapping at around 14 or 15 and had recorded plenty of music that had never been released. He even joked that it might eventually “come out in a film” or “come out in a character somewhere.” Looking back, that sounds less like a joke and more like a preview; because Hardy's relationship with hip-hop kept finding ways back into his career.

It also wasn't just nostalgia for his teenage years. Hardy stayed connected to Britain's music culture, including relationships with artists from the grime/hip-hop scene, and appearances connected to mixtape culture. Music remained something he could return to rather than something he had abandoned.

You can hear that influence in the way he acts. Hardy doesn't always deliver dialogue like ordinary dialogue; he plays with cadence, rhythm and pauses almost like a rapper working around a beat. Bane's deliberately measured delivery in The Dark Knight Rises gives his lines a strange musical quality. Eddie Brock and Venom constantly interrupt one another, switching tone and tempo as if two performers are battling for the same microphone. Then there is Alfie Solomons in Peaky Blinders, whose speeches can move from a low murmur to a rapid burst before landing on a punchline.

The characters are different but his fascination with delivery keeps showing up. That is perhaps what happened to Tommy No. 1. He didn't disappear; he got absorbed into the actor.

Even Venom gave Hardy another route back to hip-hop. Eminem's “Venom” became part of the first film's soundtrack, while Hardy's own musical interests continued to develop behind the scenes. 

Years later, he would take another major step by collaborating with Czarface, eventually appearing as the masked rapper Frankie Pulitzer in Knull & Void. 

Then came 2026, when the secret became almost impossible to keep.

Hardy released Czarface Meets Frankie Pulitzer, a full-length rap album with the hip-hop supergroup Czarface, featuring artists including Method Man and Busta Rhymes. And, in perhaps the most obvious collision between his two careers, Hardy even brings back Bane's voice on one of the tracks.

Suddenly, that old line about the music eventually appearing “in a character somewhere” feels prophetic.

The bedroom recordings with Edward Tracy. Tommy No. 1. His connection to grime and hip-hop. The spoken rhythm of Bane, Venom and Alfie Solomons. And now an actual rap album.

For years, Hardy seemed to have moved on from the rapper he once wanted to become. Maybe he didn't. Or he just found a bigger stage for him. But Tommy No. 1 didn't really disappear. He learned how to act — and remembered why he started.‍

 Cover Credit: Wikipedia 

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Drill music began on Chicago’s South Side turf around 2010, shaped by the American rapper Chief Keef and a generation of artists who followed him into a sound marked by dark production, heavy bass and lyrics rooted in street life. 

When it travelled to the UK, artists reshaped it around their own cities and experiences, creating a version that developed its own identity. Nigerian drill inherited both sounds, from the Chicago original to the UK interpretation, and for a while, many of the artists making it wore that influence openly. The sound came from somewhere else, even as the people making it were Nigerian.

Kiing Lu, born Lucas Emeodi, grew up around Nigerian indigenous music and hip-hop, two sounds that had very different histories from the drill taking shape overseas. He’s publicly argued that Nigerian artists could borrow from American and British rap without losing their own identity. “No matter how we try to sound like the Americans or the UK rappers, you cannot take away the fact that you are African,” he said. “If you cannot infuse your roots into your music, then you are losing touch with what makes one African.” His new single, “Get Up (Dance),” puts that idea into practice, bringing drill into conversation with a distinctly Nigerian musical tradition.

To understand what the single is doing, it helps to understand where Fuji comes from. The genre was formalised by Sikiru Ayinde Barrister in the late 1960s and early 1970s, developing from Were music performed by Yoruba Muslims during Ramadan. Its foundation is percussion, call and response, talking drums and participation, with the music built around a crowd as much as the person leading it. Fuji has absorbed other sounds over the years, including hip-hop in the 1990s, but those influences have been worked into a musical tradition that remains distinctly Nigerian.

Drill comes from a different musical tradition. It developed in Chicago around a sound built on heavy bass, sparse production and a darker lyrical tone before the UK gave it another identity. Bringing it together with Fuji therefore involves more than placing familiar Nigerian sounds over a drill beat. Fuji gives the music a different sense of rhythm and participation, while drill brings a harder, more restrained framework around it. “Get Up (Dance),” featuring Liya, Bkay EastGaad and Nextee, sits in that space, with the Fuji influence providing a clear link between the two sounds. The result is less about making drill sound Nigerian on the surface and more about seeing what happens when the two musical traditions are allowed to shape each other.

Kiing Lu’s interest in this question comes from years spent working inside the Nigerian music industry. After leaving Jos, he spent seven years in Ghana learning the business side of music without releasing music of his own. He returned to Nigeria and worked in Alaba distributing records before moving through label roles and eventually becoming Head of Promotions and A&R at Universal Music Nigeria. He also gave TG Omori one of his earliest opportunities when the director had no portfolio, before building Speedplug Promotions and Captive Music around artists including Tems, Tiwa Savage and OdumoduBlvck. 

When he rebranded as Kiing Lu, he put more emphasis on A&R and executive production, taking on the role of a curator and connector. His stated philosophy, “impact first, money follows,” comes from a career spent largely behind the scenes, where the work has been about finding people, developing ideas and helping them reach an audience.

There is a long history of Nigerian music doing something similar with sounds from elsewhere. Highlife took elements of Western jazz and palm wine music and developed into something distinctly West African. Afrobeats drew from American R&B, Jamaican dancehall and several strands of Nigerian popular music before becoming a global sound of its own. Fuji also absorbed hip-hop in the 1990s, with musicians finding ways to work the new influence into an established local tradition. 

Now, Nigerian drill is going through its own version of that process. The sound came from outside, but the artists making it have been finding ways to place it within Nigerian rhythms, language and street culture. “Get Up (Dance)” is one example of that ongoing process, bringing Fuji and drill together on a record that asks what Nigerian drill can sound like when its influences are allowed to meet on local terms.

Cover Credit: Kiing Lu

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When Charles Onyeabor speaks about his late father, there is a certain tenderness in how he experienced such a generational legacy.

Between 1946 and 2017, his late father, William Onyeabor, the genius electro funk inventor who created era-defining records in his prime, carved a reputation that remains a consistent muse for the young musical warlock. Today, Charles’s life’s work is a testimony of a man preserving a golden memory while creating his own.

When his father was alive, the music was important, but it still lived close to home. It belonged first to the man he knew as a parent before the world framed him as one of African music’s most enigmatic visionaries.

After his death, that music began to return to Charles with a different weight.

“When he was alive, I knew his work was important, but I don’t think I fully grasped just how far-reaching his influence was,” Charles says. “After his passing, I started to see his music through a different lens, not just as his child, but as someone witnessing how the world connects with what he created.”

That shift sits at the heart of Charles Onyeabor’s ongoing artistic journey. In an earlier phase of his career, the conversation around him naturally circled his father’s legacy. It was almost unavoidable. William Onyeabor’s name carries an unusual charge in African music history, not only because of the brilliance of the records, but because of the mystery, restraint and spiritual seriousness that surrounded his life after music.

For Charles, the task was never as simple as continuing a family name. It was about understanding what that name had become in the world, while figuring out what part of it belonged to him.

Now, the question around Charles is no longer only whether he can preserve his father’s legacy. It is whether he can live with that inheritance while successfully allowing the world to appreciate his own voice.

For years, William Onyeabor’s music has been described through words like futuristic, spiritual, experimental and original. His records created a world of synthesizers, groove, gospel feeling and electronic imagination that later generations would come to receive as prophetic. Yet, to Charles, the man behind that sound was also a strict father, a disciplinarian, a diligent workaholic, a believer in Jesus Christ and someone who insisted on truth no matter its cost.

“He was extremely intentional, a real workaholic and a go-getter,” Charles says. “He was also a strong believer in Jesus Christ and a very straightforward man who never hesitated to speak the truth, even if it meant losing what he valued most.”

For an icon who barely let the world into his private life, Charles believes the world only experienced a slice of William. He remembers something more immediate; the father who shaped him and his brothers, Chika and Emeka, with discipline, faith and resolve; a man who believed that words had to be backed by action.

“One of the things he always said that stuck with me is, ‘Something must kill a man,’” Charles recalls. It ultimately became one of Charles’ first lessons in conviction.

For Charles, music has become one of the places where that lesson continues to unfold, although his return to it was not immediate.

Before his father’s passing, Charles was not pursuing music seriously. He loved singing at home and around friends, but for nearly 18 years, even that casual relationship with music disappeared. His father’s death unsettled him. It pulled him back towards sound, although without much clarity. At first, there was grief, responsibility and confusion. It was a trinity of experiences that weighed him down as he navigated being the duty-bearer for his father’s transcendence.

“After my father passed, I started thinking a lot about his legacy and how to keep it alive,” he says. “The challenge was, I didn’t really know how to go about it. I felt quite lost and unsure of my direction.”

The stillness of the COVID period softened that burden. With the world slowed down around him, Charles began to softly accept that purpose.

However, in his case, while the Onyeabor surname already suggests originality, experiment, timelessness and a standard that can feel impossible to satisfy, he still resists the idea of being trapped by it.

“There’s pressure no doubt,” he says. “When you carry the Onyeabor name, people already have expectations before you even say a word or drop a note. That can feel heavy sometimes because you know what that name represents. But I don’t let that pressure box me in.”

That tension also feeds his recent single, “You Can’t Tell Me Nothing,” a record built from defiance and self-belief. The title may first register as swagger, but Charles frames it as something more intimate. “No matter what you say or do, I’m still making my money, I’m still valid. I’m still doing my music my way. You can’t break me,” he quipped.

In staying true to himself, Charles is also not rejecting his father’s world.

Obviously, William Onyeabor came from a different era, without digital stores, social media, Amapiano, or the current machinery pushing African pop across the world. So, blindly copying him would be betraying the core building block of the Onyeabor legacy: originality.

“When I’m doing music, I don’t think about how my father did his own music. I just let everything out naturally. His own time was different. The groove was different. There was no Amapiano back then. There were no digital stores or social media. So I can’t use his era to compare this era.”

Still, the Onyeabor DNA still manifests in Charles’ instinct for groove, his interest in live instrumentation, his ear for melody and his belief that music should feel human. He is constantly experimenting, still searching for the sound that feels most original to him. He does not see that uncertainty as weakness. For Charles, it is part of the process.

“If you know me well, you will know that I have it in me,” he says. “And it’s gradually unleashing.”

A major turning point came in Bologna in 2024, when Charles opened for Ruger during his Europe tour. The performance mattered, but what stayed with him most was the soundcheck. Ruger was not working with a DJ set. He had a full band, and everything about the arrangement felt alive, deliberate and controlled. It changed his perception of stage performance.

“It wasn’t a DJ set, it was a full band, everything tight, intentional, alive,” he says. “That moment made me fall in love with live performance on a deeper level.”

Since then, he has been focused on building his own band and developing a richer stage sound. It is one of the clearest ways his path begins to separate from the mythology around his father. William Onyeabor’s legacy was not built around the stage in any conventional way, but Charles is drawn to the immediacy of performance, to the feeling of meeting an audience in real time.

Opening for acts such as P-Square, Otile Brown, Abrantee, May7ven and Ruger has taught him that audiences are moved by presence and emotional truth.

He has also continued to remain active on stage, opening for Offset and Odumodublvck on their European tours. The thrill of performing his music live continues to be an energy that propels him.

“Performance is really about energy and honesty more than anything else,” he says. “It’s not about trying to impress people. It’s about making them feel something.”

Ultimately, Charles sees himself within the wider global rise of African music. And, for him, artists like his father are proof that African music had long been ahead of its reception. The world may now be listening more closely, but the imagination was already there.

“African music getting global attention now is powerful, but it’s not new. Artists like my father were already creating sounds that the world is only just catching up to.”

In the end, Charles Onyeabor is writing his own story one chapter at a time. His surname is more than just nostalgia. It has become a movement. While his music is still unfolding, there is no finished reinvention here, no attempt to present the son as a fully formed answer to the father’s legend. Instead, he’s telling a story of a talented chap working through grief, pressure, memory and daredevil ambition, trying to discover what the Onyeabor name can mean in his own voice.

“I want Charles Onyeabor to represent growth, evolution, and fearlessness,” he says. “Someone who took the foundation and pushed it into new spaces, to the next level, creatively and culturally.”

At the heart of that dream is still legacy. Like his late father, Charles wants to leave something that will last for his children, the same way his father left something that still speaks to him.

“Something that speaks long after I’m gone. For my kids, just like my father did for us.”

Cover Credit: Charles Onyeabor

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When Charles Onyeabor speaks about his late father, there is a certain tenderness in how he experienced such a generational legacy.

Between 1946 and 2017, his late father, William Onyeabor, the genius electro funk inventor who created era-defining records in his prime, carved a reputation that remains a consistent muse for the young musical warlock. Today, Charles’s life’s work is a testimony of a man preserving a golden memory while creating his own.

When his father was alive, the music was important, but it still lived close to home. It belonged first to the man he knew as a parent before the world framed him as one of African music’s most enigmatic visionaries.

After his death, that music began to return to Charles with a different weight.

“When he was alive, I knew his work was important, but I don’t think I fully grasped just how far-reaching his influence was,” Charles says. “After his passing, I started to see his music through a different lens, not just as his child, but as someone witnessing how the world connects with what he created.”

That shift sits at the heart of Charles Onyeabor’s ongoing artistic journey. In an earlier phase of his career, the conversation around him naturally circled his father’s legacy. It was almost unavoidable. William Onyeabor’s name carries an unusual charge in African music history, not only because of the brilliance of the records, but because of the mystery, restraint and spiritual seriousness that surrounded his life after music.

For Charles, the task was never as simple as continuing a family name. It was about understanding what that name had become in the world, while figuring out what part of it belonged to him.

Now, the question around Charles is no longer only whether he can preserve his father’s legacy. It is whether he can live with that inheritance while successfully allowing the world to appreciate his own voice.

For years, William Onyeabor’s music has been described through words like futuristic, spiritual, experimental and original. His records created a world of synthesizers, groove, gospel feeling and electronic imagination that later generations would come to receive as prophetic. Yet, to Charles, the man behind that sound was also a strict father, a disciplinarian, a diligent workaholic, a believer in Jesus Christ and someone who insisted on truth no matter its cost.

“He was extremely intentional, a real workaholic and a go-getter,” Charles says. “He was also a strong believer in Jesus Christ and a very straightforward man who never hesitated to speak the truth, even if it meant losing what he valued most.”

For an icon who barely let the world into his private life, Charles believes the world only experienced a slice of William. He remembers something more immediate; the father who shaped him and his brothers, Chika and Emeka, with discipline, faith and resolve; a man who believed that words had to be backed by action.

“One of the things he always said that stuck with me is, ‘Something must kill a man,’” Charles recalls. It ultimately became one of Charles’ first lessons in conviction.

For Charles, music has become one of the places where that lesson continues to unfold, although his return to it was not immediate.

Before his father’s passing, Charles was not pursuing music seriously. He loved singing at home and around friends, but for nearly 18 years, even that casual relationship with music disappeared. His father’s death unsettled him. It pulled him back towards sound, although without much clarity. At first, there was grief, responsibility and confusion. It was a trinity of experiences that weighed him down as he navigated being the duty-bearer for his father’s transcendence.

“After my father passed, I started thinking a lot about his legacy and how to keep it alive,” he says. “The challenge was, I didn’t really know how to go about it. I felt quite lost and unsure of my direction.”

The stillness of the COVID period softened that burden. With the world slowed down around him, Charles began to softly accept that purpose.

However, in his case, while the Onyeabor surname already suggests originality, experiment, timelessness and a standard that can feel impossible to satisfy, he still resists the idea of being trapped by it.

“There’s pressure no doubt,” he says. “When you carry the Onyeabor name, people already have expectations before you even say a word or drop a note. That can feel heavy sometimes because you know what that name represents. But I don’t let that pressure box me in.”

That tension also feeds his recent single, “You Can’t Tell Me Nothing,” a record built from defiance and self-belief. The title may first register as swagger, but Charles frames it as something more intimate. “No matter what you say or do, I’m still making my money, I’m still valid. I’m still doing my music my way. You can’t break me,” he quipped.

In staying true to himself, Charles is also not rejecting his father’s world.

Obviously, William Onyeabor came from a different era, without digital stores, social media, Amapiano, or the current machinery pushing African pop across the world. So, blindly copying him would be betraying the core building block of the Onyeabor legacy: originality.

“When I’m doing music, I don’t think about how my father did his own music. I just let everything out naturally. His own time was different. The groove was different. There was no Amapiano back then. There were no digital stores or social media. So I can’t use his era to compare this era.”

Still, the Onyeabor DNA still manifests in Charles’ instinct for groove, his interest in live instrumentation, his ear for melody and his belief that music should feel human. He is constantly experimenting, still searching for the sound that feels most original to him. He does not see that uncertainty as weakness. For Charles, it is part of the process.

“If you know me well, you will know that I have it in me,” he says. “And it’s gradually unleashing.”

A major turning point came in Bologna in 2024, when Charles opened for Ruger during his Europe tour. The performance mattered, but what stayed with him most was the soundcheck. Ruger was not working with a DJ set. He had a full band, and everything about the arrangement felt alive, deliberate and controlled. It changed his perception of stage performance.

“It wasn’t a DJ set, it was a full band, everything tight, intentional, alive,” he says. “That moment made me fall in love with live performance on a deeper level.”

Since then, he has been focused on building his own band and developing a richer stage sound. It is one of the clearest ways his path begins to separate from the mythology around his father. William Onyeabor’s legacy was not built around the stage in any conventional way, but Charles is drawn to the immediacy of performance, to the feeling of meeting an audience in real time.

Opening for acts such as P-Square, Otile Brown, Abrantee, May7ven and Ruger has taught him that audiences are moved by presence and emotional truth.

He has also continued to remain active on stage, opening for Offset and Odumodublvck on their European tours. The thrill of performing his music live continues to be an energy that propels him.

“Performance is really about energy and honesty more than anything else,” he says. “It’s not about trying to impress people. It’s about making them feel something.”

Ultimately, Charles sees himself within the wider global rise of African music. And, for him, artists like his father are proof that African music had long been ahead of its reception. The world may now be listening more closely, but the imagination was already there.

“African music getting global attention now is powerful, but it’s not new. Artists like my father were already creating sounds that the world is only just catching up to.”

In the end, Charles Onyeabor is writing his own story one chapter at a time. His surname is more than just nostalgia. It has become a movement. While his music is still unfolding, there is no finished reinvention here, no attempt to present the son as a fully formed answer to the father’s legend. Instead, he’s telling a story of a talented chap working through grief, pressure, memory and daredevil ambition, trying to discover what the Onyeabor name can mean in his own voice.

“I want Charles Onyeabor to represent growth, evolution, and fearlessness,” he says. “Someone who took the foundation and pushed it into new spaces, to the next level, creatively and culturally.”

At the heart of that dream is still legacy. Like his late father, Charles wants to leave something that will last for his children, the same way his father left something that still speaks to him.

“Something that speaks long after I’m gone. For my kids, just like my father did for us.”

Cover Credit: Charles Onyeabor

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Céline Dion feels like an idolization of our 2000s. One of her biggest hits and best-selling singles, My Heart Will Go On, was recorded for the blockbuster Hollywood flick, Titanic, in 1997. She has also soundtracked other movies like Disney's Beauty And The Beast and Up Close and Personal in 1996. And that’s barely just the surface to scratch with her accolades over the decades.

Other of her fan favourites include songs like; Power Of Love, Before You Loved Me, and It's All Coming Back To Me Now. Dubbed the Queen of Ballads, she is the youngest of 14 children and she wrote her first song when she was 12. 

Recently, Céline Dion struggled with a rare neurological disorder called Stiff Person Syndrome. The singer was told she could never sing again. A 2024 documentary about her life, I Am: Céline Dion showed her opening up about her 2022 diagnosis: "If I can’t run, I’ll walk. If I can’t walk, I’ll crawl.”  She promised to never stop singing. 

On Saturday, Dion later returned to Paris, at the Plénitude Arena in Nanterre, to much love and admiration at the opening night of her five-week residency in a statement black dress and diamond jewelry. It's no surprise that fans had camped out to watch the star perform her first sold-out live concert in six years.

Mid-show, Céline Dion got emotional - a testament to a six-year struggle with the nightmarish possibility of never singing again. She has one of the most powerful voices in the industry, and has sold a lot of records and dominated charts. 

Seeing an invincible figure break down gave fans a vulnerable look into everything she has gone through with her diagnosis.  "I made a promise to be back on stage. Singing for you. Singing for me, Singing for life,” Dion said, muffling tears. And she did it! 

She pummeled through with hits like Because You Loved Me, The Power of Love,  My Heart Will Go On, All By Myself, and Courage - a song that was recorded after the death of her husband, René Angélil. She performed more of her other classics to a crowd of more than 30,000 people that night, proving why she is one of the highest-grossing female artists of all time. 

According to John Hopkins Medicine, the rare neurological disorder called Stiff Person Syndrome causes severe muscle spasms and, in other cases, symptoms include unsteady gait, slurred speech or double vision. The syndrome is common in people around 40-50 and it can come in different types.

In the 2024 documentary, we saw how the disease affected the once potent voice that earned her awards and adulations. SPS gave her strong muscle spasms that left her with broken ribs. 

The 58-year-old is also an entrepreneur and a philanthropist. She goes through life's blocks with strength and confidence, whether she’s battling grief from her husband's death or anxiety from her neurological diagnosis. Céline Dion is always going to be Céline Dion, irrespective of circumstances that societal conditioning might see as a disability. Céline Dion would go on and on. 

Cover Credits: Robin Galiegue

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The 12th of September marks a great loss for the Nigerian music industry. It was the day Mohbad, Ilerioluwa Aloba, reportedly died three years ago while receiving unlicensed treatment in Lagos. Sadly, three years later, and the controversy surrounding how he died is still debated by the aggrieved families involved. 

Mohbad is known for hits like Peace, Sorry, Feel Good, and KPK(Ko Po Ke), which would go on to be nominated multiple times for the 2022 The Headies Awards, among other notable awards. His musical prowess is his ability to tap into different genres like hip-hop, street-pop, Afrobeats, Amapiano, and Afropop and translate these genres into songs that resonated with thousands. He was also nominated for Best Street-Hop Artist by The Headies Awards in 2023, the very year he passed away. 

The 27-year-old singer had built a fanbase with his freestyle videos before breaking into the scene with a debut album called, Light EP. One of his popular songs, Ponmo, which features Lil Kesh and Naira Marley was part of this album. His collaborations with other artists went from Davido to Small Doctor, Zlatan to Oladips, and many more. 

Perhaps one of the biggest controversies when he was alive was his 2022 split from his then label, Marlian Records, headed by street-pop maverick, Naira Marley. Mohbad alleged mistreatment and assault from Naira Marley, as well as his then manager, and industry socialite Samson Balogun, popularly known as Sam Larry. However, these cases were not addressed for many reasons; prior to his death Mohbad hadn't followed up with the police over these allegations, majority of the parties involved distanced themselves from the reported crimes, while others filed a defamation suit. 

Justice delayed or dignity denied? 

Also, Mohbad’s death has been marked by public discourse of which his wife, Omowunmi and his father, Joseph Aloba, are positioned in the centre. He remains unburied under divisive paternity claims and unresolved DNA tests. 

Many of his fans are calling for justice over his death as the investigation has been inconclusive, entering a third year with no closure or any end in sight. 

A Nigerian tabloid called Leadership Newspapers spoke to ‎a civil rights advocate, Kunle Faboyade, ‎who commented on Mohbad’s body being held without a forthcoming burial that "justice delayed is dignity denied." 

Bella Shmurda, a colleague of his and fellow collaborator who has made a tribute song called My Brother and also released a R2 Sept 12 EP dedicated to the late singer, posted a three year tribute on X (Formerly Twitter) saying, "Woe to Evildoers. Keep resting Imole!". 

Fans and loved ones alike are still calling on the authorities to conclude investigations on his case so he can be laid to rest.  

Cover Credit: Spotify

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When Yemi Alade dropped her breakout hit, Johnny, in 2014, Nigeria’s pop culture felt her pulse in full force. Bars, concerts, disco floors, recreational spaces — her music was embraced everywhere. Its distinct cultural flavour, powerful melodies and unforgettable hooks kept Yemi Alade in the spotlight since then. 

Six albums, two Grammy nominations, a Grammy win alongside Angélique Kidjo, a Beyoncé collaboration, sold-out world tours, over one billion global streams, a UNDP ambassadorship and a beauty brand later, Yemi Alade is back with her seventh album, It’s Yemi Alade. 

The album was named by her fans directly —  the first time she has handed that decision over — and is built on highlife, zouk, RnB, house, disco and Afropop. She taps vocal powerhouses from Nigeria, Kenya and Congo including Bien, Jeriq, Fave, Njerae, Don Jazzy, Singuila, Spyro, Ferre Gola and Sofiya Nzau.  

The 37-year-old chanteuse describes it as something new, something old and something borrowed. Before the day of its release, Deeds spoke with Alade about going back to her roots, what it felt like to let her fans choose the album title, and why she is not interested in playing it safe.

Sophia From Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and your music?

My name is Yemi Alade. I am a musician and music is what I do. It's therapy to me and it's my love language to the entire world.  It's the thing that I was put on this earth to do. I'm best known for my high life inspired Afro Pop sound. Blessed to also be one of the few Nigerians granted Grammy nominations. At the end of the day, I feel like my music is a safe space for people that love authentic music and are in touch with their roots or want to reconnect with their roots. I'm that person.

It's Yemi Alade is your eight studio album, shaped by two years of writing and recording. What was different about this process compared to your other album?

First of all, this is the one album that was titled by the fans. My fans were in charge of the process. I had put it out online that I needed their assistance to influence and inspire me on the album title. They came to my rescue. They offered me hundreds of options but the most reoccurrent option was Yemi Alade. I feel like they wanted a self named album and chose that and that is one thing that really stands out for me. I've never done that before. I always produce the title of my album. So that's it about the title. However, speaking on the body of work itself, I went with the approach of something new, something old, something borrowed.

The thing that is old is going back to my roots of high life completely and really revisiting that and revamping that to elevate it to the sound of today and also still retaining something old.  Then in terms of something new, I played music that people did not expect to see me on. I dabbled with a bit of rap and some house music. In terms of elevating the sound and borrowing a sound, I mixed high life and disco at some point. There's a lot to experience on this album and I feel like on this album I wasn't playing it safe. That's a very beautiful place to be creative.

The collab list spans Kenya, Nigeria and Congo - Bien, Don Jazzy, Ferre Gola, Teni, Singuila and others. How do you actually manage that in the studio without losing the thread of your own identity?

I feel like the best way to answer that question would be to say, I feel like every artist is the product of their environments, their experiences and their musical taste boards. And for me, I grew up in a family where I was exposed to all genres from jazz, the high life to juju to opera, RnB etc. So, there is no putting me in a box. I feel like that foundation has helped me to very easily flourish in any genre that I find myself in. So when I am on beats or a piano beat or whatever instrumental I might put in my face, I'm able to flow, I'm able to adapt, I'm able to occupy space like water because of my foundation. At the end of the day there will always be the Yemi flair. There is no diluting. I'm just always becoming myself on every track.

'Don't Be Shy' with Bien has already gone viral and 'Ala Bekee' with Don Jazzy is the highlife-inspired lead single. What do those two songs together say about the emotional range of this album? I do love Ala Bekee’s music video. 

It's been a while since people did that. Shout out to Clarence Peters for putting all of that together.

I feel like Don't Be Shy featuring Bien and Ala Bekee featuring Don Jazzy. They are both two good examples of the range that is on the Itzyme Aladdin album where the. The Ala Bekee song with Don Jazzy truly emerged, is submerged into the high life side, whereas the Don't Be Shy truck, which is on a zouk beat is also an R & B version of myself. It's R & B and it's still Afro pop in there. It just goes to show the versatility that is on the album. It's a buffet of sound.

You collaborated with Beyoncé on The Lion King: The Gift and with Angélique Kidjo on Mother Nature, which earned you your first Grammy. Looking at those two moments and now It's Yemi Alade, how has your understanding of what African music can do globally shifted?

Honestly, I have always known that African music would always belong in the sky amongst all the stars of the world. I've never doubted that for a second. I'm also aware of the history of musicians before me who have been. Who have been nominated and actually won several awards that are world acclaimed, you know, but for me personally now being on this journey to self where I have been blessed to be nominated in association with Angelique as for the Grammys as well as be nominated with Beyonce on Lion King for the Grammys, it has opened my eyes to the possibility even more. Just knowing that in my own lifetime, I'm able to experience that as. Also there's the Grammy nomination for the Latin Grammys as well. 

That's not a category that a lot of Afrobeat artists are blessed to have under their belt, and I'm thankful for that. Even with all these Grammy nominations in association with other artists, God has been so gracious because I have also been nominated for a solo song that is mine, and that song is called Tomorrow. It came at the right time, especially with the message behind the song.  The message in life as well. I think it just goes to show that everyone's, every one of us, our dreams.

You are UNDP ambassador, ONE Campaign ambassador, founder of the James and Helen PathWay Foundation, founder of yem beauty and Mama Africa to millions. How do you hold all of that alongside simply being an artist who makes music?

Now that you mention everything like that, I'm like, who, who's that? That's a lot to carry on and I'm thankful that I'm able to carry these things and make it seem like it's easy. But I would say that I've always taken everything one step at a time. Everything that you mentioned, now all those titles, were amassed over time. They didn't just come at me. I feel like as long as, you know, they say a rolling stone, you know, God is no more. Then the more you move, I feel like the more momentum you get and things start to seem easy. So in all I would just say that I have continued to be myself and what is for me. I'm thankful for the opportunities that come and opportunities that are still on their way. I'm more than ready for more titles.

It's Yemi Alade arrived September 11. What do you want a first-time listener to feel by the time the last track ends?

So what I'm served on this album is a proper food buffet, and a proper balanced diet. Every corner is covered. Expect you to be full of joy and full of a connection. I want the listener to feel seen and to connect with me on the topics that truly matter the most to them. Because that is my number one goal on this album, it is a love letter to my fans and to any listener out there.  Connection is the most under-appreciated thing in life. But that is what we thrive on. Human beings, we all thrive on connection. I dearly and truly intend to and hope that at the end of the track, of the album, the listener will feel more connected than ever to me and to the experience that we have said in that moment.

Cover Credit: It’s Yemi Alade Album Cover

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We have all had that moment when a song finds us before we find the artist behind it. It might be a few seconds in a TikTok or Instagram Reel, the kind of hook that refuses to leave your head for a few days. The discovery feels intimate even though it happened through an algorithm. 

Now, imagine finally finding the song, only to discover that the voice you have been trying to place belongs to nobody at all.

AI-generated music has moved from an experimental corner of the internet into the mainstream music ecosystem, with synthetic and AI-assisted acts appearing on charts, artists incorporating generative tools into their work and streaming platforms confronting an unprecedented volume of machine-made uploads. 

In June 2025, Deezer said fully AI-generated tracks accounted for more than half of all new music delivered to the platform on some days, with the service receiving nearly 90,000 such tracks daily. Although fully AI-generated music still represented only a small share of actual music streams, at that time, its sheer volume was enough to force the industry to confront what happens when making music becomes something that can be done almost endlessly.

The development has inevitably revived an old argument about technology and music. Every major technological shift has initially unsettled the people whose work it changes, from drum machines and synthesisers to sampling, Auto-Tune and, more recently, streaming. 

Streaming was once criticised by artists and independent musicians who feared that a system built around unlimited access would devalue recorded music and make it harder to earn a sustainable living. Those concerns did not prevent streaming from becoming the dominant way much of the world consumes music; instead, the industry gradually built its business around it, even as debates over royalties, algorithms and artist compensation continue.

Is it Time to Regulate?

AI is obviously not the same technological or economic phenomenon, but streaming offers a useful warning about what happens when an industry treats a disruptive technology as something it can simply react to later. By the time the music business established the structures through which streaming would operate, the technology had already fundamentally changed how music was distributed and consumed. AI is still at an earlier stage, which means artists, labels, platforms and regulators have an opportunity to decide what kinds of participation, consent and compensation should be expected before synthetic music becomes as ordinary as a Spotify release.

Black music has a particular reason to be attentive to that conversation because technological change has always been woven into its evolution. Drum machines helped shape the rhythms of hip-hop and R&B, synthesisers transformed production, sampling became an artistic language of its own and Auto-Tune eventually became an expressive tool rather than simply a piece of corrective software. 

The difference with generative AI is that the technology does not merely expand what a human artist can do; it can draw from existing music, generate new material and, in some cases, imitate voices and styles closely enough to make the distinction between influence, assistance and replacement increasingly difficult to establish.

Tyga's latest album, $TARFACE, placed that tension directly in the public eye. After initially discussing the project largely in terms of its analogue equipment and '80s-inspired sound, Tyga later confirmed that AI had been used as a tool during production, specifically mentioning the generation of '80s-style synthesiser parts and a guitar solo while maintaining that the songwriting and vocals were completely his. He compared the technology to Auto-Tune and argued that artists should adapt to where music technology is going. The response demonstrated how quickly the presence of AI can become part of an argument about artistic credibility. 

Tyga's position is not shared by everyone however. Dr. Dre has taken a more openly pragmatic view, describing AI as another tool for creativity and comparing people who see it as an existential threat to those who would once have opposed drum machines. Coming from a producer whose career has been built around technological experimentation as much as musical instinct, his argument reflects a long-standing reality of music production: new tools do not necessarily eliminate the artist who uses them, but they can change what the artist is expected to contribute.

That contrast is precisely where Tiffany Ngige, an A&R at Unhurdmusic, sees the enduring value of human artists. For her, a label is not investing in a song alone but in whether there is an entire world around an artist that can be developed, from their identity and community to their relationship with an audience, personality, values and lived experiences. She argues that those things are fundamental to the music business precisely because it remains, at its core, a people business.

“If AI makes it possible to create an endless amount of music then the scarce commodity becomes the artist themselves; their perspective, emotional depth and ability to connect with people,” Ngige tells Deeds.

She also points to something that can be difficult for generative systems to replicate convincingly: the accidents of human creativity. For instance a vocal crack that was never supposed to make the final recording, an unexpected take, a spontaneous lyric or an imperfect moment in the studio as the very things that gives a record its emotional character.

Those moments are not necessarily the result of an artist deliberately choosing imperfection; they emerge from the unpredictable experience of human beings making something together.

That does not mean the A&R sees AI as inherently destructive. In fact, she believes it has already begun democratising music-making, particularly for independent and emerging artists who may not have access to expensive studios, engineers or producers. AI stem splitters, for example, can allow artists to isolate vocals and instruments for remixing, sampling, experimentation or analysis, giving musicians ways to explore ideas that might previously have required considerably more money and technical access.

Her concern is what happens when the tool stops serving the creative decision and begins making the creative decision itself. If artists begin using the same systems to generate music optimised around what algorithms already reward, the industry could find itself with more music but less distinction between the people making it. In that scenario, convenience and volume could become more valuable commercially than risk, experimentation or individual perspective.

“There’s a line between using technology to realise your creative vision and allowing technology to become the creative vision,” she says, something that becomes even more complicated when audiences cannot tell whether the human contribution they believe they are hearing actually exists.

Fenix Flexin's “Rubberz” became one of the year's most striking examples of that uncertainty after the song climbed to No. 58 on the Billboard Hot 100 while listeners questioned whether its unusual vocal performance and production had been generated using AI. Flexin has denied that the song was AI-generated, and the controversy remains unresolved, but the fact that a song could become a significant charting hit while listeners were simultaneously debating whether the credited artist had actually made the recording himself points to a new problem for the industry. Authenticity is becoming something audiences may feel compelled to investigate rather than simply assume.

Pushing Back on IP Theft 

It is one thing for an artist to use AI themselves; it is another when their music is used without their knowledge or consent. R&B singer-songwriter SZA has spoken forcefully about discovering that 238 of her songs appeared in material identified as being used to train AI systems, including songs she believed could include unreleased work. Her anger points to a different side of the debate from artists such as Tyga and Dr. Dre, not as a user of AI herself yet large chunks of her catalogue have become part of the material from which machines learn without her permission.

Mary J. Blige's own recent experience with Suno, an AI music creation platform, exposed another dimension of the same problem. The company released an advertisement that made it appear as though Blige was endorsing an AI-generated R&B song, only to withdraw the campaign after discovering that the person who negotiated the deal had falsely claimed to represent her. The incident goes to show that the threat posed by AI is not limited to copying a recording or generating a synthetic vocal; an artist's name, likeness, credibility and cultural authority are also increasingly becoming part of the technology's commercial machinery without their consent.

For the music industry, these developments have made regulation increasingly difficult to postpone. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) introduced principles this year for determining the eligibility of recordings developed using generative technology for official charts, while industry organisations have also moved toward distinguishing between music that is substantially human-made but AI-assisted and recordings in which generative AI creates the primary creative material. 

Streaming platforms are developing their own approaches as well, namely platforms like Tidal which announced that fully AI-generated tracks would be labelled and excluded from royalty payments, while Spotify and other platforms have introduced measures targeting unauthorised vocal impersonation and mass-uploaded AI music.

Responses that suggest the industry is beginning to recognise the central issue of how unstoppable AI is and draft measures to protect the people whose work, voices and audiences make the music business valuable as it is and give it meaningful control over how AI participates in it.

This becomes even more urgent for African music. AI could give artists across the continent access to production possibilities that were previously limited by money, geography or industry connections. At the same time, African music is increasingly valuable within a global cultural economy, which means the continent's artists have to think carefully about who controls the technologies learning from their music, how cultural material is incorporated into those systems and whether the economic value generated from that material returns to the communities that created it.

Ngige believes the answer should not be to reject the technology outright. Instead, she argues that AI can remain useful as long as artists retain control over the creative decisions that give their work meaning – which ultimately determines whether AI becomes another chapter in music's long history of technological adaptation or something more disruptive to the people who make/have made the industry function.

The temptation will be to measure that disruption in the simplest terms of how many AI songs are uploaded, how many are streamed, how many appear on charts and how much money can be made from producing them. But those measurements risk overlooking the thing that has always made music more than an efficiently manufactured product. A song carries the perspective of the person who wrote it, the experiences that shaped the performance, the decisions made in a studio and the relationship that develops between an artist and the people who listen to them. At the core, music is and has always been inherently human.

If AI eventually makes it possible to generate an effectively infinite supply of competent music, that abundance may make those human qualities more important rather than less. As Ngige puts it, when music becomes easier to generate at enormous volume, “authenticity becomes a lot harder to fake.” The challenge for the industry, then, is not simply deciding how much AI it can tolerate, but making sure that in its pursuit of efficiency it does not lose sight of why audiences cared about the human artists in the first place.

Cover Credit: Courtesy of Getty Images. 

Graphic treatment and AI composition by Stanley Kilonzo. 

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Photo Credits: Adraint Khadafhi Bereal

‎After her 2015 mixtape, But You Caint Use My Phone, Erykah Badu did not release any musical project. After a decade of waiting, it is unsurprising that when she announced her collaborative album, early last year, with one of  Hip Hop’s most influential producers, The Alchemist, fans were strapped to their seats before the tracklist, cover, or title was out. 

‎Before the World Blows: The Abi and Alan Experiment, is a 16-track project with star features ranging from Earl Sweatshirt,  Kamasi Washington, Westside Gunn, to Steve Lacy. The recording of this album bounced from Dallas to Los Angeles, and after many cryptic teasers Before The World Blows saw a digital release on August 28. 

Erykah Badu, known for her afrocentric expression and her big contribution to the neo-soul genre, is always an exciting act to watch out for. Her last mixtape project was a 30-minute RnB/Soul bop inspired by Drake's 2015 Hotline Bling. She made a Hotline Bling remix titled HOTLINE BLING BUT U CAINT USE MY PHONE MIX before expanding the idea into a mixtape. The mixtape was about how everyone is always connected due to the accessibility of the cellphone. After this mixtape, Erykah Badu would go on to sell out arenas for 10 years before her recent album. 

The Alchemist, Alan Maman, is one of the big names in hip-hop, having produced tracks for main hip-hop artists like Kendrick Lamar, Rick Ross, Lil Wayne, Eminem, MF DOOM, Earl Sweatshirt, Ghostface Killah and many more. His signature sample-heavy beats made him popular to underground rap acts. His discography is a wide range of interesting genres; alternative hip-hop, jazz rap, and lo-fi. He produced Meet the Grahams by Kendrick Lamar during the 2024 feud with Drake. And was the runner-up for Producer of the Year by HipHopDX, an online magazine for hip-hop news.

Two influential people in hip-hop collaborating on a record was sure to create electric buzz before and after the album release. Erykah Badu's contribution was more than vocals and a self-directed visual to the track, Witch Doctor. 

In a video posted on Instagram, Erykah Badu spoke about her production abilities saying, "My ears are lethal. I have a gift." She has always talked about not wanting to be limited to being the queen of neo-soul. In the same Instagram upload, she continued to say, "I just want you guys to know I ain't just a singer. This is my production." The Alchemist had provided some beats for Badu and she programmed it into what is now Before The World Blows. 

About their collaboration, The Alchemist said in a conversation with Apple Music that it "enabled him to be like a motorcycle sidecar instead of riding in the cockpit." Erykah Badu also revealed in the conversation that she has written a poem with the title Before The World Blows. The now-released album had been given a placeholder title because the album title took a while to be figured out. 

A throwback to one of her appearances in Tamron Hall Show, Erykah Badu sat before the interviewer in a statement red hood (or hijab) and bold, eclectic jewellery. She said the difference between a recording artist and a performance artist is: a recording artist perfects a moment, while a performance artist creates a moment. Before The World Blows is a seamless integration of Erykah Badu being a recording and performance artist. 

In an NTS RADIO live show, Erykah Badu is seen singing passionately in a trashy blonde wig, a distinct look from the Witch Doctor video, and creating a soulful performance with The Alchemist. The producer duo/hip-hop trendsetters would embark on a North American tour with hip-hop group De La Soul that was formed in New York in 1988 and St. Louis rapper, Smino in 2026-2027. ‍

Cover Credits: Adraint Khadafhi Bereal

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The first time this writer heard Nikita Kering’, she was already singing with the kind of conviction that made it easy to forget how young she was. 

“Happy With You,” her debut 2018 single, arrived when she was just 16, introducing audiences to a young Kenyan R&B and pop singer-songwriter whose voice seemed far older than her years. 

Nearly a decade in, her music still carries that same immediacy. But Kering’ has spent the years since growing far beyond that girl to a more intimate, assured fully-fledged artist who isn’t afraid to say exactly what she means.

That evolution has unfolded across three EPs, A Side of Me, The Other Side and this year’s The Lick Back that finds her leaning further into self-possession, desire, vulnerability and the freedom to speak from a place of greater personal clarity. 

In 2021, just three years after her breakthrough, Kering’ became the first-ever East African musician selected for Apple Music’s Africa Rising programme, another benchmark of how quickly her career was expanding beyond home. Since then, she continued to build a catalogue around her distinctive RnB sensibilities while drawing from pop, Afrobeats, dancehall and the sounds of her roots – all feats she has done without a full-length studio album to her name yet and a gap she hopes to finally close next year.

Deeds caught up with the Kenyan singer-songwriter to talk about growing into her voice, embracing the parts of herself she once kept hidden, the evolving identity of Kenyan music, and what comes next for an artist who is still discovering just how much she has to say.

Stanley for Deeds: How is your day going so far? 

My day is great. I just came back from a getaway, so just kind of back with a lot of work.

Your music has been around for more than five years now, but songs like “Never Let You Go” and “Ex” still feel remarkably current. How does it feel knowing people are still returning to those songs years later? 

So cute. Thank you so much. 

You’ve been making music since you were very young. When did music stop feeling like something you were naturally good at and start feeling like something you had something to say through?

I guess from just being a talent to being almost like a channel or a platform for expression, right? I'd say probably when I was around 16. It's kind of my mom that pushed me and pressured me into writing my own music. I really used to think that I can't write my own music. So she used to just tell me, you can just try. And so that's when it happened. It stopped being about music school, stopped being about just vocal ability. But it started to be about like, who is she? Because the only way people can really know who I am is to connect with me really, was through using my music as a space where I could give my thoughts and opinions on certain things, where I can share my emotions. People could tell the kind of person that I am through my music. And so yeah, I'd say around that time and then it also became a business, so it was kind of just trying to balance the two.

Fans can hear different versions of you across A Side of Me, The Other Side and your newer work. Which version feels furthest from who you are now?

I'd say the first EP. I'm only saying that because it just makes sense for that to be so, given that that was the youngest version of me. And I allow myself to really immerse myself into my eras or phases, like I really live in the moment. And so, A Side of Me may be the furthest to who I am now, but it was very authentic to who I was then, right?

You’ve grown up in public ever since the Emmy Kosgei days we discovered you and that audience has grown up alongside you. What part of your evolution do you think people haven’t quite caught up with yet?

People haven't yet seen that side of me that doesn't really care, the side of me that is aggressive and speaks up for herself. And I think with The Lick Back, the people who are the closest fans that are listening to the music deeply and listening to the lyrics, they can see that.

But what I've seen is my music really takes a long time for people to catch up to. I don't know what it is about the music, because when I drop it at first, no one ever really gets it. Then a year comes, okay, everyone is now on the Nikita Kering’ hype and blah, blah, blah. So I would just say, perhaps the people who listen to my music at a more surface level haven't really gotten to see the side of me that is a little bit more outspoken and doesn't shy away from the truth.

So you feel like sleeper hits/albums are a good thing?

A hundred percent I think sleeper albums are the best because the majority of people then who are discovering are actually in a quest to discover, rather than the people who just were listening to it because it had hype at the moment. You'll find that people who are listening to an album a year after and had never listened to it probably were like, okay, this album had gotten good reviews let me see it for myself and there isn't that noise at the time that they're listening.

So I'm for it and the whole sleeper concept has really built and sustained my longevity that I've had because then people are still able to experience music of three, four years ago right now. And in fact, if you want to look at TikTok and stuff like that, there's people that I'm seeing still discovering “Ex.” There's a performance I did in Ethiopia months ago of a song that came out years ago that's trending right now. So that just tells you that rediscovery is amazing because even as I perform songs I sang five years ago today, they're still relevant. And I feel like that's how music is supposed to be.

People are always listening. Is there a song you've written that you understand differently now than when you wrote it?

I actually don't. I don't think I have an answer to that because I don't really listen to my own songs. I just perform them. After I sing them, now it's in the hands of the people I made it for.

You write quite openly about love, heartbreak, and desire. Do you really understand what you're feeling or do you need to understand it before you can?

 I don't think I internalize my feelings before writing music. I kind of just go with the flow. So I would say I discover my feelings after the fact.

When a melody or lyric comes to you, do you usually know what the song is about, or does the song tell you as you go? 

Yeah, it definitely tells me, but it depends. Different songs, different approaches. When I initially write it, sometimes I know what I'm trying to talk about, but for the most part, it always reveals itself. 

For instance, the “Niwache” song, the line that you sang, was actually the first line I came up with in the whole song. I only had that, and nothing else. And then I sent that to the producer, and we built from that. So already that kind of tells me this song is probably about someone who's playing games, someone who's doing like a cycle back and forth type of thing. 

What emotions do you find the easiest to sing about, but hardest to actually live through?

I think the pain from heartbreak; because we hear about it so much, we watch a lot of movies, we interact with each other, our friends go through it and the pieces of heartbreak; the crying at night, people's life moving on and yours is kind of stuck. We know those little pieces, so I'd say heartbreak is very easy to write, yet very difficult to go through.

When you're going through it, the process is so profound and you get so immersed in it that those feelings never really leave you and that's why perhaps it's very easy to describe them because literally, you live inside those feelings so immensely and so vividly that I guess you can't forget.

Your latest EP feels like another step into your artistic evolution. What did making The Lick Back reveal about the artist you're becoming?

I would say that it reveals less to me about the artist that I'm becoming, but more so the person that I'm becoming because my art is directly linked to my personal experiences and to who I am and how I'm feeling. So I think it's just a reflection of somebody growing up, finally becoming a woman. Being able to speak out for myself because that's some of the things I struggled with a lot as a young person. Like I’m finally grown up and out of being that timid young girl who is scared of voicing her opinions and is scared of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. It's just shown me how much I am actually growing and if I thought that I wasn't growing I can now see it in my music from also experimenting with different sounds.

You’ve experimented with different sounds and languages throughout your catalogue. Is there a version of yourself you can express musically that you can’t quite access in everyday life?

The sensual part of me, mainly because I find that society isn't very forgiving with women. Sometimes when it comes to freely expressing your sensuality and yourself. That’s something that I've been able to put in my music, even in collaborations such as Motto, I feel as though if I was to transcribe that and tell it to people word for word, everyone would be like, what the hell is this girl saying? 

We are also at a time when Kenyan music is drawing increasingly from across the continent while also developing its own new identities. What does the Kenyan sound look like to you today?

I think that Kenyan sound looks like a Kenyan person that grew up in Kenya or was exposed to Kenyan culture, presenting it in the way that they understood it. I don't think there's any way that it's supposed to sound. I just think that if you took part in being Kenyan in any way and you're expressing that musically, I think that's Kenyan music.

I think the exposure to the difference in cultures and even different music and how you choose to interpret that is exactly what makes it Kenyan, because the thing is, that culture is just a bunch of people that sat together and behaved and acted a certain type of way. It wasn't influenced by any sort of DNA or anything. We are just a couple of people that settled on this part of the earth and started to do things in this manner. And that became culture. So I think with music, it's the same. I'm glad the exact rule applies.

And what do you think Kenyan artists or creatives are doing exceptionally well right now and what are they still getting wrong?

Let me start by saying that finally, there's some kind of trend where there's a lot more Kenyan musicians making Kenyan music that is inspired by their own cultures. So when I look at Kodongklan, Kosta Ojuang, Elsie Wameno or Zaituni, all of these people are not only inspired by, for example, the Nairobi culture or the Swahili language. They have embraced who they are and where they come from. And even through my EP and what I was doing with the intro with Sofiya Nzau. 

We have unlocked a new level to even more content by allowing ourselves to access our own cultures because I genuinely believe that we are spiritually connected to where we are from. I myself come from the Nandi community, and I know my clan and exactly where we come from. And there are stories our parents teach us about our clan and the things that we used to do and our strengths. And I can see that coming out now, even being in Nairobi or traveling around the world, I can understand.

So I would say how we are attaching ourselves or rather how we are holding on to our history is really important and I think that is something that we're doing so right because it makes the pot overflow. It will consistently pour out more and more content because we're not just Kenyans, we're not just Kalenjins, we're not just Nandis, we're not just Taitas, we come from this home. And the deeper you go into who you are, the more there is to find and the more of that DNA will show through your music making it even way more unique than perhaps someone that was just following some trends, right?

Yeah and at the end of the day, like creativity, music continues. Music has been around for maybe a few thousand years and maybe even more, but I mean in terms of like proper proper structured songs and stuff like that, it can't end here. It has to keep going and how does it? We have to keep finding new inspirations and that means going deeper into your culture while at the same time going wider into the future and wider into exposing yourself. How can my culture mesh into this? How can we intermarry different cultures to create a new art form? And that discovery is what I'm seeing in Kenyan music and not just music/artistic space, because even with fine arts, even with culinary arts, with people like Denis Ombachi, turning things like managu and terere into cold salads, you know, that kind of stuff. That's why people like that are still relevant, because it's innovation. And innovation doesn't necessarily mean that you have to come up with something from thin air. Sometimes it just means taking this thing, taking this other thing, and blending them together to create a new thing.

Because that's exactly how humans evolve. It's a mother and a father coming together to create something new. And if you yourself see yourself as a new being, as a new creation, then that, I think, reflects creativity. That you've taken this that was already in existence, and this other thing, and you're putting them together, and you're literally just consistently creating something new every time. And I think that's amazing. In terms of what I feel like Kenyan artists are doing wrong, I don't know what Kenyan artists And I don't think I will ever come out and say anyone is doing anything wrong creatively because I see artists who are making “bubblegum” music being shunned upon, but we are listening to it.

That is an art form in itself. For example, there's calculus and then there's freaking one plus one. And without one plus one, there would have never been calculus. Like both of those things are necessary. Sometimes life doesn't have to be so complex. People don't have to do the right thing all the time. And so I would never, ever comment on what I think someone should do or shouldn't do creatively. What I think I would say is how hard are you working to make this into something proper? Because you can turn something very stupid into something amazing and something that is worth sharing to the world as a representation of Kenya music. What I would say artists are doing wrong on the other side of things is not knowing how to protect this art that they are creating, is not knowing how to correctly monetize it. Those are now the things I can speak on because I can see exactly how my input would benefit them.

What do you admire about the next generation of East African artists coming up alongside you?

I applaud my fellow artists because they’ve kept going because I've seen and experienced crazy things, and there's times where I've genuinely sat down and was just like, bro, I don't think I can do this anymore. I can imagine that all these different artists have probably been in the same exact space where they felt like giving up. But the choice to continue, to me, that is the most amazing, brilliant thing. And I'm so proud of all of them.

And I support in the ways that I can. When I speak to upcoming artists, when I talk to Bridget Blue, when I speak to so and so; I sit with these people, and all I do is encourage them and tell people, you should try this and try that. My hand is never closed. It's always open to giving and that's why I believe that I keep receiving, because I don't tie that information to myself. I don't believe in gatekeeping, because I really genuinely believe that we can all coexist. And I know people that are so worried about gatekeeping and stuff, they're copycats because they know they copied something and they know it's not authentic enough to sustain, but because I know what I'm coming with is so original, I'll never be worried about what anyone else is doing or that they're doing better than me.

I'm so proud of each and every one of my fellow artists and I wish them all the best and I have generally given upcoming artists opportunities way more than I've even given anyone else and I don't talk about it, I don't post about it, I don't go out there wanting anyone to lick my bum about it, I'm just out here and I know one day, should I help the right person, and they're grateful, they're gonna come out and they're gonna be like, you know what, I appreciate Nikita because she helped me get here, she helped me get there, but I don't even do it for the applause, I don't do it so that they can say, I do it because it's just the right thing to do. And why not? 

Your music influences have ranged from Rose Muhando and Nigerian pop to American R&B with people like Rihanna. When you're creating, do you think about those influences, or have they become so deeply embedded that they just come out in the way you create your own music? 

I see inspiration kind of like taking a test. You read for your exam, and when you're in the exam room sitting with your paper, you're not thinking about every single thing that you read. You read the question, and you hope that the answer will flow to you depending on how prepared you are.

How I relate it to making my music is if I am genuinely, I've listened to the music, I've taken it in, I've meditated with it, I do not need to go over my notes again. I just write, and it will show. There is a way that your brain is able to divide or to compartmentalize different ideas and how they would apply into your different ideas. You never have to be listening to other songs at the same time in order to make that happen. 

You just have to constantly feed yourself with the material, and then it will show in the music, because if you then do the former, what's going to happen is you're just going to plagiarize. So even when I'm making a song and I can hear like, okay, this song kind of sounds like, let me give an example, Diamonds by Rihanna. The one thing you're not allowed to do at that one instance is play that song because then you're going to start copying. That's how I do it. 

Speaking of influences, are there any people that are on your dream collaboration list? 

I think I only have one person on my dream collaboration list right now, and that's Dave. I really like Dave. His song, Raindance with Tems is amazing. But I think if I were to make a song with Dave it would never be a commercial song. I wouldn't waste my opportunity on that.  I would want to drain him of every little bit of niche creativity he has in him, because that's how I fell in love with Dave. I didn't really get exposed to Dave through the commercial song.

What can fans look forward to next? Is there anything else in the book? An unreleased project before the year ends that you want to bless them with?

There's definitely gonna be some songs out before the year ends, but, in terms of a whole project, no. I'm not gonna lie and say that. I really hope to release my debut album next year though.

For the Peaches and Cream event, I would say that's gonna be the best show of the year yet, actually the best of my life yet. So if anyone is waiting to attend my concert, and they don't know which one to attend, because I know there's a couple, they need to attend that one.

Finally, if we remove Nikita Kering’ the public persona that people know, what would you want to discover next just for yourself? 

I really just want to see how far I can push my entrepreneurial side. I'm just about to launch one of my businesses, aside from Nikita Kering’, because I'm not going to be publicizing it, and I just want to see that I can actually manage a huge business and not lose my mind.‍

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Cover Credit: Nikita Kering’/Tofauti Vibes

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Erykah Badu's Mama's Gun Is A Bold Experiment Of The Soul And The Self

Mama's Gun is one of Erykah Badu’s acclaimed albums. After she made headlines with her debut album, Baduizm, her second studio album, Mama's Gun, was widely anticipated. Erykah Badu's distinct sound is a tasteful blend of RnB, neo-soul, jazz, and hip-hop. In one of her recent interviews, the American music icon told Popcast’s Jon Caramanica and Joe Coscarelli that she only puts out a record when she has something to say. The songwriting in Mama's Gun touched on spiritual themes, romantic love, and the mistreatment of marginalized groups. 

Mama's Gun is many things; bold, soulful, inspiring and lyrically witty. This is the second album after her exciting 1997 debut, Baduizm. Mama's Gun set out with a goal and at Green Eyes, a song about her then breakup with rapper Andre 3000, that goal was completely achieved. The neo-soul album successfully blends elements of funk,  jazz, rock, and reggae. Released in 2000, Mama’s Gun is more than 25 years old and is considered one of the best albums of its era by numerous publications like NPR and Pitchfork.

The record succeeds at expert storytelling. It starts with a 6-minute opener, Penitentiary Philosophy, where Erykah uses her vocals like an instrument. She sings about boxing oneself into an identity, and the nonconformity of individualism. Three songs off this album; Bag Lady, Cleva, and Didn't Cha Know explores self-fulfilment in relationships with self and others. This is one of many things that makes Mama's Gun a timeless listen; she covers issues—both personal and societal— that are integral to the human experience. 

My Life, the third track of the album, was from a 1995 demo. Two other songs from that era On &  On and Appletree were released as singles from Baduizm. Following My Life is ...& On, a sequel to her Grammy-winning single, On & On. She continues to teach the principles of the Five-Percent Nation, a black supremacist movement on this track. Erykah Badu has been linked to the Five-Percent Nation due to her cultural identity and lyrics with nods to the doctrines of this movement. Based on research documented in Encyclopaedia Britannica, Five Percenters believe that 85 percent of humanity are oblivious to the true nature of God and thus, are misled by 10 percent of humanity who are knowledgeable but falsely teach about the existence of God. Only 5 percent understands the truth about God; He is living and He is a black man teaching freedom to black communities. Hey Sugah (interlude) levels the tempo before going into the track Booty. A song with clever lyrics about an unfaithful man and his protective lover. Other songs that explore romantic motifs include; Kiss Me On My Neck (Hesi), Orange Moon, In Love With You (featuring Stephen Marley), and Green Eyes. 

Mama's Gun also features two songs about the racialized sufferings of black people in early 2000s America. A.D. 2000 is a tribute song to a 22-year-old Guinean immigrant Amadou Diallo, who was shot dead by members of the New York City Police Department in 1999. Wyclef Jean also made a similar tribute that year with the track Diallo. Time's A Wastin' is a message about survival, targeted at young black men who aim at thriving in a white supremacist system that wasn't created for them. The  album  spans more than an hour of soulful melodies and grounding lyricism.

When Erykah Badu broke into the scene with her signature head wrap inspired by African women and her silver jewelry, she came as herself and noted the influence her spirituality has on her music. Perhaps one of my personal favourite things about Mama's Gun, apart from its mid-tempo groove is its richly textured soundscape, with everyday sounds like finger clicks and sounds from analog or naturalistic elements being incorporated into the composition of the album. This was the perfect addition to nail down the perfect album for a chill, candle-lit day. 

Truly, who could compare to the great Erykah Badu? Her influence can be seen in fashion, film, and music. Erykah Badu is more of a lifestyle. She is a cultural tastemaker, and a trueborn artist. RnB and soul acts like SZA, Summer Walker, Jhené Aiko, Ari Lennox, Teyana Taylor and many more have cited her as a major influence in their music artistry, especially for her spiritual teachings and use of sound systems like tuning forks. Ari Lennox has covered a lot of Badu songs including Green Eyes. According to VIBE, the singer Solange said of her at ESSENCE‘s 8th annual Black Women in Music in 2017: “She is a beautiful reminder that you cannot put us in a box.”

P.S: If you enjoyed Mama's Gun by Erykah Badu, then give two of Willow Smith's projects a listen; Petal Rock Black, and The Thread. A Seat At The Table by Solange and 5 by Sault are also some of this writer’s personal favourites. 

 Cover Credit: Erykah Badu captured by Eric Johnson in 1997

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…on reinventing himself, mental health recovery, olodo uprising 

YCee dropped his breakout song Jagaban, in 2016, and Nigerian pop culture did not recover for a long time. Within the next two years, another smash hit, Omo Alhaji, followed, then Late Night Vibrations, an EP that showed a different side of the same artist, one willing to sit inside heartbreak and make something honest out of it. By 2019, his debut album, YCee vs Zaheer had surfaced, cementing his status as a prolific rapper. After another extended play, Love Drunk, in 2021, and it went a bit quiet on YCee’s end. The years after were shaped by a bipolar disorder diagnosis that he has only recently begun speaking about publicly. Out of Sight, Out of Mind, his debut album, was built across that period. 

In this conversation with Deeds, the 33-year-old artiste, born Oludemilade Alejo, speaks about mental health recovery, artistic integrity and what the ‘Olodo Uprising’ revealed about modern Nigerian youth culture.

Sophia From Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and your music?

My name is Ycee Omo Alhaji.  I'm a rap musician from Lagos, Nigeria. I love music. I love creating music, I love consuming music. I like to think of myself as a fun guy.

Who is YCee when there is no music, no industry, no public version of you to maintain? What does a regular day actually look like?

I mean, it depends on the day of the week, actually. If it’s a Monday—because I literally have a tattoo that says “Weekend Forever”—I think I structure my weeks like weekends. It’s like one long weekend.

Very flexible Mondays. I try not to do anything, you know, just probably chill, unless I have obligations like work or an interview or any other thing. But outside of work, I’m usually just home, either on my laptop, watching a movie or series or anime, or playing a video game.

When you think about what success, money, family and happiness meant to the person who made Jagaban and Juice, how different does that person feel from who you are now?

I’d definitely say my view on success has changed a lot over the course of not just my career, but my life in general. I think at different stages, it’s usually a thing where you have dreams or goals that you’ve envisioned for yourself, and there are people who are lucky enough to get to a point where you meet those goals and you live those dreams.

I think one thing that I learned very early on in my life is that there’s always a higher level than the top. So it’s always been a thing for me where, whatever venture I’m embarking on, when you achieve that, you then realise there’s always that question of, “What next?” There’s always a next step.

I think for me, success right now, as opposed to back then—back then, success meant making music that would travel the world, I guess. It was never necessarily a thing about, “I want a million dollars.” It wasn’t. I think my concept of success has always been detached from monetary value and more about just breaking boundaries, breaking ceilings.

There was a conversation I was having with a younger friend of mine, and he was just talking about how he needs to make money. He wants to make money, money, money. Bro, you’re better off setting goals for yourself that, when you achieve those goals, there’s possibly no way you would be in that position and money wouldn’t be there.

I feel like there are a lot of people we see in society today who have money or have made money, but there’s still a certain longing, there’s a certain itch that needs to be scratched. For me, I’ve always been detached from that. I’m not saying that I don’t like money. I like money because money makes things happen. Money is a necessary tool. Whatever it is you want to do in life, even if you want to live a low-key life, that in itself comes at its own cost.

You know, as opposed to back then, where it was just about trying to get my music to a bigger stage than I was at the time, getting a larger fan base, being able to travel and just take my music as far as I could take it, I think right now success for me is more about my well-being, my state of mind, my state of physical being, and the state of my relationships with my friends and my family.

I feel like if I’m able to maintain a good level of that, then I would think I’d be successful in whatever other metric people would want to grade my life or career by.

So I feel like I’ve grown older. I’ve become more in touch with who I am as a person. I think, for me, it’s just about trying to make that reflect in the music. That’s the most important thing to me. I’ve come to realise that, in doing so, it elevates the quality of the music itself.

I’m a yapper, by the way. I tend to just talk.

The years when things went quiet publicly - what was actually happening? Not the narrative, not what people assumed. What were you doing, who were you spending time with, what was shaping you?

Oh my God! You know, it’s so crazy. I feel like every time I was getting ready to release music again, people were always asking, “What’s been going on? What have you been getting into?” I think a lot of people were expecting deep responses like, “Oh, I went on a journey of self-discovery. I was, you know, with the monks in the mountains. I was meditating.” And I was like, bro, I literally was just out here trying to live as much as I could.

I think from when I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, it just put a lot of things on the back seat because I wasn’t able to necessarily function as I used to before the diagnosis and before all the medication and everything that I was going through. So I think when I was able to get some level of stability back in my life, I was like, there’s no reason why I will not make the most of every single minute of every single day for the rest of the life that I have.

Because one thing that I notice about the entertainment industry in Nigeria, especially within the music space, because that’s where I operate, so that’s where a lot of my knowledge comes from, is that we work so hard to become so big, just to seclude ourselves from the world. And that has never made sense to me because I think one of my favourite things about being popular and being a celebrity is the perks that come with it.

There are pros and there are cons, but I’m not going to sit here and act like a lot of times the pros don’t outweigh the cons because you’re in a position where your presence is appreciated anywhere you go. You get access to the crème de la crème, premium spaces and everything. It’s just a great experience. It’s a great thing to be popular.

And you find that people just become so secluded from everything that’s going on because you don’t want to become too accessible. You don’t want your value to be overly saturated because it’s like, “Oh, we see this guy here, we see him there.” But I still want to do the things that I used to do before I became popular. I still want to go to the cinema. I mean, private cinemas are cool, but there’s nothing better than the experience of watching a movie and seeing the reactions of other people as well, in real time, and just being part of a community.

Just going to the beach, going out to eat in a restaurant. I tell people all the time, I feel like the number one thing about living on this earth is how we interact with other human beings. That’s one of the best experiences in life because there are times that I will literally just be in a crowded place and I’m looking at, maybe, give or take, hundreds of thousands of people, and it’s like every single person in this crowd, every individual, is a different story, with different experiences. You know, even within a household, children don’t necessarily experience the same parents, even if they are born of the same parents.

So our experiences as human beings come down to how we interact with other human beings. And it’s like, why would you want to keep yourself away from the pinnacle of human experience, existence? I love to go out. I love to just do things.

So it was a question of, “Where’s Ycee?” and it’s like, Ycee is in W Bar. Ycee is here. Ycee is there. I pretty much was very active, just not necessarily present within the music industry.

And I felt like the time away that I took just really helped my outlook on life in general and informed my decisions on what it was that I wanted to do with my re-emergence back into the industry. I think it’s always a thing where you tell artists all the time that, as long as you’re within your younger years, because you can’t be active for as long as you would want to be, you should make the most use of it.

And that, in turn, tends to—not all the time—but tends to translate into: you can’t take breaks. You have to always be at the top of your game. You have to be active. You have to be releasing music. And it just gets very exhausting because you can go to the cinema and count the number of times you watch certain actors in movies, and it’s not because they’re not good actors. It’s not because they’re not making movies. But there’s a season for everything. There’s a time for everything.

And breaks are very important because one thing that I’ve learned about the body is that if you don’t take a break for yourself, it’s going to be worse when your body decides to take that break for you.

I think the whole time away and just being low-key was a very trying time, obviously, with my mental health issues and dealing with that. I think one of the saddest parts about it was not just what I went through personally, but pretty much what the weight of my condition was putting on the people around me. It affected a lot of my friendships. It affected a lot of my relationships as well.

But I think one of the key parts of my recovery was also the people who stuck it out with me and were able to meet me in my time of need. And I’m more than grateful to the circle around me that just helped me get back to—not who I was—but back to a version of myself that was able to come back into the industry and just get back to making music and the things that I love.

I think, as much as there were certain experiences that were dark, I feel like it was a necessary time that I needed for myself. And I’m glad that I was able to deal with everything that I dealt with and just come out on the other side and get back to doing what I want to do.

About bipolar disorder. How are you?

Yeah, I’m good. I’m fine. I haven’t had an episode, if I’ll call it that, since 2024, and everything has been very good, I would say. Aside from the things that we deal with on a day-to-day basis, I’m just thankful for a good state of mental well-being and, to a certain extent, some peace of mind as well.

I think ever since I became public with my mental state and my mental health issues, I’ve encountered a lot more people, more Nigerians, coming up to me and saying, “I also suffer from bipolar disorder,” or some form of mental health issue. So I think it’s a conversation that a lot more people need to be having because, as much as there’s been positive feedback on it, there’s also been a lot of pushback, even from people that I know personally, just talking about why I’m speaking about bipolar disorder so casually.

And I think it just comes down to how I was able to deal with it. I’m still—I don’t think there’s a cure for it—you just need to learn how to live with it.

I feel like the more people share their lived experiences, the more it helps other people who are dealing with the same struggles know how they can navigate their lives as well. It’s something that I would always like to push for. I would always want to speak about it, just let people know that, as much as the healthcare system in Nigeria is the way it is, there are still means to navigate mental health issues through the strength of community and the strength of just being within safe spaces where you’re in touch with your emotions and you’re able to speak freely about your feelings without the pushback of other people’s opinions, stigma and all that stuff.

Late Night Vibrations is the clearest example of your personal life finding its way into the music. Is that something you do deliberately, or does it just happen?

It started to come about the older I got because I think, in the earlier stages of my career, I was just more content with making music that people would listen to and just be amazed by my rapping ability, or people would listen to it and it’s just like, “Oh, it makes them dance.” I started gravitating towards wanting to make music that would make people feel something because I realised that, with the music I enjoy from my favourite artists, they’re pretty much giving a piece of themselves. It’s always a crazy thing to listen to a song and be able to relate to the experiences of whoever is creating the music.

I think that’s one thing that has helped my music connect with my core audience: the level of relatability. I think with Late Night Vibrations, that was pretty much the first time that I was open enough to be as vulnerable as I was with what I was going through at the time. So I made that EP during the time when I was going through my very first major breakup, from a relationship that I was in for almost over two years.

And I think, for me, it’s just been a situation where, regardless of whatever I’m going through, my number one coping mechanism is just going into the studio and expressing my emotions on a song or into a song. And it’s not necessarily about whether the song is going to come out or whether I’m going to release it. It’s more as a means of therapeutic release than as a means of self-expression.

I would liken it to someone who journals. It’s like just being able to put your thoughts down and then go back to it, read it again, listen to it again. In this case, I think it was a thing of joy for me to see people gravitate towards certain songs and connect with certain lyrics. It just strengthened my thoughts on music being a universal language. Ever since then, I’ve been more comfortable with just expressing my views on love and life and everything else in between.

I think within the Nigerian space, it wasn’t up until more recently that you had artists singing more about the dark side of relationships. I think, for the longest time, you had love songs where it was always beautiful stuff. You know, you talk about the girl, you talk about meeting the girl, guy meets girl, they fall in love—all the fairy-tale stuff. Don’t get me wrong, that is equally essential to tell that story. But there are also other sides that we encounter every day. We experience it every day.

I have a lot of my friends who complain about the fact that I’m always listening to, quote-unquote, sad music. But I find it a lot more sincere when people are singing about heartbreak because it’s very easy to sing about love even when you’re not in love. It’s the easiest thing to say: “I’ve got sunshine on a cloudy day,” all that.

There’s a certain level of sincerity and just a certain level of vulnerability that goes into making music that touches on the discomforting side of love.

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Out of Sight, Out of Mind was made across several years, which means different versions of you are in it. When you listen back now, do you like them? 

I like them a lot. I think most of what makes me like them is the fact that, inasmuch as these individual songs were made across different periods of time, there’s still some level of cohesion across the body of work.

And I think, for me, I listen to it and I just see growth and maturity because, like I said, over different periods, this was created and that was created, and we brought that together to make this. It doesn’t feel out of place. It doesn’t feel like these songs shouldn’t be put together. It’s a thing of beauty for me, and I just feel like it’s even helped me with the next step that I want to take creatively, just going off people’s reactions and everything, and then listening back.

That’s the thing about music. You could listen as a consumer, and there are certain songs that, when you listen to them, take you back to the first time you heard the song or the memories attached to the song. Like, “Oh, I remember this song. I heard it at this wedding.” Every time I hear the song, I remember the wedding party and all that stuff.

Yeah, I think for me, anytime I listen to the album, from the intro, I can remember when I got the voice note that I used for the intro. With the songs, I remember how I felt when I first heard the production and the beat: “I like this beat. I want to work on this beat.” It’s like a time capsule of sorts.

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You are a rapper, a singer and a songwriter, and Nigerian music has always wanted you to pick one. Has that pressure gone away?

I think during the earlier years of my career, it was always a thing where I was—I wouldn’t say forced—but I was pushed to work on my singing because, at the time, it was considered that if you wanted to make money, there wasn’t really that much money within the rap industry.

So I had to get a vocal coach. I was doing vocal training, and I got better at singing. It then started to lean to a point where I was doing more singing than rapping. My earlier fans, or the people who fell in love with me because of my rap ability, were now on the side where they were like, “Oh, so you’re no longer a rapper? Are you going to leave what we all fell in love with you for?”

It wasn’t until I became more confident in my ability that I realised getting better at singing had also helped me become a better rapper, in the sense that I was able to infuse melodies into the rap I was doing at the time. And with singing, because of my ability as a rapper and being able to write raps as a songwriter, it also helps you make better songs that are more fleshed out, with deeper meaning and deeper lyrics. It’s a no-brainer.

So it got to a point where I was able to blend both seamlessly, and that just gave rise to a merger of both fans: people who love the singing and people who love the rap side. It was always a conversation where you either do one or the other, but I feel like, as a creative, there’s always going to be that desire to evolve, that desire to better yourself, that desire to make all kinds of music and touch on as many genres as you can.

Because I feel like being an artist and just being comfortable enough in one sound gets very monotonous. It gets very boring. And you could extend that conversation to collaborations. For example, before Asake did “Chanel” with Blaqbonez, I don’t think anyone would have envisioned Asake on that type of bounce. Seeing how he was able to just come into the song and make it his own, it’s one of those things that shows it’s even better for artists themselves to step outside of the box as much as they possibly can. It’s in those experiences that you’re able to evolve as an artist and as a creative.

How do you make your records? Take us through your creative process.  

For me, it's always a thing where I believe the creative should decide what the fan base consumes and not the other way around. My reason for this is I would use my journey personally. It's like before I made Condo, it wasn't like anyone asked me to make it that way. It was because of what I made and how good it was that they liked it.

So it's always a thing where I always liken this situation to someone going to eat in a restaurant, for example, you go to a Michelin star restaurant, look through the menu and find out there's no jollof rice. You're not going to ask them to tell the chef to make you jollof rice; you know where to get Jollof rice. So it's like regardless of whatever it is that you want to eat, it all comes down to what's on the menu, what they're offering. So you have to pick from what is available.

So it's not the restaurant's job to make what the fans want. It's the restaurant's job to make the best meal possible. As soon as you taste it, your taste buds start telling you that this tastes amazing. As a creative, it's just my own job to make music that I feel like making, to just put my best foot forward and work to the best of my ability. As a music consumer myself, I want to believe I know what good music is.

So, the beauty of making music is that you've made something that you think is great and you can share with the world. I feel like a lot of people want to always question an artist when they say they made an album for themselves. You see, that is the beauty about art; it is like you've made something beautiful, but you can't possibly be the only one that would enjoy the beauty of what you've created. And that therein lies why people share the music that they make for themselves with other people. Because it's like the beauty of art is consumption. It's people resonating with what you've created for yourself and they also like relating that to their own experiences. So, for me, it's always going to be me first, then you guys can come in and I share that with you. That's just the beauty of creation in total.

The Olodo Uprising and the Peller conversation - beyond that specific moment, what is your bigger concern about what Nigerian popular culture is rewarding right now?

As much as I'm trying, I feel like it's a necessary conversation that needs to be had. I feel like in this day and age, especially with the advent of social media and social media now being a platform that is giving people, it pays now, there's financial benefits from being on social media. There's always going to be another trending topic, another trending conversation. But I think with the strength of how long we've had this little olodo uprising conversation, it just shows that it's a necessary conversation that we need to constantly keep having so that we continue to increase the bar of excellence within our society. I feel like a lot of people look at the clippings from the video that went viral as opposed to going to watch the full interview. So a lot of people were considering that I had something personal against Peller. Yeah, I feel like it goes beyond just the content creation industry or just the entertainment industry as a whole. You can akin certain different areas of our lives and point out an olodo uprising moments within them, whether it's politics, dealing with other people within your neighborhood, within the systems you operate in, within education, within the movie industry, the work, the office, the 9 to 5 industry. There's a hint of Olodo uprising within every facet of our Nigerian society today. 

People can beg the question to say, it's not just a Nigerian thing. But at the end of the day, I can only speak to the society that I am a part of, and that's the Nigerian society.  I think a lot of people felt like it was a personal attack on people that don't necessarily have formal educational backgrounds and stuff. I think for me, it was just like a degradation of just education in general. People are no longer curious anymore. People don't ask questions. They only rely on AI summaries. It used to be a thing where one would research publications, factual accounts on history, scientific theories and so on. Now, people are okay with outsourcing their own intelligence.   That's why we are dealing with the repercussions already.  People consider this mentality of, “as long as he's making money,” and that's why we have a lot of people that are okay with doing questionable things. If you are in a working society, you wouldn't be doing those things unless you really wanted to. There's no reason why you would want to be a clown when you're not part of a circus. So I just look at certain things and I think, “oh, God, I wish we had better leaders. I wish we had a better, administrative arm.”

If you look at it, it's like people have just outsourced, not just intelligence now, but even their justice system. People don't have faith in the judiciary anymore. They're more comfortable with going to social media personalities that will bring them justice because of their following. It just is quite telling that people are more comfortable with putting their trust in somebody that's just within the same sets of limitations as themselves.  

That in itself lies the lesson where it's like we can see that this person is able to pull this much public appeal or public opinion. So why can't we, as the public, pull our own public opinion ourselves and engineer the change that we so desperately want?  So, yeah, it's a lot.

Cover Credit: _teeshots

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For its second annual edition, this year, Afro Plus Fest returned with a sold out event headlined by major acts across Afrobeats, dancehall, soca, R&B and hip-hop. Held in the DMV, Maryland, this past weekend, it was a full 3-day experience that saw headliners such as Wizkid, Davido, Tems, Ayra Starr and Alkaline take the stage – as well as supporting acts namely Latto, Sexyy Red, Chief Keef, Tiwa Savage, Sarkodie, Odeal and more.

Dubbed as the largest celebration of global Black music and culture, Afro Fest debuted last year, founded by DMV (Washington D.C., Maryland and Virginia) native Michael Awosanya who noted that the festival represents the culmination of years spent building spaces for African and diaspora culture in the region. 

A Prince George’s County local and Towson University alum, Awosanya began organizing DJ battles and dance competitions before bringing artists, including heavyweights like Burna Boy and Asake, to the region. 

That work eventually culminated in Afro Plus Fest’s inaugural edition in 2025, a one-day event at the RFK Festival Grounds, which sold out and drew more than 20,000 attendees. The festival also generated an estimated $10 million in local economic impact, establishing Afro Plus as more than a concert but a growing cultural and economic platform.

That first-year response set the stage for an even more ambitious sophomore edition which expanded from a single day to a 3-day format and moved from the RFK Festival Grounds to the Northwest Stadium Complex in Landover. Additionally, it was projected to draw as many as 120,000 attendees across Labor Day Weekend, reflecting the rapid growth of an event that is positioning itself around the breadth of Black music and diaspora culture rather than a single sound or region.

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In that sense, Afro Plus joins a wider festival movement using large-scale live experiences to bring Black artists, audiences, businesses and cultural expressions into the same space; therefore pushing its central idea even further and the increasingly interconnected sounds of the African diaspora. 

If its sold-out debut proved there was an audience for that vision, then this year’s 3-day expansion shows just how far that audience can reach. It also ultimately suggests that Afro Plus may be building something with staying power across other cities such as London, Dallas, among others, beyond its inaugural location.

Cover Image Credit: Afro Plus Fest

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The scenes witnessed at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on the first of Jay-Z’s two-night JAŸ-Z30 London show can only be described as captivating, iconic and legendary. For the Brooklyn rapper celebrating the 30th anniversary of his debut album Reasonable Doubt, this was another stop on the tour, a true celebration of the iconic catalogue he has built over his 30-year career and his impact on hip-hop.

The show marked a major moment, not only celebrating 30 years of his career but also his first solo performance in London in 13 years, since his Magna Carter tour, and his last time on stage alongside Beyoncé on their On The Run II tour in 2018. From the start of the show, which began with Hackney native Idris Elba delivering the intro to “American Gangsta”, Jay showed why he is one of the greatest of all time. The show featured an iconic setlist and a band of musicians who enriched the songs. It also featured stunning visuals that matched themes and moments from his life and career. It was truly special to witness an artist who has built and delivered a show at that level 30 years into his career.

His energy towards the crowd was truly next level. The transitions and outfit changes flowed effortlessly across the 2-hour show, which felt like it could've gone on with the amount of music he has. The love and deep respect for all he has was well and truly alive in the stadium of fans who were not only London locals but also very much international, having crossed borders and seas. New York was present, as shown by the number of American accents and the NY merch all around. It was worth every minute and truly euphoric to witness.

From the announcement of the show, which was taking place on September 4th, there was high anticipation that he would be joined on stage by his wife, Beyoncé, who just happened not only to be celebrating her 45th birthday but also the 20th anniversary of her second album, B’Day. Yet on this night, she was merely one among the crowd, watching like a proud wife and, most importantly, a fan. She did have a brief moment in the spotlight when the crowd sang happy birthday to her and put on a fireworks show in her honour.  Another iconic moment came when he was joined by two other musical legends, The Fugees, who took the stage to perform a 3-track medley of “Killing Me Softly,” “Ready or Not,” and “Fu-Gee-La” from their album The Score, which is also celebrating 30 years since its release. The group went back with Jay, who opened for them on his first European tour, so the moment was full circle for both legends. Another legend who took the stage was the UK's own Giggs, who joined HOV for the UK anthem "Talking The Hardest." Having previously shouted him out in his 2022 single “GOD DID”, it only made sense for him to bring him out, adding in his “Welcome To The Jungle” verse and adding in his own freestyle ad-libs over the iconic beat.

There was so much to take in from the show in how it married and came together from the production, which was quite simple yet maximised in its execution of the stage design, screen and lighting show. It was much needed, and it really showcased Hov's true artistry and performance. Multiple outfit changes and transitions flowed effortlessly before you realised they were happening. The setlist was crafted not only to showcase his many hits but also his catalogue as a whole. It included tracks like “Pray” “Fuckwithmeyouknowigotit” “Run This Town” “Dead Presidents” “Can I Live” “Song Cry” “Girls Girls Girls” “Niggas In Paris” “Public Service Announcement” and the show closer “Numb / Encore” It was a perfect blend of old and new yet also timeless delivering something for the old school JAY-Z fans as well of those of the new generation. Backed by a band of live string players, drummers, piano players, and electric guitarists, the show enhanced the songs' sound and emotion, adding a special touch to the musicality. Not to mention the visuals displayed throughout the show, put together by Gabriel Moses, which spoke to the emotions and impact of the songs and the significant cultural and personal moments in his career. His vocal performance is another thing to note, as his breathwork and control were flawless throughout. Whilst some of his counterparts struggle to maintain it throughout a couple of songs. As a 56-year-old who performed with the energy and hunger of someone who just started, he reinforced that he is still the best in the game, because no rapper comes to mind who can match that breathwork and control.

The whole thing was captivating to witness and will stay in the memory of all who saw him and will see him for the remainder of his run of shows, as somebody who has retired from music, having not released any new original material since 2017’s 4:44 album. He clearly showed that music will always be in him. Dusting off the mic and showing the world why he really is one of the greats, and that his legacy does speak for itself. Rappers, artists, and creatives should take note of the master at work, showing that even at this point in his career and life, he remains meticulous and maintains a status that will forever be etched in the history books.

Cover Credit: Chloe Newman

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Today is the 45th birthday anniversary of one of pop’s biggest songbirds: Beyoncé. Somewhere in Lagos’ bustling Lekki suburbs a group of fans are planning a special party in her honour — a tradition they’ve held for years. 

Elsewhere in Atlanta, some others from the ‘Beyhive’ are hosting something similar.

The same thing is happening across Paris, Mexico City, Dublin, Bangkok, Toronto, and Barcelona, thanks to her distro-publishers Sony Music. Beyoncé, herself, is expected at the London edition tonight, as she’s in town for Jay-Z’s concert as well.

Social media is agog with fan updates on their own versions of celebrations across the world. Fan-pages are buzzing with tributes. A large slice of the internet is celebrating with the mother-of-three today, because to her large fanbase — one of the most dedicated among contemporary fandoms —  it is kind of a big deal. 

However, beyond the extravaganza tied to her birthday festivities tonight, the parties are also curated to celebrate her just-released 20th anniversary edition of her sophomore album, B’day. 

This expanded digital version contains 31 songs, with guest features from late Mexican-American powerhouse Selina Quintanilla and Colombian rapper Maluma. Beyoncé clinched approval from Selena’s estate for the duet “Irreemplazable (Como La Flor)”, having popularly cited Selena as one of her biggest influences behind her 2007 Spanish EP, Irreemplazable. 

The remastered version also melds B-sides, Spanish-language recordings, extended material, archival tracks and previously unreleased tracks like “Creole,” “Back Up,” “Lost Yo Mind,” and “Can I Watch You” featuring Pharrell Williams alongside other original tracks from 2006. 

Arriving three years after she went solo, Beyoncé’s sophomore album, B’Day was a defining mark for one of popularCover Credit: Parkwood Entertainment music’s most recognisable women. Twenty years later, that is yet to change. 

So far, Beyoncé has become an artist for whom music, fashion, choreography, photography and visual storytelling operate as parts of the same creative language. Her albums have become events, her performances extensions of their worlds and her visual choices subjects of cultural conversation in their own right. 

The 35-time Grammy Award winner first teased the 20-year commemoration with, “Morning Dew (Donk)” – released earlier on July 4, a kick-off to the 60-day countdown that heralded the album’s unveiling. 

The four-LP edition also includes a commemorative booklet and collectible prints, inevitably inviting nostalgia – while Beyoncé also remastered the accompanying videos, originally captured on 35mm, recoloured and finished in 4k Ultra HD. The reworked video for “Déjà Vu,” featuring Jay-Z and directed by Sophie Muller, was also released alongside the anniversary album.

Revisiting B’Day in 2026 shows a pristine moment when Beyoncé was learning how to make an album visible. Nonetheless, one thing we have to make clear right from the start though is that Beyoncé did not invent visual storytelling in pop, nor did she invent the visual album. 

Long before B’Day, Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Madonna and more had explored strong visual identities for their music, while specific artists such as Missy Elliott had radically expanded what a Black artist could do with a music video. Missy's surreal environments, exaggerated silhouettes and playful approach to tech and fashion rivalled the status quo of music marketing around that era. 

Kelis known for her 2003 hit “Milkshake” was similarly unwilling to remain visually predictable, using fashion, colour, sexuality and experimentation to construct an identity that was inseparable from her music. Ciara, meanwhile, made choreography fundamental to the experience of her early records. Her body was not simply present in the music video; movement became part of the music's vocabulary.

Still, Beyoncé arrived within that lineage and showed how these elements could be consolidated around one of the world's biggest pop stars. 

B’Day was an unusually visual project for its time. Songs including “Déjà Vu,” “Ring the Alarm,” “Get Me Bodied,” “Freakum Dress,” “Suga Mama” and “Green Light” were accompanied by distinct visual identities, allowing Beyoncé to appear glamorous, confrontational, sensual, playful and commanding across the same album cycle. 

The scale became even clearer with the B’Day Anthology Video Album, which gathered 13 videos connected to the album and its deluxe material. The project transformed the record from a collection of songs with promotional videos into a body of music that could be experienced visually as well as sonically. 

That does not make B’Day the first visual album. It does, however, make it an important forerunner to the way Beyoncé would eventually approach the format of visual albums. When she would eventually release her self-titled fifth album seven years later, with a video accompanying every song, the visual album became an undeniable part of mainstream pop vocabulary. 

C/O Parkwood Entertainment and Youtube

Seen from 2013, B’Day might have been an early prototype. Black pop's visual history is much older than Beyoncé, but her contribution is instead one of consolidation and scale. 

Additionally, fashion was central to that construction. The clothes were not simply accessories to the songs; they helped establish the characters Beyoncé inhabited from video to video. 

Choreography worked in the same way. A song such as “Get Me Bodied” was difficult to separate from movement, just as “Freakum Dress” became culturally attached to an idea of dressing, confidence and physical presence. The music could travel through radio, but the image gave it another life.

That relationship between music and appearance would become increasingly important throughout the next decade. Rihanna made reinvention a central component of pop identity, moving through radically different visual eras without losing her recognisability while Kanye West is revolutionary in the way he developed album campaigns in which artwork, fashion, stage design and public persona increasingly operated as one creative system. Together with artists who came before them, these developments have helped establish the expectation that a successful album should have a world around it.

But Beyoncé would take that expectation further. Take Lemonade for instance, where she would eventually turn the visual album into a vessel for autobiography, Black womanhood, Southern identity and historical memory; or on the world her 7th studio album, Renaissance constructed around Black dance music, queer cultural histories, fashion and liberation. Cowboy Carter would use the scale of a Beyoncé album to interrogate country music and the place of Black artists within American musical history.

Those projects are more ambitious than B’Day, but that underlying instinct is familiar. The music is never expected to exist alone. That may be the most enduring significance of B’Day. It arrived before the contemporary pop industry had fully embraced the idea of the “era,” but it understood its potential. 

In that sense, B’Day belongs to a transitional period in global Black pop. Music television was still powerful, but digital culture was beginning to change how artists reached audiences. Fashion magazines, music videos, DVD releases, performances and celebrity photography all contributed to the construction of a star. Beyoncé was operating at the centre of that project and learning how to make those different forms speak to one another.

The result was not simply a successful album. It was a more expansive idea of what an album could be. That idea would eventually travel far beyond Beyoncé. Contemporary artists now, be it Ayra Starr, Tyla and more, release music surrounded by carefully constructed aesthetics, from photography and fashion to choreography, stage design and social media. Fans do not only stream albums; they study their visual languages, recreate their outfits and participate in their worlds. The “era” has become a standard way of organising pop culture.

Ultimately, Beyoncé did not create that system alone. But B’Day shows how early she was in understanding its potential. Two decades down the line, that may be the most revealing way to revisit the album. Its legacy is not limited to the singles we can name off the top of our minds; more readily its deeper significance lies in the way Beyoncé began treating “visuals” accompanying a song as part of the song's cultural life and promoting that tradition across contemporary music. 

Cover Credit: Parkwood Entertainment

Like several great inventions, House music has travelled continents, evolving into the diverse versions that defined it everywhere it went. 

Now, Something similar is happening in Nigeria. 

This present wave of indigenous Nigerian House-pop fusion appears to be one of House music’s strongest influences in the country’s music scene.  

Just as the French, the South Africans and Europeans localised House music for their audiences, Nigerians are now creating and playing House music that is textured with the accent, lingo and spirit of the community. 

  So why don’t we talk about ‘Nigerian House’?  

The music itself is harder to ignore on a Lagos dance floor. The four-on-the-floor pulse remains, but around it are sounds that belong unmistakably to the environment in which the music is now being made: Yoruba and Pidgin vocals, familiar percussion, Nigerian melodic instincts, indigenous phrases and singing patterns that alter the character of the electronic production carrying them. House may have travelled here from elsewhere, but somewhere along that journey, Nigerians began interfering with it.

This is what makes the current evolution of Afrohouse in Nigeria interesting. Nigerian artists are not simply adopting an existing global sound. They are interpreting it through their own languages, rhythms, musical traditions and experiences. As more artists, producers and DJs experiment within the space, Afrohouse is beginning to develop something that sounds increasingly like a Nigerian accent. But this isn’t entirely new. 

The foundations of “Nigerian House” dates back to a period before streaming platforms and the current explosion of electronic music culture

For instance, Niniola has spent more than a decade building a career around a sound she has consistently identified as Afrohouse. When she released “Ibadi” in 2014, she was entering a Nigerian music industry where the sound was still unfamiliar to many listeners. She has spoken about how people questioned whether the genre would last, particularly because she was singing Yoruba over house-influenced production. She also resisted record-label offers for years because she wanted to protect the sound she was developing.

Her story challenges the idea that Nigeria has only just discovered Afrohouse. What is happening now is less about introducing Nigerians to house music and more about watching Nigerian artists become increasingly comfortable deciding what house music can sound like here.

And this raises the more interesting question: what exactly makes Afrohouse Nigerian?

It would be easy to reduce the answer to indigenous lyrics, indigenous percussion or samples from older Nigerian records. Those things can certainly contribute to the sound, but they cannot be the entire definition. Nigerian music has never depended on a single ingredient to make it Nigerian. Sometimes it is language; sometimes it is rhythm; sometimes it is the way a producer rearranges a familiar musical idea. Sometimes it is the story being told or the audience for whom the music is being made. Nigerian identity can exist in the smallest details of a record without announcing itself loudly.

That makes the idea of “indigenous Afrohouse” particularly interesting and complicated. If the term is going to mean anything beyond a catchy description, it has to be about more than putting a Nigerian vocal over a house beat. It has to consider how Nigerian musical instincts are changing the music itself.

Yimeeka Olayinka's music offers one way of thinking about that question. Across records such as “Ola ” featuring Black Culture and her more recent “Ibadi ,” there is a meeting between electronic production and Nigerian musical expression. The language does not simply sit on top of the production as decoration; it becomes part of the identity of the record. Yoruba is allowed to occupy an electronic space without being translated into something more familiar to an international listener.

That matters because language can do more than tell us where an artist is from. It can determine the feeling of a song. A Yoruba phrase carries its own rhythm, inflection and emotional texture. When it sits over house production, the vocal is not simply bringing Nigerian content into a foreign genre. It is changing the way that genre is experienced.

Xylaa's “ìyà ni wúrà” offers another example of how indigenous language and cultural expression can occupy an electronic space without losing their familiarity. Even the title, which translates to “mother is gold,” carries a distinctly Nigerian cultural resonance. The significance is not simply that Nigerian words are appearing in electronic music; it is that Nigerian cultural references can exist there naturally, without needing to be introduced or explained.

This is one way genres change when they travel. A musical form can be reproduced as closely as possible to its original form, or it can be absorbed by a new environment and eventually emerge differently. Nigeria has a long history of doing the latter. Highlife, jazz, funk, reggae, hip-hop and other foreign influences have all passed through Nigerian hands and been reworked through local traditions.

Afrohouse is now entering that process.

The Nigerian accent is therefore not necessarily found in one particular sound. It can be heard in the language, melodies, rhythms, samples, vocal delivery and the decisions producers make about what should sit at the centre of a record. 

And if Nigerian Afrohouse is still deciding what it wants to sound like, the people helping shape that sound matters too. This is where Nigerian women become part of the larger story, not simply as women entering a male-dominated industry but as artists, producers and selectors helping to determine what the emerging sound can become.

Niniola provides a historical context. Yimeeka’s record demonstrates how Nigerian language and identity can move through electronic production while Xylaa shows how cultural references can remain central within an electronic framework. 

DJ Yin adds another dimension to the conversation. Her role illustrated that Nigerian interpretation does not happen only through singers. DJs and producers are equally important in determining which sounds reach an audience and how those sounds are experienced.

Her work sits within the overlap between Afrohouse, house and Nigeria's wider electronic music culture, demonstrating the importance of the person behind the decks in building a scene. A DJ introduces an audience to unfamiliar sounds, connects records that might not otherwise appear beside each other and can make a song that exists quietly on a streaming platform become the soundtrack to an entire room.

That fluidity is increasingly important in Nigerian music. A DJ can move from Afrobeats into house, from house into Afrohouse and into another electronic form, showing an audience that these categories do not necessarily need to remain separate. The listener may not care whether a record belongs technically to Afrohouse, Afrotech or another electronic subgenre. If the rhythm works, the body responds.

Together, these women point towards the same possibility: Nigerian women are not simply being added to an existing Afrohouse story. They are helping shape what that story becomes. 

However, that influence does not exist in isolation. 

Electronic music has historically depended heavily on the spaces around it: DJs, clubs, parties, festivals, collectives and audiences. A producer can create a brilliant record, but a scene needs somewhere for that record to live.

Lagos is increasingly providing those spaces.

The city's rave culture has expanded beyond the traditional club environment, creating rooms for DJs, producers and audiences interested in electronic music. Warehouse parties, outdoor events and alternative nightlife spaces have helped build communities around sounds that might not always receive the same attention on mainstream radio.

Afrohouse benefits from that shift because a sound needs an audience before it can become a movement. Listeners willing to spend a night with electronic music give producers permission to experiment. DJs can introduce records that might otherwise struggle to find an audience, while artists can collaborate across genres without worrying about whether every song fits neatly into a commercial category.

A scene therefore becomes more than the sum of its releases. It is the DJ who keeps playing the record, the crowd that requests it again, the producer who hears that response and makes another one, and the organiser who creates another night for that audience. These decisions may seem small, but they are how musical cultures develop.

The Blueprint For Nigerian House

This raises the bigger question: is Nigerian Afrohouse becoming a new genre?

The honest answer may be that it is too early to say. Calling it a new genre now could impose boundaries on something that is still evolving. The artists working within the space do not necessarily share one formula, and Afrohouse continues to overlap with other electronic forms. Some artists may identify strongly with the term, while others may simply consider themselves electronic artists.

That uncertainty may actually be the most interesting part of the story.

Perhaps Nigerian Afrohouse does not need to become a neatly defined genre. Perhaps what is emerging is something less rigid: a Nigerian production language within global electronic music, where Yoruba can sit comfortably over a house groove, Nigerian phrases can become the titles of dance records, indigenous references can exist alongside synthesizers and electronic drums, and DJs can move between genres without treating the boundaries as rules.

This matters because Nigeria's global musical influence has largely been discussed through Afrobeats. Electronic music offers another way for Nigerian musical ideas to travel. It does not require every record to sound conventionally Nigerian. Instead, it allows the country's rhythmic instincts, languages, cultural references and musical traditions to enter a global form and change it from within.

That is what makes the current Afrohouse moment worth watching. Not because Afrohouse is destined to become “the next Afrobeats,” but because it demonstrates what can happen when Nigerian artists encounter a global sound and refuse to leave it unchanged.

It may never dominate Nigerian radio. It may remain a relatively niche club sound. It may continue to overlap with Afrotech, house and other electronic genres without settling into a universally agreed definition. None of that necessarily makes it less significant.

Nigerian music has always evolved through collision. Older traditions meet newer technologies, local sounds meet foreign influences, and artists borrow, reshape and return those influences with something changed in the process. Afrohouse is now entering that cycle.

The Nigerian accent will not necessarily sound the same on every record. It may arrive through Yoruba vocals on one track, a Nigerian phrase on another, a familiar percussion pattern somewhere else, or simply through a producer's instinct for rhythm. It may be obvious or almost invisible.

What matters is that Nigerian artists are no longer approaching house music as something that has to remain untouched in order to remain authentic. They are making room for themselves inside it.

Perhaps the most interesting future for Afrohouse in Nigeria is not that it becomes a neatly defined Nigerian genre at all. Perhaps it becomes something less tidy and more useful: a space where Nigerian artists can experiment with electronic music until the distinction between what was imported and what was made here becomes difficult to trace.

The sound travelled to Nigeria. Now Nigeria is giving it an accent.

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Casper TNG, born and raised in Toronto, has quickly become one of the city’s most compelling new voices in hip-hop. Known for his melodic flow and introspective lyrics, Casper has built a loyal following through both his solo work and collaborations with other rising Canadian artists. His music reflects the diverse influences of his hometown and his own journey from the underground scene to the national stage. With a unique ability to blend personal storytelling and infectious beats, Casper’s sound captures the energy and ambition of a new generation of Toronto talent.​

Casper’s debut album, Draft Day, serves as both a personal milestone and a reflection of his environment—blending stories of ambition, struggle, and triumph. Overall, the project explores how his experiences in Toronto, the challenges he’s overcome, and the relationships he’s built have shaped the music. The result is an album that captures not only Casper’s evolution as an artist, but also the spirit of a city known for producing global talent.

We spoke with Casper about making his debut album, the experiences that inspired it, and the vibrant Toronto scene fueling his rise. Dive in to discover the moments, influences, and vision behind the music.

Where did the process of this album begin for you?

I started recording some of it before I got signed. I had a couple of songs that I was thinking about releasing, but I held onto them. Once I got signed in January, everything came together quickly. We made most of the project between January and April.

What was different about making this particular album than your previous work?

During this album, we did a lot of living. I got to have different experiences while I was recording. We travelled the world, and I was able to bring my friends along.

Experiencing a different side of life with my people and making great music out of it was special. I was putting those experiences on wax. The music has a different vibe because I'm in a different environment now. That's really the biggest difference.

How has being from Toronto influenced and impacted your musical style?

Everything about my musical style is Toronto. We have some of the biggest artists in the world here: Drake, The Weeknd, Justin Bieber, Tory Lanez. I grew up on all of them. They were a big inspiration for me.

The culture we grew up in here in Toronto has shaped my music. There are some really big shoes to fill, and that keeps me hungry and motivated to keep getting better and bigger in the game.

Who are some artists that have inspired you?

Definitely the Toronto and Canadian artists. Drake, The Weeknd and, honestly, people would probably be surprised, but I listened to a lot of Justin Bieber growing up too.

Then on the U.S. side, I listened to a lot of Kanye West and French Montana. On the R&B side, Chris Brown too. Those are the main artists I listened to growing up, and the ones that inspired me most to make music and keep making music.

In terms of building the sound and crafting the album, how was that process?

I wanted it to feel like a continuation of One Helluvalife, my last project with 100Bandplan. I wanted to keep the vibe the same.

That's why I made sure Heath Stone was involved. He produced "The Market" and most of One Helluvalife, so I wanted to keep the sound as consistent as possible.

I didn't want to leave the pocket I was already in just because I got a deal. I wanted to keep the ball rolling. If it's not broken, don't fix it.

When it comes to talent from Toronto, how do you feel about the hip-hop landscape at the moment?

I think we're in a good place.

It feels like everybody's at the top of their game right now. The Weeknd is touring the world, Drake's got the city going crazy with the music he's been dropping, and "The Market" is having a big moment too.

Younger artists are coming up with a lot of potential too, like 100Bandplan and some of those younger guys. The momentum is coming back to the city. The light is coming back to the city, the eyes are coming back, and in a few years there are going to be a couple of new names at the top of that list.

What does this particular body of work represent in terms of where you are in your artist journey?

That's really why I called it Draft Day.

Everyone who knows me knows I used to play basketball. I wanted to go to the NBA. Draft Day is the beginning of a player's professional career, but it's only possible because of all the work that came before it. Playing when you're a kid, AAU, high school, college. You have to earn that moment.

For me, Draft Day represents the start of my professional career. It's my debut album, but it also represents everything it took to get here. It's a fresh start and a new beginning.​

If you could play one song from the album that you feel people should hear, what would it be?

I'd probably say "Where’s Reed (Freestyle)”.

It feels really triumphant. It captures where my life has been over the past six months, and you can feel that through the music.​

Let's talk about ‘The Market ’; how did that song come about, and the collaboration with 100Bandplan and A Boogie wit da Hoodie?

"The Market" came together pretty naturally.

I found the beat before I went to the studio. I loved how it started with that Caribbean influence before it switched into trap. I'd always wanted to do something with that Caribbean sound, but I never wanted it to feel corny. I'm not really too good with the patois and all that, so I never wanted to force it. When I heard this beat and how it switched into trap, I knew I had to try something with it.

I recorded my verse and posted a Reel the same day, and it just started going crazy. It got way more love than I usually get.

Around that time, 100Bandplan had just come home from jail and released his single "Thought I Was Done," which was doing really well. I was watching that happen, and I felt he'd be perfect for the record because he'd bring something different and had built his own audience. We got him into the studio, filmed him recording his verse, posted that clip, and it took off.

When the song kept growing, my label asked who I wanted on a remix. A Boogie was one of the first names I mentioned, along with Central Cee. Through some mutual connections, A Boogie heard the record, liked it, and everything came together. We linked up for the video, and it was all good vibes.

I didn't expect the song to become this big, but it was an incredible moment for the city. It created another wave and another shift in Toronto's music scene.

What excites you most about where you are in this moment?

Knowing that this is only the beginning.

There's still so much I haven't done yet, and that's what excites me the most. I'm excited for everything that's still ahead.

You collaborated with A Boogie wit da Hoodie, are there any other collaborations we can expect from you?

I kept this project more Toronto-focused.

There might be a UK feature people can look forward to, but I wanted to keep the features to a minimum. I wanted to see what I could do on my own. I didn't want people to be like, "Oh, he has a song with this person," or, "He has a song with that person." I wanted people to like the songs for what they are.

I just wanted to introduce myself to the world and say, "Here I am. This is my music, and this is what you can expect from me." On the next project, I'll probably do more collaborations, but for now I wanted to build my own fanbase first.

Outside of your own music, you also launched PuzzL Music Collective Inc. Tell us more about that?

PuzzL Music Collective is about creating a platform for artists who take music seriously and share the goal of bringing Toronto's underground scene to the forefront.

I called it PuzzL because everybody's just one piece of the puzzle. You can't build it with just one piece. We all have to work together to reach the bigger goal: bringing Toronto's underground scene to the forefront and showing people the talent we have here.

We've got 100Bandplan, K Money, and I'm looking at a few more artists coming up in the city. Hopefully we can keep growing it. We'll see what the future holds.

​

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Ghanaian rapper Black Sherif announced Sun Sherif Vol. 1, Friday,with a post on X. "Thank You for Your Love & Patience," a note accompanied the post, with the EP confirmed to arrive September 4.

Since his breakthrough moment with "First Sermon" and "Second Sermon" in 2021, Black Sherif has moved through artistic personas deliberately — Blacko, Iron Boy, and now Sun Sherif. 

Back in 2022, the world got the first chapter of Black Sherif’s artistry in his debut album The Villain I Never Was. The storytelling was centered on a young artist from the gold-rich city of Konongo processing pain, identity and ambition. His 2025 sophomore, Iron Boy, pushed that plot further, focusing on someone who is learning to protect what he is building. The album featured Seyi Vibez, and Fireboy DML.  Since then, Black Sherif has also collaborated with Davido on his recent ORIADÉ album, expanding his ties with the Nigerian scene.  

Now, Sun Sherif reads like the other side of Iron Boy. This title suggests something warm, ambitious and magnetic.Whether the music delivers that same quality is a question September 4 will answer.

The "Vol. 1" framing signals something beyond a standard EP release. Black Sherif is building in installments, which for an artist who has released two albums and an EP in four years suggests he has found a creative rhythm he is not willing to slow down for a longer gap. At 24, Black Sherif is one of the most compelling figures in West African music.  Sun Sherif Vol. 1 arrives with no massive pre-release campaign, just an announcement and a date.

Sun Sherif Vol. 1 drops September 4 across all streaming services.

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With summer in full swing and the year more than halfway through, 2026 has already given us plenty to talk about. From long-awaited albums and songs that have soundtracked the summer to films, fashion moments, sporting spectacles and celebrity appearances that took over our timelines, these are the records, songs and pop-culture moments that have defined the year so far. 

Top Albums

January 16 

A$AP Rocky – DON’T BE DUMB

After years of delays, Rocky finally delivered DON’T BE DUMB, a maximalist return that moves between psychedelic production, sharp rap performances and the experimental instincts that have always made him difficult to pin down. The long-awaited release felt like both a comeback and a reminder of why his albums have always existed somewhere between music, fashion and art.

January 23 

Wizkid & Asake – Real, Vol. 1

Bringing together two of Afrobeats' most formidable powerhouses, this collaborative EP project fused Wizkid’s silky melodies with Asake’s high-energy, Fuji-infused choruses. The lead joint track "Turbulence" and fan-favorite "Jogodo" dominated playlists instantly. It set a high bar early in the year, proving that dynamic dual releases can redefine mainstream soundscapes. 

March 20

BTS – Arirang 

Marking their monumental return as a full group after completing their mandatory military service, BTS’s sixth studio album Arirang was a triumphant celebration of resilience and unity. Highlights like the title anthem "Arirang" and "SWIM" set instant global streaming records. Blending traditional Korean motifs – they’re known for – with sleek global pop, the record reignited one of the most powerful fandom movements in history.

March 27 

RAYE – This Music May Contain Hope 

Following up on her meteoric independent success, RAYE delivered a soaring, grandly arranged album that blended symphonic jazz, R&B, and raw narrative catharsis. The emotionally raw "Click Clack Symphony" (ft. Hans Zimmer) and “Where Is My Husband" became immediate vocal benchmarks across social platforms. 

March 27 

Slayyyter-WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA

Leaning hard into chaotic hyperpop, Y2K rock-pop textures, and unapologetic party anthems, this Slayyyter’s record delivered her most aggressive body of work to date. The project offered a high-octane soundtrack to internet culture, full of sharp wit, electronic bass drops and pop-punk flair.

March 28 

Kanye – Bully

Stripping back massive stadium arrangements in favor of raw, sampling-heavy production, Kanye West’s Bully offered a volatile yet undeniably captivating listening experience. The raw sampler cuts "Beauty and the Beast" and "Preacher Man" ignited widespread music-nerd debates online. The album leaned into unpolished minimalism, reminding audiences of his instinct for sonics. 

May 15

Drake – Habibti, Maid of Honor, Iceman

In a surprise triple-installment release, Drake delivered a sprawling look into his current headspace across three distinct projects. Habibti, Maid of Honor, and the icy rap Iceman sparked massive debate over which installment reigned supreme. Moving from global club tracks to toxic R&B confessions, the albums dominated streaming charts overnight.

April 3 

Omah Lay – Clarity of Mind

Omah Lay deepened his signature "Afro-depression" genre with an album that trades moody isolation for profound emotional clarity and spiritual reckoning. Standout tracks "Holy Ghost" and "Waist" highlighted his hypnotic vocal delivery and atmospheric production. It stands as one of the year's most vulnerable and captivating Afro-pop projects. 

April 24
Kehlani – Kehlani 

Self-titled and deeply personal, Kehlani’s latest body of work is a smooth, sultry celebration of self-love, queer romance, and vocal maturity. The silky "Folded" and "Back and Forth" (ft. Missy Elliot) had fans hailing the project as a modern R&B staple. The album effortlessly glided through contemporary textures, reaffirming her place as one of the genre's most consistent songwriters. 

May 1 

Asake – M$ney 

M$ney captured Asake at his most triumphant, delivering an anthem-heavy tracklist that celebrates prosperity, street hustle, and spiritual gratitude. Club-destroying tracks "Forgiveness" and "Gratitude" echoed through summer venues globally. 

May 1
Zara Larsson – Midnight Sun: Girls Trip 

With this deluxe, Zara Larsson delivered an unabashedly fun, dance-pop record designed specifically for high-energy nights out and summer festival mainstages. Hits like "Hot & Sexy" (ft. Tyla) and "Pretty Ugly" (ft. JT and Margo XS) provided an immediate soundtrack for the warmer months. Brimming with disco basslines and soaring hooks, it stands as a masterclass for the Swedish popstress. 

May 8
Little Simz – Sugar Girl 

With razor-sharp precision and flawless storytelling, Little Simz used Sugar Girl to dissect womanhood, fame, and artistic freedom over slick, jazz-influenced rap beats. 

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May 15

Tayc – JOŸA 

The French singer’s deeply personal and expansive R&B album blends afro-love melodies with cinematic storytelling with notable tracks like "Girlfriend" and "Va Loin" featuring Aya Nakamura, highlighting the project's smooth and soulful versatility. 

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LUCKI - Dr*gs R Bad 

For his fourth LP, Lucki’s record featured guest appearances from artists like Lil Yachty and Lil Baby to expand on his signature hazy trap style with more polished production and twenty new tracks 

June 5

Vybz Kartel – God & Time 

Reflecting on freedom, spirituality, and dancehall legacy, Vybz Kartel’s God & Time brought heavy-hitting riddims alongside deep, conscious storytelling. The project was a powerful reminder of his unmatched influence over global street sounds. 

June 19

YG – The Gentleman’s Club   

YG pivoted slightly from his classic West Coast bounce to present a smooth, cinematic album balancing gangsta rap roots with lush, vintage soul samples.

June 26

Kwn – And All Pride Aside 

UK breakout artist Kwn made a definitive statement with a debut project full of alt-R&B grooves, smooth vocal stacks, and vulnerable writing. And All Pride Aside captured the messy beauty of young love, marking her as an exciting new talent. 

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July 10

Baby Rose – Yearnalism

Anchored by her extraordinary, raspy contralto voice, Baby Rose delivered a blues-soaked R&B project that feels both timeless and deeply modern. Yearnalism is an acoustic and orchestral journey through heartbreak, longing, and self-actualization.

Kelela – New Avatar

Returning to push the boundaries of ambient music, electronic R&B, and club culture with a mesmerizing and ethereal album; full of tracks that offered a futuristic listening experience and floating over synth structures and club-heavy rhythms while acting as a sanctuary for reinvention. 

July 17
Steve Lacy – Oh Yeah?

Oh Yeah? found Steve Lacy continuing to blend lo-fi bedroom pop, funk, and psychedelic soul with breezy, effortless charm. Packed with catchy guitar riffs and relatable lyrics, the album serves as an easy-breezy backdrop to warm afternoons. 

July 24 

Tyla - A*Pop

Building on her meteoric global breakout, Tyla refined her signature blend of Amapiano, pop, and contemporary R&B on A*Pop. The Zara Larsson-assisted single "She Did It Again" and "That Girl” are some of the notable summer staples, packed with sultry vocals and club-ready rhythms – positioning her as a leading global pop princess. 

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Rico Nasty – RX

Unleashing raw punk energy over heavy trap and hyperpop beats, Rico Nasty’s RX is an explosive, cathartic musical trip. The project leaned heavily into themes of mental health and rebellion, offering an unapologetic sanctuary for alternative rap lovers. 

August 7 

Ariana Grande – Petal

For her 8th studio album, Grande leaned into delicate, dreamy whistle notes, acoustic arrangements and soft-focus pop-R&B production. The delicate title track "Petal" and "Hate That I Made You Love Me" showcased some of the most impressive vocal arrangements of her career and an intimate, ethereal glimpse into healing after intense public scrutiny. 

Davido – Oriadé 

Even though it’s not been a full month since it came out, Davido’s sixth LP is a majestic, star-studded celebration of royal African identity, success, and family heritage from one of Afrobeats’ biggest icons. 

August 14

Ayra Starr –arr Girl

Solidifying her evolution into a full-fledged global pop phenomenon, Starr’s latest offering is an intoxicating mix of Afrobeats, sleek pop-R&B, and dancehall influences. Fan favorites "Tornado" and the Zayn-assisted "Heaven Baby" took over timelines and radio stations worldwide - showcasing her undeniable and sharp melody-making ability. 

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Toronto traffic thwarted my plans to catch all of Kehlani’s openers, but I persisted. But I should have expected it, given that this stop on the Kehlani World Tour sold all 16,000 seats in the RBC Amphitheatre! For those who had tickets for her suddenly cancelled show in 2024, this show was a long time coming. 

The first thing I hear as I walk into the venue is the serenading voice of opener, The Arti$t. The New Jersey-born R&B artist expertly engaged the milling audience with different sides of their catalogue, including their viral 2023 single, “Sober”. Before heading off the stage, she made sure to enlist the crowd’s help to say a loud, “Thank you, Kehlani!”

Last but not least is the Grammy Award-winning Durand Bernarr. With an irresistible stage presence and a plethora of props, he took us on a sonic journey starting with his latest album, BERNARR, before diving into older favourites. He thrilled the crowd with his rapturous self-love anthems, impressive vocal runs and spontaneous dancing. By the end of his set, we were all cheering, laughing and feeling ourselves. 

After Durand Bernarr’s set, our MC and resident DJ, Wa$eel, set the mood further by playing some popular tunes before Kehlani took the stage. In chatting with us, he proudly revealed he was a proud Palestinian American, which was received with loud cheers from the crowd. His inclusion in the tour was no surprise since Kehlani has repeatedly shown support for the Palestinian cause. 

Once Kehlani arrived, the crowd was so loud that I could barely hear her. Her entrance was an entire event on its own, complete with intentional storytelling, colourful stage design, and a dance number that put all others to shame. It was immediately clear to me that this production was a well-oiled machine with Kehlani at her peak. For the most part, her performance centred on her latst self-titled project, but she made some space for past albums with fan favourites including “Piece of Mind”, “Hate the Club,” “Serial Lover,” and “Nights Like This”. 

Most of Kehlani’s performance had dance at the centre, but vocals weren’t skimped on, cementing her place as a top performer in modern R&B. Her dancers also received multiple spotlights, acting as her fictional friend group for the night as she took us through a fictional retelling of the night before. The dancers also joined her as she went around the stadium during a performance of the club-ready hit “After Hours” to get up close and personal with fans, especially those in the back. 

If it wasn’t already clear that the album, Kehlani, was an homage to the R&B greats, she made sure to restate the point by adding further nods through visuals and song arrangements. One minute, she was dancing like MJ, complete with a low-slung fedora, and the next she was merging her song “Serial Lover” with Ne-Yo’s “So Sick”. Another point she emphasized was her queerness. During the performance of “Oooh”, she and a female dancer engaged in some heated role-play, and the crowd went wild. This section of the tour has already gone a little viral, with many fans applauding her continued championing of queer rights and storytelling.

To wind down the show, Kehlani performed “Unlearn”, the heartfelt last track on her latest album and a self-proclaimed letter to God. She did so with the help of her openers (Dixson, The Arti$t, Durand Bernarr) and the crowd’s flashlights, which lit up the night sky. She took the time to praise each opener for their skill and thanked them for joining her on stage each night. 

Before diving into her last song, “Folded”, Kehlani also made sure to thank us for getting the song to where it did. “This song changed my life.” She joked that despite the haters, she’d never stop singing it and it would go down as one of the classic R&B party songs. Based on the numbers, she might be right; I can’t see any other song replacing “Folded” anytime soon. Singing along with the entire stadium was a perfect way to end the night. 

Image Credits: @chaz.arellano

Tyla and Ayra Starr have never needed to announce a rivalry. The internet did it for them. 

For years, the two African pop stars have been placed on opposite sides of an imaginary line. There are, admittedly, reasons people see parallels. 

Both artists are young African women who have turned music, fashion and performance into global pop currency. Both have built careers around Afropop-adjacent sounds while refusing to remain confined to one genre to reach a level of international visibility where their careers are no longer judged only against other African artists, but against the world's biggest pop stars. 

Both of their two latest studio albums add another metric to the comparisons. Tyla’s sophomore, A*Pop is a deliberate expansion of the sound she established with “Water.” At 14-tracks long, it continues to blend amapiano, Afropop, R&B and pop, while incorporating house, electronic production and dancehall. 

More importantly, it is her attempt to increasingly use her global platform to foreground the musical culture that made her. South African artists MaWhoo and Babalwa M appear on the album, while her reworking of Liquideep's “Fairytale” connects her current pop world to an older South African musical lineage. The FADER described the album as Tyla taking a more expansive role as both collaborator and cultural emissary, while the Guardian noted her ability to move between genres with the ease of an established pop star.

Starr’s eponymous Starrgirl takes a different route, moving between Afrobeats, R&B, pop, soul and other influences, bringing together collaborators including Wizkid, Zayn Malik, Leon Thomas, Rema and more. Critics dubbed it her most adventurous album yet, noting that Starr stretches beyond the boundaries of her earlier work without abandoning the musical ecosystem that made her a star.

That distinction matters because once placed side by side, what emerges is not two artists copying the same blueprint but ones testing how far African pop can travel without abandoning its roots.

But it could be their career histories that also show why the comparison has become so tempting. Tyla won the inaugural Grammy for Best African Music Performance with her hit single “Water,” in 2024 and won the category again in 2026 with “PUSH 2 START.” Ayra Starr’s “Rush” was nominated in 2024, while collaboration with Wizkid, “Gimme Dat,” was at this year’s awards.

Nevertheless, Starr has plenty of milestones of her own. Signed to Mavin Records, she emerged with 19 & Dangerous in 2021 before expanding her sound and ambitions on The Year I Turned 21, two already acclaimed records that have cemented her place in the genre; an increasingly international résumé, from becoming the first Afrobeats artist to perform on Glastonbury's Pyramid Stage to winning two MOBO Awards in 2025, including Best International Act and her international management partnership with Roc Nation which has expanded her career infrastructure. 

As much as the industry numbers therefore make the two women look like competitors, their actual careers make them look more like parallel examples of what African pop can now produce, which they captured perfectly in their 2023 collaboration, “Girl Next Door.”

Both artists have also adopted elements of the Y2K aesthetic that has dominated contemporary pop, appearing in tiny skirts, crop tops, low-rise silhouettes and deliberately sensual styling. Both use choreography as an important part of their performances. But none of these things belongs to either artist. The internet's treatment of choreography is particularly telling. Tyla's global breakthrough helped make Bacardi-inspired movement recognisable to audiences far beyond South Africa, but it’s not a dance style she invented. It is part of a South African cultural tradition that existed before “Water.” When Ayra incorporates similar movements, therefore, the question cannot simply be whether she copied Tyla. It must also be whether Tyla herself is being treated as the owner of a cultural form that is bigger than her.

The irony is that the accusations have gone both ways. Nigerian audiences have accused Tyla of borrowing from Ayra Starr, while South African audiences have accused Ayra of copying Tyla. The “original” changes according to which fanbase feels its woman has been threatened.

That is not really a plagiarism debate. It is fandom turning cultural exchange into territory. The women are not only compared as musicians. They are compared as women. Who has the better body? Who is sexier? Who dresses better? Who has the more desirable complexion? Who has the more “African” look? Who is more marketable internationally? Who is more original? Who deserves the bigger stage?

That’s never been accidental. The music industry has a long history of placing successful women into artificial competitions. Whether Beyoncé and Rihanna being framed as competing pop empires or Nicki Minaj and Cardi B in the female rap game. Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston were frequently reduced to the question of who had the superior voice. Yet those comparisons rarely function as neutral assessments of artistic differences. Women are expected to prove their greatness relationally.

There is a misogynistic scarcity built into that expectation. As opposed to men, women are more frequently presented as though only one can occupy the position of “queen.” They must be the prettiest, most talented, most successful, most fashionable or most desirable woman in the room and the Tyla-Ayra discourse reproduces that logic almost perfectly. 

Their bodies, skin color, clothes and even their relationships with peers is part of the argument. More importantly colourism is especially revealing here. Tyla's lighter complexion has been cited by some critics as evidence of the beauty privileges that can accompany lighter skin in Western mainstream entertainment, while Starr's darker complexion is sometimes invoked as an explanation for why she supposedly receives less international recognition. 

Those are legitimate structural questions worth examining, but turning them into ammunition against another Black woman only reproduces the competition that colourism itself helps create.

Then we add nationality — another already combustible comparison. Tyla's career is inseparable from South Africa, a country whose musical influence she has increasingly foregrounded. Yet South Africa's recurring xenophobic violence against African migrants, including Nigerians, has made her nationality politically complicated. In July, Nigeria publicly pressed South Africa to do more to curb attacks against Nigerians and other African migrants, with Reuters reporting deaths and the evacuation of nearly 1,500 Nigerians amid the latest violence.

Most recently when Tyla announced a Lagos stop on her A*POP World Tour, Nigerian social media erupted over whether the concert should go ahead amid the violence. Calls for a boycott followed, and days later the Lagos date disappeared from the tour itinerary. Crucially, there was no public confirmation from Tyla or her management that the removal was directly caused by the xenophobia controversy. The episode did however raise a difficult question about celebrity responsibility. Should she be expected to speak on xenophobia simply because she is South African? Or is that expectation itself unfair, effectively asking an artist to use their platform to become a spokesperson for the behaviour of an entire country?

Her later appearance at the South African Music Awards offered something less direct. Tyla spoke proudly about being African and expressed a desire to see a unified Africa. It was an affirmation of continental solidarity, but not a detailed public condemnation of the attacks that had triggered the Lagos controversy.

Starr's relationship to social issues is equally complicated. Nigeria has its own history of state violence and oppression, most notably the #EndSARS protests against police brutality. Amnesty International documented widespread abuses by the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, including torture, extortion and extrajudicial killings. Yet Starr should not automatically be expected to comment on every Nigerian political crisis simply because she is Nigerian.

But that has never been something new. It is the tension celebrities increasingly face. They do not owe governments political loyalty, but their platforms can become powerful cultural megaphones. When artists become international symbols of their countries, audiences inevitably ask whether representation should come with responsibility.

Rihanna offers another lens on that question, but her relevance to Tyla and Ayra is ultimately more personal. Tyla has openly cited Rihanna as a major inspiration, explaining that seeing someone from outside America achieve global superstardom made her believe she could do the same. On the other hand, Starr has also referenced the Barbadian mogul as her dream collaboration, but her relationship with the superstar has received a more visible public cosign – the Nigerian singer speaking about Rihanna's support and their interactions, particularly her publicly engaging with Starr's music. That distinction became particularly combustible in 2026 when Rihanna used Ayra's “Who's Dat Girl?” in a social-media post after the Met Gala moment involving Tyla. Online, the moment became evidence of a supposed hierarchy: one where Rihanna chose Ayra, therefore Ayra had won. Except she never said that.

The same misogynistic framework that turns Tyla and Ayra into rivals turns every celebrity interaction into a ranking system. A Grammy becomes a score, whilst forgetting some of the greatest artists of our time never won one or did so much later on in their careers. A song post becomes a cosign. A dress becomes evidence of copying. A friendship becomes a strategic alliance. Two women cannot simply exist in the same cultural ecosystem; their proximity must mean someone is winning.

That is why the Tyla-Ayra comparison deserves to be questioned without pretending the similarities do not exist. They are comparable. Their careers intersect. Their aesthetics overlap. Their music sometimes occupies neighbouring territory. Their awards histories give fans genuine material for debate. Their latest albums make for perfectly legitimate critical comparisons.

But comparison becomes misogynistic when it requires one woman to diminish another. The bigger story is that Tyla and Ayra Starr are succeeding during a period in which African music is becoming increasingly central to global pop. One is carrying South African amapiano and its surrounding musical traditions into new spaces. The other is extending Nigerian Afrobeats into a broader pop and R&B universe. Their success does not cancel each other out.

And maybe that’s what the internet finds hardest to accept. There does not have to be one African female pop star. There does not have to be one winner. Perhaps the most radical thing these two women can do is exactly what they appear to be doing: build careers big enough that there is no longer only one space at the top.

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In an exciting blend of soundscapes, British artist Skyla Tylaa, Kenyan singer Sofiya Nzau, Deepa and American star Chloë Bailey’s latest offering, “Makuhia,” is a striking balance of amapiano,house,, R&B,and traditional East African vocal styles. 

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The track’s title “Makuhia” loosely translates to coming closer or approaching in Nzau’s native language Kikuyu – a not so new occurrence for the singer-songwriter whose sound has often combined Afro-house and EDM influences with contemporary tunes – ultimately paying off with her big 2023 breakout when Brazilian DJ and producer Zerb remixed her jam, “Mwaki.” 

Now, with the new release Nzau builds on that distinct identity coupled with both Tylaa and Bailey’s backgrounds to elevate it further.

The latter two have already built a name in their respective lanes, namely Tylaa’s unequivocable presence in the UK’s electronic music scene as a DJ and producer, bridging Caribbean-inspired tunes with South African amapiano and deep house textures – in turn helping in promoting African club genres at an international level. 

Bailey on the other hand brings her refined R&B sound and discerning production to the mix. Coming onto the scene at first as part of acclaimed sister duo Chloe x Halle and going on to pursue a solo career, it's fair to say she’s made a name for herself in the industry – not to mention the evolving vocal range and versatile performance style.

Ultimately at its core, “Makuhia” attests to what can happen when artists from different musical and cultural backgrounds meet without having to flatten what makes their respective sounds distinctive. Instead, the collaboration allows Kikuyu vocal traditions, amapiano, house, electronic music and R&B to exist within the same space, creating something that feels both rooted and outward-looking.

It also arrives at a moment when African music is increasingly being heard through unconventional combinations and unexpected collaborations. As artists continue to take sounds born on the continent into new genres, scenes and markets, “Makuhia” is part of that new wave showing how cultural specificity is becoming a strength rather than a barrier and one major way through which they [sounds] aren't simply being exported, but reimagined, shared and given new life on a global scale.

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Right now, Afro Plus Fest is the hybrid, one-of-a-kind movement standing proud as the largest independent, Black-owned Afro-Caribbean and Hip-Hop festival in the United States. And the reason it’s thriving as such is simple: intentionality.

From giving deserving local talent a main-stage platform alongside global titans, to intentionally bridging African, West Indian, and African-American cultures under one roof, the festival exists to celebrate the roots. African culture serves as the original blueprint for modern pop music, and by bringing Afrobeats, Dancehall, Amapiano, and Hip-Hop together, it showcases versatility and a shared life experience.

At the center of this movement is founder Michael “Legendary Mike” Awosanya, a Nigerian-American entrepreneur, Towson University alum, and Prince George’s County native, alongside his core team. That tight-knit group includes Derick leading production, Bri handling marketing, Grace heading festival operations, and his sister Bussy Awosanya directing partnerships. After eight years evolving from local DJ battles, dance competitions, and parties, the brand grew into Afro Plus Fest in 2025.

Now, the momentum is increasing. Expanding from a sold-out, single-day debut of 20,000 attendees at the RFK Festival Grounds, the festival expects to welcome a projected 120,000 guests across a sophomore three-day weekend in next month’s Labor Day (Sept. 4–6, 2026). Set at the Northwest Stadium Complex in Landover, Maryland, this year's experience features world-class headliners like Wizkid, Davido, Tems, Ayra Starr, Alkaline, Lil Baby, Latto, Chief Keef, and Sexyy Red across a main stage and sub-genre hubs like the Piano District and La Vibe. Beyond the music, the immersive campus includes an expanded cultural marketplace, a diverse lineup of local and global food vendors, and brand-new features for '26 including an interactive on-site basketball court and a full-scale carnival.

For Michael, bringing a stadium-level event back home to Prince George’s County isn't just about scale; it’s about driving substantial economic impact back into the community that raised him. Where many organizers forget their roots once they reach this level, the Afro Plus team remains intentionally focused on community wealth, multi-generational connection, and real-people impact.

We sat down with Michael to talk about the origin, the ethos, and what it takes to build a movement on your own terms.

Q: For anyone just discovering Afro Plus Fest, how did this start, and what does the name actually mean?

A: "This didn’t start as a festival. Back in 2017 it was DJ battles, dance competitions, and parties. Then it grew. We brought Burna Boy out in 2018, ran Heatwave DC in 2022 with Asake, and launched Afro Plus Fest in 2025. It really crystallized after years coordinating events across the DMV and watching these different sounds collide in the room: the whole thing was built on one simple truth: Afro is everywhere. You hear it in Afrobeats, obviously, but also in Hip Hop, in Dancehall, in the fashion, the slang, the way the whole world moves right now—that’s the 'plus'. The name is 'Africa, plus more,' and to me the plus is the full, unfiltered expansion of global Black culture. We're taking Afrobeats, Dancehall, and Hip Hop and building space for everything that feeds our identity from style, beauty, wellness, gastronomy, and hospitality to local business ownership and real community wealth. African culture is the foundation of global pop culture, and this festival reflects that reality."

Q: The whole thing is built on a “block party” feel. Where does that come from?

A: "That’s my DNA. I grew up in Prince George’s County, Nigerian-American, and the block party is exactly that upbringing: high energy, everybody outside, community first. It’s built to hit whether or not you know every artist on the bill. The energy is the point."

Q: You could take this to New York or Miami. Why plant a stadium festival in your home county?

A: "Because Prince George’s County raised me. This one’s for the people who raised us. PG County has one of the most vibrant, prosperous African diaspora communities in the country; major destination hubs are cool, but bringing 120,000 people to the Northwest Stadium Complex in Landover is deeply personal. Building something this size in our own backyard lets us funnel an estimated $40 to $60 million in economic impact right back into the community that made us. Created for us, by us, in the place that made us."

Q: A stadium event needs buy-in. How much did being a native matter?

A: "It mattered everything. You can’t scale to this level without your community and your government in the room: the county executive, the governor, the city council, all of it. That financial and logistical support from local entities is essential, and being from here is what opened those doors and made the relationships real."

Q: The 2026 bill runs Wizkid and Davido next to Lil Baby, Alkaline, Sexyy Red, Chief Keef, Latto, Tems, and Ayra Starr. What story are you telling with that map?

A: "Lineage and connection. Traditional live music infrastructure always tries to box genres into separate lanes, and that framework is completely outdated compared to how our generation actually consumes. Putting Tems, Ayra Starr, and Alkaline on the same bill as Chief Keef or Lil Baby shows how African, Caribbean, and American sounds feed off each other in real time. You can catch Wizkid or Davido on the main stage, walk to the Piano District or La Vibe for deep Amapiano and electronic sets, then hear Hip Hop heavyweights all in one night. Afrobeats, Dancehall, Hip Hop, R&B, soca, Amapiano: it all lives together. The dedicated hubs let us spotlight hyper-localized sounds that are actively shaping global club culture."

Q: Pairing street artists like Chief Keef and Sexyy Red with Olamide and Tiwa Savage, what’s the philosophy?

A: "Street culture is global diaspora culture. The raw energy of American Hip Hop shares the exact same DNA as Dancehall or street-pop out of Lagos and Accra. Putting those artists side by side breaks down artificial respectability barriers; it reflects what real people are actually bumping in their cars, in their headphones, at day parties, across nightlife. My curation comes straight from that world; I came up as a nightlife promoter, so I book what’s moving the club right now. Down the line we might play with a more nostalgic vibe, artists who haven’t performed in a while, but this year was about high-energy, recognizable hits."

Q: Does anything happen on that stage you can’t get anywhere else?

A: "That’s the magic; this festival is an accelerator. We bridge producers, writers, and artists in real time. Gunna and Wizkid performed 'Forever Be Mine' live on our stage for the first time ever. That’s the whole thesis: put these worlds together and something new comes out of it."

Q: Someone can come purely for the music and leave connected to the whole culture. How do you design for that?

A: "Music gets people through the gate; the environment creates the core memory. New this year we’ve got an interactive on-site basketball court, a full-scale carnival, and an expanded cultural marketplace packed with Black-owned vendors: fashion, beauty, wellness, lifestyle, plus food and beverage. You come for a headliner, but on the walk between stages you’re eating authentic West African or Caribbean food and discovering local DMV designers. We designed an immersive cultural campus so no two days feel the same. We love being the bridge between all of it."

Q: On food specifically, how big is that operation?

A: "It’s serious. We run 94 food slots with 80 to 90 unique vendors and global cuisines across the board. The onboarding is intentionally rigorous and tedious, because we need vendors ready for real volume. Some of these businesses bring up to 20 staff a day to keep up with the crowd."

Q: You’ve carved out a whole section for hometown talent. What are you looking for, and what does it unlock for them?

A: "Authenticity, work ethic, distinct regional character. For years DMV talent and local DJs got passed over by the major festivals despite driving the whole local scene. Through 'Made in the DMV' we book 10 to 15 regional artists Mannywellz, Foggie Raw and an almost entirely local DJ roster, and we put them in front of up to 40,000 people a day right next to global superstars. That’s direct access they’ve earned."

Q: This isn’t just a party, it’s an economic engine. How do you balance stadium-scale commerce with staying community-rooted?

A: "We measure success by community payout, not just ticket revenue. Last year our small business vendors averaged $22,000 in a single day. Scaling to three days at a stadium turns us into a direct economic pipeline for minority-owned vendors, security teams, production staff, creators. When the community around you profits directly from your growth, scale and roots work in complete harmony. The first year alone drove an estimated $10 million in local impact; this year we’re projecting $40 to $60 million into PG County and the region."

Q: You’re doing this without major corporate backing. What does independence cost you, and why hold onto it?

A: "Real talk: production costs this year are two to three times what they were last year, and we’re carrying that without a safety net from big institutional sponsors like Visa or Amex. We run on our own internal sales and financial model. That independence is the point: it forces us to build a permanent, self-sustaining economic engine instead of renting someone else’s. When we do bring on partners, brand alignment comes before the check; a sponsor has to match the energy of our crowd, not dilute or commodify it."

Q: How do you define success beyond the attendance number?

A: "Life-changing opportunities. Full-time and part-time jobs, vendors who change their livelihood in a weekend, local artists who get elevated. When the lights go down on Sunday, Sept. 6, success is 120,000 people from everywhere feeling completely seen, safe, and celebrated in Prince George’s County vendors setting record sales, hometown artists feeling bigger, and the community taking pride in what we built at home."

Q: It’s explicitly all-ages. Why was that non-negotiable?

A: "Because our culture is inherently intergenerational. The music our parents played in the house directly shaped the Afrobeats, Dancehall, and Hip Hop we make now. An all-ages space. Is it lets high schoolers, college kids, their older siblings, and their parents share the same grounds. Last year we had families pull up three generations deep. I watched my own mom celebrating with her friends. That was the goal."

Q: It started as an Afro-Caribbean space. Is it only for that community?

A: "Not at all. The core is the Afro-Caribbean diaspora, but the energy is contagious and the door is open to everyone dancehall, soca, amapiano, hip-hop, trap, Afrobeats, whatever brought you. The proof is organic: random people now walk up and tell me they’re part of the 'Afro Plus' community. That’s a movement, not a marketing line."

Q: Who’s actually building this with you?

A: "A tight-knit team locked in since our Towson University days in 2014 we built a family around this. Derick leads production, Bri runs marketing, Grace heads festival operations, and my sister Bussy Awosanya is our director of partnerships while she’s also out here working as an OB-GYN. I came up promoting college parties in this region for over a decade before we ever touched a stadium. Year one was an 80-day turnaround at RFK on pure grit and adrenaline; year two forced me to step up as an executive and the team to scale production fast."

Q: Where does Afro Plus go from here?

A: "The next move is expanding the footprint into major diaspora hubs here in the US and abroad while we keep our momentum in the DMV first. By 2031 I want Afro Plus as a four-day festival doing 50,000 to 60,000 a day, still based in the DC area but operating internationally, creating consistent year-round employment and pioneering how Afrobeats bridges cultural gaps. Long term, we’re proving an independent, Black-owned, next-gen team can build stadium-level infrastructure on our own terms, keep full ownership, and pour tens of millions right back into our communities. The possibilities are endless."

The world was thrown into mourning on Tuesday as music icon Dolly Parton passed away from cancer aged 80.  The news was broken by her family in a heartfelt video clip posted on her social media channels by her nephew Bryan Seaver. A private service will be held for close family in the coming days. In place of flowers, her family has also asked for donations to the Dolly Parton Imagination Library.

Dolly Parton was an American singer, songwriter, actress, entrepreneur and philanthropist born in Tennessee in 1946, who rose from Appalachian poverty to country music stardom.

Across six decades, songs including “Jolene,” “9 to 5” and “I Will Always Love You” made her a global pop-cultural figure, alongside a successful career in film and business.

Beyond entertainment, ventures such as Dollywood and her Imagination Library literacy programme extended her influence into philanthropy and American public life.

Fun Facts About Dolly Parton

Nelson Mandela chose 'Jolene' on Robben Island

During his 27 years of imprisonment, political prisoners were occasionally permitted to play music over the loudspeakers. When Mandela's turn came, he chose a 1973 song by a white woman from Tennessee. 

His fellow prisoner and anti-apartheid activist Tokyo Sexwale confirmed this on the NPR podcast Dolly Parton's America: "He loved Jolene. No human being cannot be affected by Jolene." It says something specific about the reach of a voice that was never limited by the audience it was made for.

She Advocated For the End of Apartheid  

Her relationship with South Africa was complicated and honest about its complications. In 1982, Parton performed at Sun City in Bophuthatswana during the apartheid cultural boycott - a decision she later publicly regretted, acknowledging she had not understood the political situation at the time. 

She subsequently pledged not to perform in South Africa under apartheid. 

In 1996, she also collaborated with Ladysmith Black Mambazo on a cover of Cat Stevens' 'Peace Train' - discovering the legendary isicathamiya group on a television commercial and bringing them to New York for the recording. Joseph Shabalala's son Sibongiseni described her as a "cultural ambassador" after her death, noting that the collaboration "affirmed a mutual respect and created a lasting bridge of shared humanity through song."

‍She Supported the US Black Community

Her support for Black communities in the United States was consistent and rarely performative. When asked about Black Lives Matter in 2020 following George Floyd's murder, she told Billboard: "Of course Black lives matter. Do we think our little white asses are the only ones that matter? No." She said this as a 74-year-old white Southern woman with a massive white conservative fanbase and substantial business interests tied to Southern tourism. 

In 2018, she removed "Dixie" from the name of her dinner attraction after learning the word's Confederate associations offended people. "As soon as you realize that something is a problem, you should fix it. Don't be a dumbass," she said.

When Whitney Houston transformed 'I Will Always Love You' into a global phenomenon for The Bodyguard in 1992, Parton invested the royalties into a strip mall in the Black section of Nashville, specifically because she wanted to be among Houston's community. 

When Beyoncé covered 'Jolene' on Cowboy Carter in 2024, Parton had been campaigning for that cover for years. She appeared on the album herself, on the interlude 'Dolly P' and the song 'Tyrant'. 

Her Imagination Library, the childhood literacy program she founded in her father's memory, has provided over 200 million free books to children - specifically including books that reflect Black children's experiences, with Hair Love as a featured pick.

‍She Built Dollywood For The Kids 

Dollywood is Dolly Parton’s theme park in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, rooted in the culture and landscape of her native Smoky Mountains. Opened under the Dollywood name in 1986, it combines amusement rides with live music, Appalachian crafts, Southern food and storytelling, becoming both a major tourist destination and an extension of Parton’s cultural legacy.

Generally, Dolly Parton never claimed to be a civil rights activist. She claimed to be someone who listened, reconsidered, and fixed things when she learned they were broken. For a white Southern woman from poverty who built one of country music's most successful careers, that turned out to be enough to matter very specifically to people she was never required to care about.

Dolly Parton was 80. She is survived by her extended family and by a body of work that, as Mandela demonstrated, has a way of finding the people who need it.

The 18th Headies Awards has unveiled its full nomination list, with the ceremony confirmed for October 23, this year,  in Toronto, Canada. The year in review for the nominations stretches fromAugust 2024 till July 2025. However, as is typical with award shows, its most significant story is not the familiar names at the top.

FOLA leads all nominees with 10 nominations, including top categories like Afrobeats Single of the Year with 'You', Best R&B Album with Catharsis, Best Recording of the Year, Digital Artiste of the Year, Best Male Artiste, Best Headies Collaboration with 'Lost' featuring Kizz Daniel, and Writer of the Year. For an artist who has been building steadily and deliberately outside the mainstream conversation, 10 nominations is the industry catching up to what most fans already knew.

Davido followed closely with the second highest nominations, earning nods in 8 categories — driven largely by one song: 'With You' featuring Omah Lay —  including Song of the Year, Afrobeats Single of the Year, Best Recording of the Year, Best Headies Collaboration and Viewers' Choice. For the rest of the Big 3, Wizkid's 'MMS' and 'Jogodo' - both with Asake - clinched Song of the Year and Afrobeats Single of the Year nods respectively. Wizkid's album Morayo is also in contention for Afrobeats Album of the Year.

The Song of the Year category brings together Kunmie's 'Arike', Poco Lee, Shoday and Rahman Jago's 'Hey Jago', Ayra Starr's 'Hot Body', Fido's 'Joy Is Coming', 'MMS' by Asake and Wizkid, and 'With You' by Davido and Omah Lay.

Then comes Next Rated - historically one of the show’s most contested categories - features Fido, Fola, Llona, Mavo and Shoday together.The category reflects a generation of artists who have been building genuine fanbases and critical credibility in parallel, and the competition this year is as close as it has been in recent memory.

The 18th Headies will hold in October 23,  in Toronto.

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Toronto was soaked in rain on Saturday night, but the moment  Asake stepped onto the stage at Scotiabank Arena none of it seemed to matter to the thousands of fans caught in the downpour. The Nigerian star had arrived in the city just two days after opening the North American leg of his “In God We Trust World Tour” in Chicago.  By the time he appeared onstage the arena was packed and ready to give itself over to the music.

The Toronto stop was reported as a sold-out show, another major arena moment in Asake’s steadily expanding global run.

Interestingly, there was also a sense of unfinished business. When Asake last performed at Scotiabank Arena in 2024, the show received a mixed response. Two years later, he returned with a much more considered production such as live musicians, dancers, instrumentalists and enormous LED screens and the difference was immediately apparent.

Asake’s entrance established the visual language of the night. Dressed in white, dark sunglasses covering his eyes and “GIRAN” emblazoned across the back of his first outfit, he stepped onto a stage where every performer was dressed in the same colour. The effect was striking against the darkness of the arena, while the screens behind him supplied an ever-changing stream of elaborate graphics. There was a sense of scale to the opening that made it clear this was a leap for Asake’s stagecraft. His dancers moved around him with sharp precision, while the instrumentalists gave the songs a fuller presence beyond their recorded versions. Asake himself remained at the centre of it all, moving easily between choreography, vocals and the loose crowd interaction that has become part of his appeal.

That becomes particularly obvious when the bigger records arrive. “Lonely At The Top” turned the arena into a huge singalong, but the reaction grew even louder when Asake reached “Sungba” and “Fuji Vibe.” The latter felt especially fitting in a room this large. Its Fuji influence is central to Asake’s musical identity but here it became something communal, with thousands of people shouting the words back at him. “Mr. Money With The Vibe,” “OBA,” “Uhh Yeah,” “Asambe” and “Ligali” kept the momentum moving, while “Remember,” “Badman Gangsta,” “Forgiveness” were also highlighted as the night’s standout moments.

At one point, Asake briefly disappeared for an outfit change, leaving the musicians to take over the stage. Rather than functioning as filler, the interlude became a performance in itself as The Compozers ran through familiar Asake hits. Their presence is important to the show. Asake’s music has always carried a strong relationship with rhythm and live instrumentation, and hearing those elements expanded onstage gives the songs another kind of experience.

When Asake returned, the change was noticeable. His second outfit leaned further into the night’s glamour sparkling beneath the stage lights as he moved back into the performance. The dancers, musicians, costumes, lighting and graphics all worked together to give the night its own visual identity.

For all the scale of the production, some of the night’s best moments were the simplest. During one performance, Asake spotted a woman in red in the crowd and turned his attention towards her, serenading her as the audience watched. For a few minutes, the vastness of Scotiabank Arena seemed to disappear. It was playful, spontaneous and intimate. 

Still, the biggest moments belonged to the music. “Sungba” had already sent the arena into a frenzy, while “Fuji Vibe”brought out another enormous response. “Badman Gangsta” and “Remember” were other particularly loud moments, and when the familiar opening of “Worship” arrived, the audience barely needed Asake to lead them. 

What makes the Toronto show particularly impressive is how naturally Asake’s music translates to this scale. His songs are built around rhythm, repetition and movement. The live musicians sharpen the rhythmic edges, the dancers amplify the physicality of the songs, and the graphics give the music a visual world to inhabit.

It also makes the scale of Asake’s progression difficult to ignore. In 2024, his Toronto show left some fans feeling that the performance itself was stronger than the overall concert experience largely because of the brevity of the set. This time, there was a greater sense of occasion around his arrival. The production was more ambitious, his catalogue had grown, and the performance felt built around the breadth of what Asake has accumulated in just a few years.

By the end of the night, the rain outside had become an afterthought. Inside, Scotiabank Arena was still moving with thousands of people singing, dancing and holding their phones above their heads as Asake worked through the final stretch of a catalogue that has grown remarkably quickly.

For all the talk around Asake’s international growth, it is moments like this that make the progression tangible. Two years after a Toronto show that left some attendees wanting more, Asake returned with a performance that felt bigger, fuller and more assured. 

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If you meet Llona and you don't already know he's an artist, chances are he will tell you he's a farmer.

It is the kind of answer that stops you for a second  , because he actually means it. Or perhaps, it is just something he says.  And once you spend enough time listening to him talk about his new album, "On The Road," you start to understand why.

Patience. Farming is patient work. It requires you to keep tending to something even when you cannot see the result yet. And this  is also the philosophy behind Llona’s  sophomore project.‍

The Concept of Motion 

Ask Llona what "On The Road" means and he will not give you a straight answer about touring or travel. He will tell you it is about motion itself, as a discipline, as a way of staying alive to your own work.

"You cannot tap in motion if you're not moving," he says. "You cannot sit and tap motion. We have to be on the road. Consistency, because that's all I have."

It sounds simple until you realize how literally he means it. The recreational vehicle that anchors the album's visual identity barely leaves Lagos, he admits it himself, barely holding a chuckle in.The vehicle is not really about geography. It is a symbol for a mental state, for staying in forward motion even when the body is standing still.

"I wanted to give my own POV of what I see," he explains. "On the road means I'm outside, I'm seeing different faces. I needed them to see what I was seeing, so they'll be able to feel it just like I did."

He was, in the literal sense, on the road for seven months while building this project. And he is careful to note that the motion did not come at the cost of care, it moved alongside it. "I just keep the motion going. I'm inside, but at the same time, I'm making sure that I'm not moving too fast from them. I'm making sure I'm healing while I'm moving, while at the same time, go, go."

There is an unspoken wisdom in that line that repeats throughout the conversation:the idea that healing and progress are not sequential. "If I have to wait for me to be at peace with whatever is going on with me before I, I don't think, I think I'm gonna have to wait forever. So I just keep the motion going."

The Road To Llona

Before there was Llona, there was Tooclasiq, a version of himself he describes with a kind of gentle distance now. "When I came in, even with Tooclasiq, I was not sure of what I wanted. So I think when I transcended into Llona, I figured a lot of stuff out."

“Figuring it out” happened far from the industry entirely. He worked as a security officer before Lagos. He taught nursery and kindergarten, the only male teacher at the school, standing in as support staff for the lead teacher, helping small children rehearse a marching parade for an interhouse sports day with none of the proper equipment. "No matter how, even though we didn't have the equipment and the resources, we still did our best," he says.

And then there is the lore of the phone. To shoot the video for his song "Comforter," recorded in the north after what he describes as a spiritual pull toward Kano, he sold his phone to fund it. He stayed in the north for three months, and it became the period where his real questions surfaced. "Why am I giving Lagos what they already have? Why am I not giving them where I'm from, and how I'm built?" That question, more than any single record, is what pushed him to stop performing an aesthetic and start building from something original to himself.

 Afro Depression Or Not?

For an artist known for emotionally rich, introspective songwriting, Llona pushes back hard against one label in particular.

"I hate that," he says, when the phrase Afro depression comes up. "I don't sing music for you to be depressed and wallow in your depression. I don't go to the studio because I want to go and sing a depressed song. That's weird."

It is the sharpest moment in the entire conversation, and a necessary corrective. His music sits with difficult feelings, but the intent, as he describes it, was never to keep listeners stuck inside them. If anything, the through line of "On The Road" argues the opposite, that movement itself is what carries you out of the heaviness, not around it.

He is candid, too, about the quieter periods people mistook for silence. "You get people thinking I stopped working," he says. "But there was a lot I needed to figure out and make sure we were in place and able to put in place for my people." He talks about wanting his fans to know they were not just streamers, they were concertgoers, ticket buyers, people willing to travel to experience the music live. Building that infrastructure took time the internet does not always account for.

The Twelve Disciples of Llona

Every Llona album, he says, has twelve tracks, and that number is not incidental.

"My own songs are my own disciples," he says. "Send them to the world to go preach. The fact that there are twelve in number, I think they're going to age well. And even when I'm gone, far, far gone, they'll still continue telling the world about my gospel."

It is a striking way to talk about a tracklist, less like a collection of songs and more like a mission. Each record carries a piece of him outward, built to keep speaking long after the album cycle ends, long after he is not the one doing the talking.

That is the real meaning behind "On The Road." Not a tour, not a vehicle, not even a genre. A commitment to staying in motion, sending the work ahead of himself, and trusting it to keep moving once he lets go.

Llona has already told us who Anger Management represents. The other eleven, he's kept close. So we're turning it over to you: which disciple do you think each track on "On The Road" carries? Drop your picks, we might just run the best ones in the next issue.

                                     

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Since 2012, Tekno has been evolving as a maestro at his craft. From writing Davido's 'If', to co-producing Kizz Daniel's 'Buga (Lo Lo Lo)', and building the legwork dance into a cultural staple before the internet had a name for his style, he’s been scoring feats only expected from pros. Then, one day in late 2018, he announced that his voice had given out-and at the peak of his career.  What followed was a 12-hour surgery in the United States, over $2 million in refunded show fees, and months of silence that he has only just recently to speak about publicly. Throughout his ordeal, one thing that kept him going besides the music was his daughter.Now, his third album, Where Did Love Go? arrives as a new chapter in his journey. It’s his first album release with emPawa Africa and a trove of deeper expressions from the 33-year-old crooner. Catching up with Deeds, we spoke about his surgery, his favourite track on the album, what his voice means to him now, and what Billie Eilish calling him her favourite artist actually says about the reach of his music.

Sophia For Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself?

Someone that loves to live life to the fullest. Music makes me happy.

You wrote “If” for Davido, co-wrote and produced “Buga” for Kizz Daniel, helped build the sonic language of Afrobeats in the 2010s and yet the conversation around your legacy often feels incomplete. Why do you think it may be the case?

It will be complete in due time. I think everything happens naturally. You get me? The story being complete is me as an artist deciding I'm walking away and I don't want to make music anymore. And then we can say, oh, he left it at that. As long as I'm out here still making music in due time the story will be as complete as it needs to because everyone has their own route in it.  So it's like you just let it play out and we all see.

You were diagnosed with muscle tension dysphonia - a condition that robbed you of your voice for months while a fraudulent doctor charged you $1,600 per session telling you that you were recovering. You eventually had a 12-hour robotic surgery in the US and refunded over $2 million in show fees. What was the moment you realised how serious it actually was?

Normally when you perform, you scream while performing, you would have a sore throat and say anywhere from one week to two to three weeks. The sore throat was normal. I think when it was two months, three months, and my throat still felt like, what? What the hell is going on?  That's when I really started getting scared. Something is definitely off. But also on the night of my show in Ghana, when this happened, we were supposed to go out and party that night. But you know like when you just have this weird feeling in your body like something has happened.  But I couldn't really place what happened. I just said, I don't feel okay. I'm good, but I just don't feel right. I don't think I want to go out tonight.  But I didn't realize at this time that my vocal nodes had been mashed up. But I think three months, two months to three months is when I realized this thing is not going away. This might be a little more serious than I thought. That's when the fear really kicked in.

You have spoken about contemplating suicide during that period. What kept you going?

My daughter. I don't play with that. There was a time I went two weeks without speaking and to be quiet for two weeks straight. Yeah, it was definitely one of the hardest things I think in the world that really put me to the limit. And to actually go through that and find out there was no improvement. Dude was just lying to me. That right there was what made me like, I want all this to stop.  Because we did, ''Don't talk for one week''.  I went back basically after one week. He wanted me to go two weeks without saying nothing. In the process of two weeks without options in the world, bro.

Coming out of that experience, how did it change the way you approach making music - specifically the voice you almost lost?

I think I'll show that in this movie or book or something. There's not enough words for me to describe or elaborate it properly.  I think that would be better told in a book or movie.

Where Did Love Go? is your third album and your first since joining emPawa Africa. Why was now the right time for this project and why emPawa?

emPawa, because Eazi and I are family. Together, you know, but with a contract. I don't know if that word is correct, like just obligations. I had contract with the company I was working with before I decided to move to emPawa. And with the album, I feel like I just enjoy making music so much and it probably took me a while to realize that. And before the years out releasing another album still. So I feel like that was the kickoff. The next one will be halftime and the following will be full time and it doesn't stop and it keeps going. 

“Wedding Day” is your favourite track on the album. There’s something specific about watching people you’ve performed for at their weddings separate shortly after. How much of this album is personal observation versus something more universal?

I would say Adaeze, but Wedding Day can take it. I won't have a problem with that.  Not someone that's really into marriage that much (laughing) but I would say Adaeze. But like Wedding Day, I can definitely have it for sure.

Personal observation hm, I actually have a friend that it happened to. Two years ago I was at a wedding performance. Before, I used to say make it sound like it's her fault because me and the guy in question were friends. But then someone in the future later told me, "Don't be like that” because you don't know it from her perspective. There's always three sides to a story.  This side, that side, and what actually happened. So in retrospect, I don't know if it was her fault, I don't know if it was his fault. But I was there at the wedding and they didn't even last a year, six months and it was done.

In the world where we live basically, this happens every day. And hearing stories and actually knowing one personally kind of really shapes the idea of where love is right now.

Billie Eilish has called you her favourite artist. What does that kind of recognition from someone outside the African music ecosystem mean to you?

I guess, like, if. If the food is sweet, it's sweet. You get me? It won't matter if you have a Portuguese tongue or a Nigerian tongue or a Jamaican tongue. If the taste is fire, like, it's definitely going to hit them violets. That's basically how I say it. 

Your dancing is as much a part of who you are as your voice - the footwork, the legwork, the effortless movement that was part of your visual identity before Poco Lee and that whole wave made it a full culture. Do you feel like you get enough credit for what you started on the dance floor, the same way the conversation around your musical contributions sometimes falls short?

I feel like I actually do, if I'm being honest, when we talk about just the fans that actually love me that would ask me “when are you gonna do a video where you're just dancing?” We were in the studio session one time, and we had Bankuli and a couple of people, and he had, like, these two artists he was working with. I think one of them is a female, 14 or 16, like, but they're still, like, growing, like training her to, like, you know, grow up. She asked me a question. I said yes. She said, are you still gonna dance and do this and do that? I was just laughing so much.

So I feel like to those that it really matters that they do know it. Also, I'm not the only person dancing on the internet. There's a bunch of people dancing on the Internet, so I'm not gonna try to, you know, want all the glory or the credit to myself. It's like me dancing on the Internet brought a bunch of smiles to a bunch of faces around the world. So for that, I'm satisfied enough with that. So I wouldn't really care as much as who gets the credit, who doesn't get the credit.  Michael Jackson is my biggest inspiration, and he's not even here to get the credit. You get me?  So, yeah, it really doesn't matter.

 So that means if we want to see you dancing, we should watch Pana?

No, no, I got something coming for y’all. Say nothing.  Say less.  Say less.  I have a track coming. It's called NO. In this track, the embodiment of my footwork is there from start to finish.  It's a lovely one. I look forward to that.

As we wrap up - Where Did Love Go? is being described as “slept on.” What do you want people to understand about this album that the streaming numbers might not be saying?

The mistake people make a lot of time is, people want to keep track of everything.

I don't look at it like that. You get me? It's art. Keep making art and keep putting art out. I'm not worried about all that. Like saying, oh, the streaming is this, or the streaming is that. People got a lot going on in their life, and the algorithm has switched from, oh, like, this is beautiful music.  Listen to it. They're looking for trends and they're looking for virality. You get me? The whole world is actually singing music. So, like, to be able to make music and put it out on its own and itself is a blessing.

So if you enjoy the process of what you do, you don't really care too much about all this, because if I specifically did it just for the numbers, streaming and what people have to say about it, other than actually enjoying it, I most likely won't be here making music, to be honest.

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Stonebwoy calls his sound "Afro dancehall" - a blend of Afrobeat, reggae, dancehall, highlife and traditional African styles that he has been refining since he was a teenager in Ashaiman, Ghana. His 2012 debut, Grade 1, introduced an artist fluent in Ghanaian street rhythms and Jamaican dancehall grammar. Three years later, he had clinched honours at notable awards including the Ghana Music Awards and the Black Entertainment Television (BET) award, rising to the limelight of African Pop. Born Livingstone Etse Satekla, the 38-year-old bard has spent over a decade building a musical identity that moves between continents without losing its roots, and a festival - Bless His Imperial Majesty - that has grown from Ghana's biggest artist-led event into one of the country’s biggest cultural exchange arenas with immense global reach. Its eleventh edition arrived at OVO Arena Wembley this August, making Stonebwoy the first Ghanaian artist to headline the iconic venue. Catching up with Deeds Magazine, he spoke about cultural bridges, what collaboration actually requires, and why the music connecting Africa and the Caribbean has always been the same music.

Sophia For Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and your music?

I will introduce myself as Livingstone Etse Satekla by birth and Stone boy S T O N E B W O Y as artist name. My music is a combination of music of black origin, you know, all from whether created from Africa or created from the diaspora. Specifically Afrobeats, high life music, reggae music, dancehall music, hip hop music, pop music, traditional musical style.  So that's the fusion of it all. That's how I describe my music.

I coined the term Afro dancehall, which would now become the representation of all these styles that I have since been propagating and been largely known for globally. So once you type ‘Afro dancehall’ out on a search engine, you find out that there's one Stonebwoy who is a pioneer behind that terminology..

You grew up in Ashaiman and built a career that now leads to OVO Arena Wembley. When you trace that journey - what was the moment that changed everything?

The moment when I decided to be very determined.  The moment when I could see in my mind's eye, in my vision platter, that I have a goal to achieve, I can feel it beat strongly inside of my heart.  I can feel the fire burn and know that I am destined to actually contribute to the musical ecosystem of Africa in my era.  That is when I took it all very, very seriously. This has been from inception. I am one of those kids who would realize their talents from a very young age and begin professing it and expressing it. So it just got more serious as the days went by and you know, here we are today and I'm not relenting.

BHIM Festival turned ten in 2025 and now moves to London. When you started it, did you see it becoming what it has become or did it outgrow the original vision?

It is actually what it is because it was fundamentally created to give myself a platform that is befitting of hosting people from all walks of life at the end of every year, so that whatever it is, before the year started, those who would have traveled from the diaspora and returned home, those who would find some time to listen to some good music and some great performance, would all gather together and listen to my style.  The same that I have actually described to you.

Because most dominantly you find out that these are not the type of typical styles that any artist possesses easily, encompassing or putting together all these influences and trying to make them into one sound. So I needed a platform that would continuously give me the time, the freedom to express myself through the audience. 10 years running, and this year is the 11th year. From inception, it was hosted at one of the biggest capacities in the country.  From year one then we knew that was the standard that were supposed to maintain and God being so good, all efforts, etcetera, put together, we have been able to become the single artist led festival that has done the biggest capacities or continued to do the biggest capacity in Ghana, while also bridging the gaps between African music and Caribbean music, most especially music of black origin, because that is the true purpose of the music that we do or that I do. That is the whole vision and mission behind it. So bringing it here in the 11th year in the heart of London for the first time is amazing.  It's the biggest. At the capacity where it's like very.  Where it's like, what do you say?  Iconic, if I can say that or it's an iconic place.

You know, Wembley, OVO arena and still with the same purpose, same energy bridging African music, especially Ghanaian music, with Caribbean style and selling it to the world and creating such an atmosphere that people would be able to continuously identify themselves as who they are and enjoy their own creative in terms of music that comes out.

Headlining OVO Arena Wembley makes you the first Ghanaian artist to do so. What does that specific milestone mean to you personally?

Personally, it makes me feel like I'm dancing to a P-Square song. 

You should get the punchline (laughing)  

Anyway,on a more serious note, the brand Stonebwoy and its team are actually relentless when it comes to breaking the envelope and representing Ghana and Africa. This will not be the first ever milestone that has been broken by the brand Stonebwoy and its associates. The BHIM Fest itself is the only festival that has done two times across Port Stadium 40,000 seater capacity into 50,000 plus twice and done other stadiums across Ghana as well. That on its own is historic right there. So bringing it here in a capacity where it's a taste that is breaking the first time and Ghanaian artists coming in to do the OVO and at this capacity it is just in line. But it will interest you to know that was not part of our plans to be the first. We just realized that is what we have become again, you know.

The London edition brings together African and Caribbean music on one stage. You have spent your career arguing that Africa and the Caribbean share something musically and culturally. What is something you think others still ignore about that cross-cultural connection?

Yeah man, there are a few things that people ignore and those are people who do not seek to know anything about history, anything about roots. To a large extent and primarily they would be denying themselves of self identity and as such you find out that, there is some amount of something missing, when it comes to their self identity. So it is very important for some people, us who actually are born from the motherland, who actually would pay attention to history and read and learn to educate ourselves and also send that information across. We have various forms, we have various media that we can use in today's time to make that communication easy, bringing about the cross cultural connection to be stronger and stronger. 

Because the Caribbean at the last African Union meeting has been agreed to be the seventh region of the African states. So that tells you that we are all definitely also economically one.  Why would it be so? It would be so because the leaders and the political handlers of the Caribbean states, they would actually know better and understand.  When you go to Sudanam, you see the West African culture predominant inside of their living.  When you go to Guyana, when you go to some, I mean when you go to most of the Caribbean countries, you realize how very prominent the African culture is in them.  And all this is carried through DNA's practices that were left uncovered.

It is very important for us black people globally to understand that we have to continue to live in the vision of those who have come and spoken and sacrificed for us, which is the Kwame Nkrumah, the Marcus Garvey, the Martin Luther Kings. And you know, all of this, it doesn't take anything away from us. It doesn't hurt to self identify.  And all that can only be done through creative arts and culture and commerce. So for us who actually are practitioners of creative arts and culture, we want to use the music, the movies, we want to use all aspects, all mediums, you know, to continue to bring together and solidify the bridge of oneness amongst black people globally. And BHIM fest does nothing but that, you know, which is its core mandate.  So yeah, man.  For those who do not really want to recognize that, I wish that they do because without true self identity, there's no fulfillment in existence. Yeah, man.

You blend reggae, dancehall, Afrobeats and Ghanaian sounds in a way that feels natural rather than calculated. Take us inside the studio sessions; what does the process look like?

Yeah, man, the process is a beautiful one. When you, when you dig into a day in the life of Stonebwoy in a studio, it's very interesting that all these influences that are carefully calculated in the mathematical, you know, formula of my DNA, it comes out easily.  You know, I am one time, I'm giving some style that will represent the Caribbean vibe. I'm giving some style that is typically high life. I'm giving some style that is typically reggae. So I would say that to come this far, it's very fluid for me to do. And that is how we continue to enjoy Stone Bwoy style, Stone Bwoy brand. I think it is not entirely alien. It has only built on its style because these styles that I'm referring to, I've always been in the African system. We have legends who have traveled and have done so much in that same context. But what Stone Bwoy has done is to continue it in a light that is even much more, very authentic. To export into the Caribbean audience. Yeah, man.  So that's how I can tell you once when you catch me being creative, it just flows, you know, over the years that I have had experience at what I do.

You've collaborated with Sean Paul, Beenie Man, Burna Boy, Stormzy, Davido, Angélique Kidjo. What does a collaboration actually need, for you to work just beyond two names on a record?

A collaboration definitely goes beyond the two people on a song. It brings the strengths of one artist together with those of another, creating something even more powerful. It also represents unity and brings people together, especially when you have the opportunity to work with one of our elders, like Angélique Kidjo, who has been in the industry for more than 40 years. I had the opportunity to collaborate with her again during her 40th-anniversary concert at the Royal Albert Hall, which was my first time there. It was beautiful to experience that crossover and connect with her audience. Collaboration is something we should always insist on and continue to push for. It reaches far beyond the music. It brings different fans and listeners together and merges different styles. That is what makes it so beautiful.

Afro-dancehall as a sound has been growing, you've been central to that conversation for over a decade. Where do you think the sound is going, and what role does Ghana specifically play in it?

Thank you very much.  The sound has definitely gone global. Not to say it's going global.  It's gone global because it is supposed to be freedom. Afro dancehall is supposed to be the vehicle, you know, that all African artists, which I can give names, who are influenced by music of black origin, especially reggae, dancehall to be able to measure that into their indigenous African styles and express them without apology, because I think 15 years ago, it was not actually cool. It was difficult for an African artist to have the freedom, to be able to expand their creativity, be it being influenced by some reggae, some dancehall, which would have been dominant or which is still dominant in Africa, you know what I'm saying? There was some level of fright, there's some level of segregation that, oh, you are not Jamaican. Why are you trying to?  You know what I'm saying? But then I came in to make them know you do not have to be Jamaican once you are African. You have what it takes equally as a Jamaican, because a large number of Jamaicans, historically, through DNA, whatever, are black people, which you also are. 

Much of the creativity we possess lives in our DNA. It does not exist only in the instruments we play or the drums we beat; it is in our blood. So I can, they can, and all of us can. I have been giving that Afro-dancehall energy and pushing the ideas and teachings behind the sound, and it has created a lot of freedom.

I see it becoming even more global. I recently released a project featuring 16 young, up-and-coming artists whose influences stretch across African music, reggae, dancehall and hip-hop. You should hear how beautifully they express themselves on the record, touching on all these influences at once. It was not always like this. A movement like this will continue to grow, become global and create more freedom.

That freedom is important because creativity thrives in freedom. Without freedom, you cannot create. That is what Afro-dancehall is here to provide: room for people to express themselves freely. That is why I exist and why I can speak my Yoruba, my Ga, my patois and my English. I can sing all of it. [Sings.] You know what I’m saying? Anytime, anyhow; freedom of expression. That is what Afro-dancehall represents.

You were recently at Rema's London listening party. There's a generation of African artists operating at a genuinely global scale right now. What do you think the generation that built the foundation - yourself included, is still owed in that conversation?

I think we deserve the respect, you know, and the honor and that's what is very important.  And the mention, you know what I'm saying? Because it's like honoring your father. It only creates room for you to be honored when you become one. Because as a child today, a father tomorrow, a grandfather, the next time, and a great grand the other time if God gives you life, you know what I'm saying? So if you honor your parents or you honor your elders, you are also going to be honored by the children who will come behind you. So I think what we deserve or what we require is honor because we have made it at least easier for the generation behind. Using Rema as a typical case study. I'm so excited about his new body of work. And all I see, all I hear in the new body of work is Afro Dancehall...(sings Rema’s Tea) It’s like this vibe. Yeah, I told you already, freedom. So when I met him at the other, at the event, it was just beautiful, you know, that would be the third or the second time we are meeting. He always expresses a lot of honor towards me in person and says, Yo OG! I say, I'm too young to be OG now, you see?  So that's it, where we deserve a lot of honor. I'm telling you, the key is that once they bring honor to us, they're going to be honored as well. You know what I'm saying? Because, yeah, that's just it. That's just it. I'm happy and excited to be a part of that school, as you would even mention, you know, that we are still contributing to that effect. 

As we wrap up - beyond the show, what do you want people to understand about this chapter of your career?

God bless you. Beyond the show, this chapter of my career is going to continue to be a global chapter. Most primarily, I want the world to know me for that African child that persistently sent some amount of education, was very proud to be black, not only at colour, but proud to invest in himself as an African child and inspire the next African child wherever they find themselves on the globe.

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Twenty years after he stepped into the Nigerian music industry, Timaya is celebrating a career that has moved from dancehall, reggae, Afrobeats and Nigerian Pop without settling in one box. 

Last Saturday the Bayelsa-born singer marked two decades on stage with a special performance at Indigo, The 02 Arena in London, bringing together the music that carried him from his early days as “Plantain Boy”. 

His solo career began in 2005 when he dropped “Dem Mama”, a song that showed he was willing to confront serious subjects. The record, which addressed the Odi Massacre of 1999 in Bayelsa, became the foundation for his debut album “True Story” which was released the following year. 

“Gift and Grace ”, followed in 2008 before  “De Rebirth”expanded his reach with “Plantain Boy”, a record that cemented his streetwise personality and dancehall-infected sound that became central to his identity.

By the time “Long Life N’ Prosperity ” and “Upgrade” arrived, Timaya had established himself as an artist that is capable of turning everyday Nigerian language, slang and experience into songs and records that were built for movement.

“Upgrade ”, released in 2012 also produced “Bum Bum”, one of the songs that became synonymous with his name and got an international remix that featured Jamaican dancehall star, Sean Paul. 

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His 2014 album, “Epiphany” continued the run with Sanko while bringing together collaborations with artists including 2Baba, Olamide, Phyno, Patoranking, Terry G and Sir Shina Peters. The album reflected Timaya’s ability to move between Nigerian pop and Carribean-influenced sounds without losing the identity he had built for himself. 

After several years of singles and collaborations, Timaya returned with Chulo Vibes  in 2019, an EP that featured Burna Boy, Machel Montano and Alikiba. A year later, Gratitude   was born which included “Gra Gra”, “Balance”, “I can’t kill myself”, “Don Dada”,  and “Born To Win”. 

His catalogue continued to grow with Gladiator  , released in 2024. The album had featured collaborations with Tiwa Savage, Olamide, Phyno, Konshens, Enugu and Mr Killa, which included songs like “Get My Money Right”, “Sweet Us ”, “Dey Your Dey ” and “In My Head”. 

Even with the fast changing sounds and beats, Timaya continued releasing music in his own style. His recent catalogue includes “Big Man Ting”, with Skiibi and Teni, Patek with DJ Obi, Odeshi  with Flavour and Yung Alpha and his 2026 single “Only God ”. 

Twenty years in, Timaya’s catalogue tells the story of an artist who has consistently adapted without abandoning the sound that first made him recognized. From Dem Mama, to Bum Bum, Sanko, I Can’t Kill Myself and Only God, the records chart more than just a career, they document sounds and moments that shaped Timaya as a person, brand and career over the last two decades.

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His London anniversary was therefore a celebration of longevity, effort and adaptability.  It was also a reminder of how much music Timaya has deposited into the Nigerian soundscape and how many of his songs have soundtracked the scene's evolution in the past two decades.

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‘Expansion.’ That’s the recurring remark Kenyan singer-songwriter and producer Njerae emphasizes throughout. Now, with the release of her two latest singles, “On My Own” (featuring KayCyy) and “Let Them Know,” she might be doing just that. 

Since her breakout  hit “Aki Sioni” off her 2022 debut album, Unintentional, Njerae’s natural aptitude to emote infectious tunes have resonated with fans who have dubbed her ‘lover girl’. With three studio albums in, across Afro-indie, R&B and Soul, becoming Kenya’s most streamed female artist last year, and being named among Apple Music’s Rising Class of 2025 is testament that Njerae has earned her mark in the game.

Deeds Magazine caught up with the ‘254’ crooner to chat about her artistry so far, the region’s music industry at home and the ambition to keep expanding her sound further.  

Stanley for Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself? 

I’m Njerae, a singer-songwriter, producer, and performing artist from Nairobi, Kenya. The OG one and only ‘lover girl.’ My music is geared towards human interaction, but mostly around the love side and the struggles and, you know, the things that come about with being in relationships, both platonic and intimate. I mostly focus on R&B but I am currently in a space where I'm trying to explore more and my two new songs are part of that exploration process. 

Every era of your music has been a slightly different version of you figuring yourself out. What has manifested as your strongest growth?

I think more than anything, music has kind of given me that space to explore my vulnerability and to embrace that as well. Sometimes it can be hard to speak about the things that you want to speak about and for me from ‘Unintentional’ all the way to now, the most important thing is to allow a space where people can feel heard. So I try to write about the things that you wouldn't conventionally stand up in front of people and talk about. It's very in-depth with the emotion and vulnerability; honesty is something that I carry at the top of everything. I think the more honest the music is the more in touch it is with people. From my debut to now I've just been trying to allow myself to think deep into emotion compared to when that era where it was more of just doing this for vibes and whatnot. I’m more intentional with it now.

Where’s the line for you between being vulnerable in your art and protecting Njerae the person?

It's definitely an important thing. I like to protect my personal spaces. There's very many things outside of music that are part of my life that not everybody knows about. I'm not exactly shying away from tapping into that energy but at the same time, I'm also very aware to keep it separate from personal aspects of my life. So I will write a song about something that happened, but I'll keep away from specific details, that will make people get the full story. The whole idea is not for you to feel like the story is about Njerae, but it's about somebody, and it happened to Njerae as well.

Do you think you’ve become better at knowing when to hold on and when to let go of a relationship?

Yes and no. I think I've definitely grown from where I was, just from interactions that I've had even through the music. But at the same time, I still think I'm a human being and I'm still figuring everything out and the whole point of my music is for people to realize that, like, all of us are just in a space where we don't really know what we're doing. We want to seem like we do but we're all going through the same kind of shenanigans and we're trying to figure out. And we shouldn't feel like we're alone because certain problems may feel out of the norm. So the idea is not necessarily to be this kind of portrayed as a person who's 100% perfect and knows what they're doing. Personally, I'm willing to fail just so that I can show other people that you can overcome these things.

With KayCyy, you already had “Far Away,” so I’m curious about what changed between that collaboration and this one in “On My Own”? 

Well, the first time it was definitely like an introduction to each other. We were still trying to figure each other out. I think with “On My Own” now, we've gotten a deeper understanding of each other. And we've also both grown as artists since we did “Far Away.” So in the new song, we're just trying to find a common ground and figure out how these two worlds can meet because KayCyy has his own world that he lives in and I have my own. And the single was kind of like trying to figure out how to bring those two perspectives together.

And “Let Them Know” feels like a different kind of vulnerability. You’ve written about love and heartbreak before, but is there something about the way you approach those emotions now that feels different from your earlier work? 

I think right now it's more like an empowering voice. Before, it was more like, I'm a bit afraid. but the whole point, it's important right now for me, for people to realize that I am in a space where I have chosen to be in this space and I am doing these things because I want to do these things and despite what comes in between, I'm taking charge of and I'm taking control of my situation and the whole idea for both these two songs, is for them to have an empowering feeling rather than a bitter feeling. I feel like most times when it comes to love matters, people come out of it very bitter and they forget that it can be something that can help them grow.

Do you think success has made you more confident creatively, or has it actually made you more self-conscious? It's definitely come with a lot more freedom for me. Before I was in a space where I had to focus on several things at the same time, and now I'm just enjoying being in this space where I can just create and focus on the creation. I don't think I have so many limitations because I have a team behind me that's handling everything. I'm very grateful for the success. Let more of it come, please. [laughs]

What makes you hear a person and think, “I need to make something with them”? Is it the voice, the writing, their personality, or just that inexplicable chemistry?

I love to write from a point of when we know each other and we have a relationship. It's easier that way because the things that we write about are deep and emotional. That's not something that you can do with everyone. So I prefer to write with people who I have a personal connection with. But like I said, the ultimate goal is expansion. So I am open to working with artists and producers from not only Africa, but all over the world. Yes, be it through connection or not, I think it's a beautiful thing to see how these two musical worlds can collaborate with each other. At the end of the day, the whole point is for the music. So it's not necessarily about the relationship all the way. The music that comes out of it is what matters the most for me. 

What has working with other artists taught you about your own sound? 

It's super empowering. We're at a time where all eyes are on East Africa, which is amazing, and I feel honored personally to be a part of that squad that's carrying the Kenyan flag high. It's definitely hard. I think throughout all of my interviews, I've mentioned that I am very introverted and music has been a space for me to like come out of that situation and to open myself up more. So I've been doing that whilst also growing not only as a musician but as a person, which I love. And ultimately the goal is for this music that I'm doing to be like my own kind of therapy, you know. So if it's going to help me in my own personal life, not only in the music aspect, then it's doing a good job.

‍From where you’re sitting, what do you think the Kenyan music industry is doing well – and what are we still seriously getting wrong?

I think that we're in a good place where a lot of people are confident enough to put out their music and have their own shows. It's not something that we'd see a long time ago. I think we're still struggling in the consistency aspect though. That's the one thing that is holding us back from moving to a global stage. But other than that, I like how passionate people are now. It's no longer just about doing music for the money, but people are doing it because they see that it can actually work for them. And we're in a space where creativity is therapeutic to a lot of people. So it's important for mental health and whatnot, like just your daily livelihood.

So it's nice to see that we're in a space where music is embraced a lot more, not just as a career, but, you know, there's people who are doing like they're singing in like hospitals or, you know, they have people who are going to like children homes and they like just engage in like music situations. The whole point is just seeing how many artists are coming out of this industry, is just seeing the impact that music itself is having on the people.

Do you also think we as the Kenyan audience are becoming better at supporting homegrown music or talent, or do the Kenyan artists still have to prove themselves abroad before we fully appreciate them here?

We're at a very good time as artists not only in Kenya, but also East Africa. We're having so many shows that are sold out and it's not from people who are even coming from abroad. It's like our own. We've literally been having concerts weekly that are sold out and you'll be having the same people performing and people will still come out and watch the performances. I believe that we're going up and up. I love the place that we're in, people are listening and we're into more Kenyan music. Even the DJs are pushing out more Kenyan music. Artists are also putting in more work to upgrade their products. And I hope that we're able to maintain that same momentum and see where things go.

You’re also signed with Universal Music East Africa at a point when you’d already built a pretty distinct identity for yourself. What did you refuse to compromise on when you entered that system?

My message and my sound. Those are the two most important things for me to remain. I got signed at a time when 90% of my fans were letting me know how my music was very therapeutic to them. And every single time they listened to it, they just felt nice, refreshed, alive and like they could conquer the world. And for me, it was very important that that feeling is carried on even when I'm in the label. Both of those, especially my sound – the root, the core foundation of where I've come from. Yes, I'm doubling into like different genres and whatnot, but the co-foundation of who Njerae is, is something I don’t think that can change.

Having experienced the industry from several angles – independent artist, major-label artist, songwriter, producer, performer; if you could go back and give the Njerae who was just starting out one piece of brutally honest advice about the music business, what would you tell her?

It's not going to be easy. You're going to want to quit 75 times, but it's going to be so fulfilling. Personally, I'm glad that I've stuck out and I've made it through all these years and that I'm still doing it. The goal is for someone else to see me and think the same thing. I think just to tell her you should have started early, you should have gone through these things a lot earlier. It's not an easy journey, but it is definitely worth it. 

Speaking of fulfillment, you sold-out your first Australian solo tour, which is such a different experience from performing for people who already know your story at home. Did being that far away from Kenya change the way you understood your own music or who your audience actually is?

A hundred percent. I think being here for a long time made me believe that my music is not moving farther than just here. But going to Australia I got to learn a lot of things, not only in the music space, but just to realize myself as an artist. Like I'm a dope person, and I'm doing my due, so I shouldn't be second-guessing myself. And I think that was the most important thing. Now I've come a lot fresher. I am so ready to just release some music. I've been writing a lot of stuff and I'm excited for people to hear as I share my experiences.

You’ve had a lot of things happen recently that look huge on paper – the international touring, the recognition, the AFRIMMA nomination, the numbers. What is something about this stage of your life that actually feels huge to you?

I think my fan responses are usually what get me the most. A lot of people will send me messages, they DM me, I interact with a lot of fans and like shows and stuff and just being able to have that one-on-one, first of all, is super. And just realizing how, aside from the fanbase and everything else, this music actually really speaks to them and it makes them feel good. So, yeah, that's usually the biggest win for me.

Now, looking ahead, you know, what are you actually trying to build, you know, not just the next song, you know, award, album?

Right now, I'm focused on expansion. I am looking to take Njerae to a global stage. So East Africa, outside Africa and we take this Kenyan sound to the rest of the world. The whole idea is pushing these collaborations and working with people that are not necessarily from our industries to just take our culture also to the other side.

You've also spoken quite a bit on some of your dream collaborations with people like Bien and Tems. Is there anything in the works and who’re other people out there that you want to work with?

What I can say is I've had a couple of interactions with some of my dream artist collaborations and their input has definitely made what is coming out right now. I won't really speak on collaborations. I don't have to spill too much tea, but yeah, I have delved into their brains and I've been able to also walk into their world, which is super amazing. Even just having coffee with Bien would finish my life and I'm still on that journey to find Tems. [laughs]

And lastly away from the serious artist questions. If we took away the music, the interviews, the stage and the whole Njerae persona, what is something completely unserious or slightly embarrassing that would immediately expose you as just a normal Kenyan girl?

I think I'd say I'm super clumsy. I bruise easily and I am very clumsy. So yeah, sometimes you'll see marks on my legs, which are just weird, random scars.

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IG:@_stanleyilonzo

All photos courtesy of Njerae/Tofauti Vibes

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For 15 years, the annual Hennessy Cypher has showcased African hip-hop talent across the continent and its diaspora. Each year, it curates a selection of artists representing the new class of rich, diverse talent across the continent.

Since its inception, the cypher has featured Didi B, Maglera Doe Boy, Octopizzo, Blaqbonez, Sarkodie, Zlatan, and M.anifest, among others. Its sonic DNA has evolved with sounds that have grown across the continent, showcasing the music's growth and evolution year after year. This year's class features Suspect 95 from Côte d'Ivoire, Yanga Chief from South Africa, Kwesi Arthur from Ghana, Fena Gitu from Kenya, British-Nigerian rapper Enny from the United Kingdom, and Tenor, who made history as the first artist from Cameroon featured in the cypher.

Produced by Sarz, the track showcases the diverse range of artistry and what each artist brings to the cypher, as creativity from the continent continues to flourish. From Afrobeats to Amapiano, African talent has grown in global reach and dominated over the last few years.

Hip-hop across Africa is vibrant and diverse, spreading from Senegal's Francophone sounds, like Positive Black Soul, to Ghana's highlife influences, like Ebo Taylor, and Southern African artists such as Nasty C and Cassper Nyovest. Each region brings its own individuality, allowing artists to identify and express themselves through poetry, lyrics, instrumentation, and emotion. It also lets them create genres that are unique to their communities and what they represent.

Since its inception in 2011, The Hennessy Cypher has grown into a platform and cultural moment that celebrates a unique class of artists in hip-hop and African music, allowing them to collaborate and express themselves in ways that showcase what they have to offer and represent their heritage across the continent.

This year is no different. In conversations with the featured class of 2026, we explore their love for hip-hop, what it means to represent this class of African talent, how their heritage has shaped their creativity, and the future of African hip-hop.

The Cypher celebrates talents from across the continent. What does it mean to you to represent this class of the Hennessy Cypher?

Sarz: Representing the 2026 Hennessy Cypher for Nigeria meant a lot to me because hip-hop has always been my first love. It was my first entry into music. I loved hip-hop, and listening to so much of it made me develop this love I have for music. So, shout out to hip-hop.

Tenor: It means not only are we reaching a new milestone, but that the focus on the work we do in Africa, and especially in French-speaking Africa in hip hop, is valued. Representing this generation in such an important project is a crowning achievement.

Suspect 95: I’m very proud of that, especially when looking at my own career and all my accomplishments. And I’m proud to bring my culture and colour to what we can now call an “institution” in African Hip Hop.

Yanga: I think it shows the self-belief that I’ve always carried in my style. There are seasons in rap where certain styles are the trend, but for me I’ve always just had my own unique approach. It’s allowed me to stay unpredictable; this Cypher was an opportunity to share that signature flow with the rest of the continent.

Where did your love for hip-hop start?

Fena Gitu: I grew up around hip-hop. Buruburu in the ’90s was one of Nairobi’s coolest cultural hubs, especially during the rise of matatu culture. I grew up in the heart of 58, absorbing everything from the rap flows and street language to the fashion and attitude. I sang and rapped in school, sharpening my skill behind the mic.

Kwesi Arthur: My love for hip-hop started in my grandmother’s house in Tema, Ghana. My uncle had a Life After Death CD, which I remember as the first hip-hop album I ever listened to. I also constantly heard hip-hop mixes on the radio, from Tupac to Obrafour, Kwaw Kese, Kwade, etc. I used to listen to Kasahare on the radio a lot too, around when Sarkodie started. I’ve been tapped in since then. My love for it extends to all its subgenres, its art, fashion, and more.​

What would you say has influenced your musical style?

Sarz: A lot of things passively, hip-hop being one of them, and African music my dad used to listen to a lot of Ebenezer Obey, Fela, and King Sunny Ade. I think, subconsciously, that created a mix of things I listened to, which was hip-hop, and things I heard passively, which was African music.

Suspect: I’m influenced by Ivorian culture, which is a very strong culture, my environment of course and the places where I grew up: Cocody, Blockhaus in Abidjan.

Fena: My style has been shaped by curiosity and by how unpredictable music can be. I have never wanted to be confined to one sound, so I draw from hip-hop, R&B, neo-soul, Afro-fusion and the rhythms around me. I am always exploring what else I can do while protecting the signature.

Tenor: Cameroonian music in general​

How much of your heritage has impacted your style of music?

Fena: Deeply. I was born and raised in Nairobi, and the city’s sound, language, pace and cultural mix are embedded in my music. Travelling from a young age also exposed me to different people and sounds, giving me a wider perspective. My music comes from Nairobi, but stays curious about the world.

Kwesi: A big piece of it is inspired by my heritage. What I talk about, the way I say what I say, choice of instruments, etc., it’s all Ghana.

When you think about hip-hop talent across the continent, what do you think is one thing that makes it stand out in terms of showcasing what different parts of the continent have to offer?

Fena: The diversity and the elegance. How far we have evolved. There is so much beauty in how differently we express ourselves across the continent, but also a real sense of unity.

Tenor: What truly distinguishes African talent is its cultural richness and diversity. It has an incomparable origin and purity. We feel the true cradle of humanity.

What inspires your creative process?

Sarz: Anything. I'm inspired by ideas, sometimes by ideas that do not exist. I'm inspired by things I like, and I fuse genres. I'm inspired by peace, and other people's music inspires me. It could be anything.

Fena: My creative process is spontaneous, even though lately it is often shaped by active projects and deadlines, with less room to wander than I had before. Even then, I still leave space for instinct, experimentation and surprise. That allows me to preserve the signature Fenamenal flow and explore.

How do you feel about where African hip-hop is, and what are you excited about in the future?

Sarz: There's new talent always coming in, and I'm excited to see where they take hip-hop and how they fuse it with being African and our African genres and instruments, and make something unique that might change the world.

Tenor: African hip hop continues to make its way, and it can be felt. Diversity is a real asset. I am enthusiastic about the impact I know it will have worldwide. People are increasingly discovering incredible performances in every sense of the word concerning us.

Yanga Chief: I think it’s in safe hands. We need to let it evolve and become what it wants to. As long as it continues to represent us and our stories, I feel like it can keep growing in ways we can’t predict.

Suspect: African Hip Hop is a strong musical genre and has many amazing artists to make it grow again. I’m excited to see how African hip hop adapts to this new era with AI and stuff to become even stronger.

Fena: We have come a long way to have African hip-hop on global platforms such as this. It shows that Africa is NOW, and Africa is the future. I am excited to see more collaboration across the continent that pushes forward a positive narrative of Africa. The world is watching, and this is our opportunity to put ourselves firmly among the global greats. Hip-hop never dies. Hip-hop takes her time, perfects her craft and stands the test of time.

Kwesi: It’s exciting to see where African hip-hop is today. I love that it’s more accepted among our people now than it used to be years ago. I feel we have found a way to make it in our own authentic way. The growth in sound and its diversity is exciting to see, too.

ENNY: I think it shows how African hip hop is constantly evolving and refining. Language is not a barrier and feeling is universal. There are so many different sounds, cultures and perspectives within African music and hip hop. I think the Cypher is a really good example of how all of those things can exist alongside each other. You don’t necessarily need to understand every word to understand the energy or connect with what someone is saying. I think that’s what makes it exciting, there isn’t one direction it has to go in.

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Victony has officially stepped into his sophomore era, proving that his global breakthrough was only the beginning. STARLIFE represents a critical evolution in modern Afropop a project where the Nigerian superstar takes full artistic control, writing and producing across a genre-bending landscape that blends Afrobeats, R&B, rock, techno, and retro nostalgia. Having followed his trajectory closely as he transformed from a rising talent into a visionary sonic architect, experiencing this 15-track album firsthand reveals a artist fearlessly bridging traditional African rhythms with futuristic global sounds.

This body of work pushes further into experimentation with immersive production, elastic rhythms, playful songwriting, and an effortless cool. Supported by guest appearances from FOLA, BNXN, Young Jonn, Blaqbonez, and YKB, the album showcases a superstar who refuses to be boxed into a single sound.

The sonic journey begins smoothly before shifting gears directly onto the dance floor. The opening highlight, "Too Lit," sets the stage with kinetic electricity, powered by melodic 80s-inspired synths and vintage arrangements that instantly establish the album's energetic atmosphere. As the record progresses, Victony weaves through lush string instruments, dynamic percussion, and classic 80s and 90s guitar riffs. By the time track six, "Frne," drops, the transition to high-energy club anthems is complete the instant the beat hits, it transports listeners straight into the center of a crowded dance floor.

Victony’s vocal range remains one of his strongest assets, shifting effortlessly from a velvety, smoky mid-range to high, dreamy melodies that balance lover-boy charm with undeniable swagger. This dynamic delivery shines brightest on "Slick," where his lustrous tone pairs flawlessly with the beat to create an irresistible, seductive energy. It is the ultimate pre-game anthem a song built for getting ready before a night out and guaranteeing all eyes are on you when it hits the speakers.

That supreme confidence continues on "2Fresh," led by smooth delivery and sharp swagger, while "Armed" shifts gears into a mesmerizing, hypnotic trance created by atmospheric melodies and driving drums. As the album moves into a more melodic close, "Missing Piece" caters directly to lovers, delivering an intimate, heartfelt ode to keeping the one close to you.

I am thoroughly impressed by this elevated body of work the sharp writing, the rich instrumentation, the expansive vocal range, and the seamless features all converge to create something exceptional. It is an absolute must-listen from start to finish. With STARLIFE, Victony delivers a versatile, genre-defying masterpiece that captures the pulse of modern music while honoring timeless influences.

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Nigerian rap has never had a shortage of talent. What it has had is a shortage of  infrastructure - the kind that takes a rapper from a dimly lit bedroom in central Lagos to a global stage with a live band, in front of an audience that showed up specifically to listen. 

Ola Blackz understands this gap better than most. He is a percussionist and drummer who fell in love with hip-hop, and the combination produced something neither world could have built alone: GLSessions, a live music platform dedicated to discovering, developing and showcasing Nigeria's emerging rap talent through the specific energy of live instrumentation.

The platform operates on a simple premise;rap music heard liveis a fundamentally different experience from the same music heard through a speaker. The cypher format, the freestyle session, the collaborative performance with live percussion and rhythm are statements about what music can do when it is allowed to be visceral. Nigeria has had cypher culture for years, most visibly through the Hennessy Cyphers that have been running since 2015, but GLSessions approaches the format as a creative hub where artists can sharpen their craft, gain visibility, and exist within a community of musicians who are genuinely invested in each other's growth.

The mainstream conversation around Nigerian music has been dominated by Afrobeats for over a decade. But rap has never stopped existing in Nigeria. It has existed in studios, in underground shows, in cyphers, in the work of artists who kept going despite the absence of the kind of platforms that make careers legible to wider audiences. GLSessions exists  to make that work visible, and to provide the conditions it needs to grow on its own terms.

The live instrumentation dimension is the most distinctive thing about what Ola Blackz brings to this space. As a percussionist, he understands rhythm from the inside. That perspective shapes how GLSessions stages its sessions, the energy it creates in a room, the specific way it documents what happens when a rapper's verse lands against live drums in real time. The vision that drives all of this is straightforward: every talented rapper deserves a stage, a platform, and an opportunity to be heard. That commitment seems  more radical than it sounds. In all, Ola Blackz is building GLSessions for the rappers who are still finding their path, because they too matter. 

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IG: sophiannadozie

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Nigerian Pop fusionist Victony has been tenderly evolving since 2016  --  freestyles on SoundCloud, covers of Cardi B and Burna Boy, a small online community that kept growing. The lockdown of 2020 pushed him toward his singing voice, a side of himself his producers had always noticed but he had never fully leaned into. His 2022 opus, Soweto introduced him to the world. Two years later, his debut album Stubborn gave that world more to hold onto. Now, with FRE$H and SLICK already out and a mixtape called Starlife dropping August 21, the young bard is in a period he describes as "just vibes." Born Anthony Ebuka, Victony is an artist in full possession of himself and Starlife is where that shows most clearly. Catching up with Deeds Magazine, we spoke about his evolution, the current state of Afrobeats, and the world he is building with Starlife. 

Sophia for Deeds: For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself?

I'm Ebuka Anthony, aka Victony. A young artist from Lagos, Nigeria.I grew up in Ojo, Lagos. I'm an upcoming creative director - I'm mastering that on the loop. 

You started as a rapper on SoundCloud in 2016, covering Cardi B and Burna Boy, and somewhere along the way you became one of the most distinctive voices in Afrobeats. When did you realise the rapper was becoming something else?

It was like 2020. Before then I used to do Instagram freestyles and I had a small online community. I'd put up covers every now and then. Then 2020 came - lockdown and I guess that was a different time in everyone's life. Out of boredom, we were forced to try something different. So I explored my singing side. My producers always told me I had a good voice - once in a while I'd do hooks, and one of my first releases, 'Sing My Song', I sang on it. But I never just thought I would be a singer. Then in 2020 I started trying more singing, started getting comfortable with it, and the rest from there has been history.

When FRE$H was being teased, people saw Blaqbonez in the studio video and immediately assumed there was a feature. What was going through your mind watching all of that play out before the song dropped?

I don't know why people thought it was a feature. I really can't control how fans think. Obviously I wanted it to be a proper release and at the time I just wasn't ready to put it out. If you follow me closely, you know I tease music when I don't have music out, just to entertain the fans. It doesn't necessarily mean I want to put it out. FRE$H just happened to demand at the time - I didn't anticipate it. When the time was right, I eventually put it out.

Soweto made a name outside Nigeria - TikTok, UK charts, the remix with Rema and Don Toliver. Did that moment change how you think about who you're making music for?

No. Not at all. Even at the time when I released it, I was still discovering myself, growing a relationship with my audience, knowing what my pocket truly is - because I'm a versatile artist. From Soweto till now, it's still been a learning process for me.

People have a lot of opinions about where Afrobeats is headed right now. What's your take on the state of the sound?

I think it's progressing into something new. With the emergence of so many new artists in this scene right now that are just extremely bold and confident, and even us - household names - finding new pockets and pushing it forward. It's moulding into something beautiful. It's going to be in a state we've never seen it in before. It's not going to be the usual monopoly where it's just Wizkid or Davido or Burna or Rema. Everyone is starting to have their own fan base, which is beautiful to see. The listeners are also having a mind of their own - people are finding their style and sticking to it. I've seen so many new artists with new sounds, in different pockets, growing their communities. This is happening here in Nigeria and this is Afrobeats. I'm curious to see what it moves into, but I'm positive about the results.

Starlife drops August 21. Give us an insight into what the mixtape is actually about - what world are you building with it?

Freedom. Authenticity. I'm actually just having fun. This is one of the projects I took very seriously and at the same time didn't take very seriously. Making sure the sound, the production, my delivery - it's top notch. But it's also very witty and playful. I don't think I've ever been this playful before, this carefree, genuinely enjoying myself. Starlife just shows growth. It shows me fully confident in my own skin. It shows authenticity, maturity, me just talking about the things that I like. It's Victor they haven't seen before.

The Odumodublvck and Blaqbonez beef was one of the biggest conversations in Nigerian hip-hop recently. As someone in the music space, how do you navigate that kind of tension - do you think beef is good or bad for the culture?

To be honest, Odumodublvck and Blaqbonez are two people I know, really nice guys. I think the misunderstanding has just been blown out of proportion and I just hope one day they figure it out. It's between both of them. I know both guys and I think it's a very huge misunderstanding on both ends.

You've worked with artists like Rema, Don Toliver, Asake, Burna Boy and SAINt JHN across your career. At this point, is there anyone you genuinely wish you could get in the studio with, locally or internationally, that hasn't happened yet?

I want to make music with anybody that just does something different. I'm really just experimenting. I don't really have that one person. Obviously I've always wanted to make music with Drake - that's one of my biggest inspirations, so that doesn't change. But I'm also open to diving into different worlds and seeing what comes out of it. Old, young, new. I'm open to collaborating with people that I really like.

Are there any upcoming visuals, tour dates or projects in the pipeline beyond Starlife that people should keep an eye out for?

I have a few shows coming up in the US and Canada. I have Afroplus in September as well. Possibly some headline concerts in Europe and America. For sure, Bonfire this year - that's an annual thing I do. And definitely the project visuals. Just fun times.

What motivates you?

Just feeling purposeful. That's been my biggest motivation right now - truly finding what my purpose is. I feel like one way to do that is utilizing my talents to the max. Every day I go hard, every day I'm creating. I want to find what my purpose truly is. I'm just enjoying the journey and trying to feel purposeful every day.

So bumbum is no longer part of the motivation?

(laughs) We like it though.

As we wrap up, what do you want people to understand about this period of your career that the music alone might not be saying?

I don't think there's anything deep. I feel like people get it and if you don't get it, I don't know. At this moment, it's just vibes.

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IG;@sophiannadozie

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PS Hitsquad has been making waves in UK drill. His debut album, Life on License, is a body of work that offers deep insight into his life. The 16-track project brings together various elements of his musical influences, not to mention pushing outside of what one would expect from the Drill Rapper.

As somebody who has lived a lot of life and has a lot of stories to tell, the album documents his growth journey and everything that has led him to this moment in his career. He is never one to shy away from the experiences he has been through. Across the album, you can pick up on everything he has to say, and his delivery comes through solidly across the 16 tracks.

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With a newly announced tour, he is set to take stages where he will bring the album to life. Before then, we caught up with the rapper to discuss the new album, the process of making it, his artistic journey and more.

You put out your debut album Life on License; how has it felt having that out in the world?

It feels amazing. I always love showing the people what I’ve cooked up, especially because there are so many new sounds/genres on this one compared to others.

When did the process begin for you to start making this album?

It’s been years in the making. I’d even say it’s an illustration from as far back as I can remember up until this point.

Before you put the album out, you had released a few singles before. So in terms of introducing the vibes of the album and setting the tone, how did you want to set that up with those particular singles?

I wanted to show all angles. From ‘Chasing My Grave’ to ‘Popeye’, ‘Dig Em Up’ to ‘Coulda Woulda Shoulda’ I wanted to show the different perspectives around the life I’ve lived while still having fun with it creatively.

How would you describe the sound of the album?

Much like myself, it’s multifaceted. I don’t know if I can narrow it down to just one sound, but I’d describe it as post-drill.

The title of the album is Life on Licence. What does that represent about what the album means?

It means a lot of things. Obviously I’m still on licence, but it’s not just about me being a convict; it’s also about life putting conditions in front of you, whoever you are & it’s ultimately down to you whether you let that stop what you got going on. Also LOL cause you gotta laugh at anyone thinking that’s all it is or will be.

You have always been open about the experiences you have had and gone through and how they relate to your music. In what way do you feel that being open in your music has helped you in terms of your own healing journey?

Music is my therapy. I don’t really talk to people about what’s going on inside, but I’ve always been able to express myself through lyrics.

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Was there a particular song on the album that stands out in the process of making the album?

‘Free Your Mind’ ft. Lihtz is one of my personal favourites.

What do you want people to know about you from listening to the album?

There’s a lot more to me than meets the eye.

In terms of your artistry and where you are. How does this album reflect where you are in your creative journey?

I’m trying to flex my creative muscle.

You have been making music a while now. So how do you feel you have grown/changed as a person have grown/changed from when you began your career till now?

I think now I’m more focused on making good music rather than just being the hardest rapper.

You grew up in Peckham. So how do you feel your environment had an impact in terms of your music and creativity?

Growing up in a place like Peckham is not for the weak. Not the greatest socioeconomic environment, so from a young age I saw & did a lot, probably why my lyrics are so graphic.

What can we expect from now that the album is out?

Expect the unexpected.

What are you looking forward to in the next phase of your career?

Enjoying it.

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Three days before the release of her third album Starrgirl, Ayra Starr published a Substack where she wrote about the album's meaning, stating that “Starrgirl is a bridge between past and present, tradition and transformation, self and society, accepting complexity and turning it into strength. To exist in multitudes, to unfold endlessly, to shine in countless numbers like STARS in the galaxy.” The entry served to provide context for what the album means to her and the backdrop against which it was derived. The album has come at an interesting point in Ayra Starr’s journey; the time between the creation of The Year I Turned 21 and its follow-up has been marked by many changes in her life, from moving to a new city, life experiences, love, situationships, personal growth and embracing her identity and self-expression. All of which have been present across the album.

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Her third album is a moment fans have been waiting for, with a lot of anticipation. Its arrival is a moment for Ayra Starr fans across the world. As you embark on the 16-track journey, there is a rawness and honesty you get that feels much more prominent than in her previous bodies of work. Speaking to her life experiences over the past few years and the life she has been living since The Year I Turned 21, her musical shift is very evident as you listen to the album. As somebody who has never been shy about expressing herself and being confident in who she is as an artist, the presentation feels like a shift from the artist we’ve known since she arrived on the music scene back in 2020.​

The album's production is led primarily by Mavin boss Don Jazzy and production duo The Elements, who served as executive producers. As well as additional production contributions from a slew of producers, including the likes of Johnny Drille, Joe Reeves, Skillies, Xize and Stefan Johnson, to name a few. Moving through the 16 tracks, the sonic expansion is very clear beyond the ‘expected’ Ayra Starr sound. From her singles alone, starting with “Gimmie Dat” featuring Wizkid all the way through to “Who’s Dat Gal” with Rema and the latest “Tornado” there is not one sound to describe her album, pulling everything from Afrobeats, R&B, and Pop and stretching her sound to the unexpected. Lyrically, it is very clear that Ayra Starr is not the same girl we met back in 2024. Maintaining that confidence, she takes that to another level as she opens up in a way that is reflective of a young woman who is navigating life as a twenty-something, from sex, love, spirituality, self-identity, and everything in between; she is putting pen to paper with all that she has experienced in the last few years of her life.

The album opens with “Dangerous”, which sets the tone for the energy she embodies as Stargirl and serves as a warning of Ayra’s star power and the energy she is about to bring to the album. Married against the production, which starts quiet in its initial moments before building into something that feels like a soundtrack for a battlefield before Ayra sings the initial words “Starr Girl I don’t play around/When the money that be coming is the right amount/ I’m talking 10 figures for the day I’m out”. Moving into the Kwn-featured “Amazing” brings what you would expect of a Kwn feature, embodying sexual intimacy with a partner in a way that matches Kwn and brings their voices together sonically. In the context of the album, “Tornado” makes sense, whereas it felt a bit misplaced as a single compared to the ones that came before it. Although technically the first official single under the Starrgirl umbrella, it had a lot of different sounds, so identifying its place in the sonic direction felt a bit confusing. “Midnight in New York” plays like a fleeting encounter one might have with a stranger for a night in what feels like something out of a Young Adult Twenty-Something TV show. “Ms Paper”, which features French artist Theodora, feels like an Amaarae-esque track and brings a slightly darker tone with an uptempo vibe, as the two sing about getting money and all that it elicits.

Whilst the majority of the album speaks to the joys and fun, more lighthearted experiences, it is in the later half of the album that we reach greater depth and more personal feelings. The shift comes starting with “Misunderstood”, where she speaks about feelings of being misunderstood and instead embracing one's voice, singing “‘Say what’s on her mind Every time Bottom line” The Zayn Malik-featured ballad presents a softer tone to the album with its piano-led production for the love song. Zayn’s contribution lifts the dual-perspective narrative of a love they both share. Before closing out the album she brings “Treasure” which feels like a testimony to her journey so far and all that she has learned the motivation that has led her to this moment in her career with the words “I do this for myself And the people wey dey follow me for years/I be chaser and I’m headed for the treasure/ Steady W’s cus oil dey my head” the songs fits perfectly in its position on the album as it feels like a celebration of where Ayra is in her life.

Overall, the album feels like the diary and story of a twenty-something girl who is just navigating all that life has to offer and everything in between. For Ayra, the album has clearly documented a special time in her life, and it will most definitely resonate with listeners far and wide. Across 16 tracks, she delivers a body of work that will hold a spot and soundtrack a time in people's lives.

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From Diamond Records to New Beats: Jay Sean’s Enduring Legacy and the Release of ‘Body’

When “Down” broke through the airwaves and music channels all around back in 2019, It was the beginning of a fruitful career journey for Jay Sean. The infectious song, which featured a verse from Lil Wayne and reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaked at number three on the UK Single Charts, became the song which broke the British South Asian singer into the mainstream. Now, almost two decades later, Jay is still basking in all that he has been able to achieve so far since then. The song, which was recently certified Diamond by the RIAA in the United States, is one of many milestones he has achieved in his career thus far.

With no signs of slowing down, he is back with his second release of the year, ‘Body’. The Afrobeats-inspired track is made for the end-of-day vibes and continues the slate of new music he has on the horizon. As someone who has always been able to diversify his musical talents, he is still delivering and has no plans to slow down.

Speaking to Jay Sean, we spoke about everything from the legacy of “Down”, the new single, his longevity, maintaining his creativity and everything he has in store for the future.

Hi Jay, Congrats on the release of your new single “Body”. Can you tell us about what inspired this song and how it came about?

I think with this one I just wanted to make something that felt good. I’ve always been drawn to melody and records that make you feel something, but this was really about taking that and putting it over something that makes you want to move. It came together naturally.   There wasn’t too much overthinking; it was just about catching a vibe.

The vibe of the song feels great for summer as it is coming to an end. What was the headspace and vibe you were in when making it?

Honestly, exactly that - summer, good energy, being around people you love, being somewhere warm and just enjoying life. I wanted something you could hear at a beach club, in the car, on holiday, wherever - and it instantly puts you in a better mood. Sometimes music doesn’t need to be that complicated!

The song has an Afrobeats feel and vibe. What drew you towards that influence?

I’ve loved what’s been happening with African music for a long time because there’s such an incredible sense of rhythm and melody to it. And those are two things I’ve always naturally gravitated towards in my own music. So it never felt like, “Right, now I’m going to make an Afrobeats record.” It was more about taking those influences and blending them with what I naturally do melodically and as a pop R&B artist.

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You’ve already released “All We Know”, and this is the second single we’ve gotten from you this year. What can we expect from the music you’ve been working on?

I think this year I’m deliberately keeping the energy up. All We Know had that Afrohouse energy, and this record continues that feel-good, uptempo direction. I’ve done plenty of heartbreak and slow jams over the years! Right now I’m enjoying making music that makes people want to dance, go out, travel, live a little. So there’s definitely more of that coming.

Your single “Down” went Diamond, which is a significant achievement. As you are now in your career, what does this moment mean for you, and how do you feel about the song as you look back to that particular time when you made the song? 

The incredible thing about writing a song is that you never really know its destiny. You can believe in it, you can feel like you’ve made something special, but once you release it into the world, it almost takes on a life of its own. To think back to being in the studio simply trying to write the best song I could, and then see that same record go on to break records, make history and still connect with people all these years later is quite surreal. Those are things you could never plan for or manufacture. I think with experience you learn just how rare those moments are, so more than anything, I look back on it with a huge amount of gratitude.

You’ve always represented South Asian artists in the music space. What has that representation meant to you, and how have you seen it change?

When I started, there really wasn’t a blueprint for someone who looked like me doing mainstream Western pop and R&B. So initially I was trying to get through the door myself. But as my career grew, I realised that every door you open hopefully stays a little wider for the person coming behind you. Now I look at the amount of South Asian talent coming through globally, and it’s amazing. There’s still work to do, but compared to when I started, the conversation has changed massively.

What does being a “cultivator” mean to you and building the career you’ve had?

For me, cultivating something is about building it over time. A career like mine wasn’t one moment or one song - it’s been over 20 years of learning, adapting, taking risks, getting things wrong, getting some things right and continuing to grow. And now part of that is hopefully helping cultivate the next generation too. Success means a lot more when you can use what you’ve learned to help somebody else. 

What fuels or inspires your creativity at this current moment?

Life, more than anything. At this stage I’m not chasing what I think I’m supposed to sound like. I’ve been fortunate enough to have already achieved things I never imagined I would, so creatively there’s a freedom in that. If something excites me, I follow it. And weirdly, that freedom has probably made me more creative than ever. 

 How has your process and outlook on creativity shifted throughout the years?

I think I trust my instincts much more now. When you’re younger, you can get caught up in what’s happening, what radio wants, what the industry wants, what everyone else is doing. These days I know myself as an artist much better. If it feels good, I trust that.

You went on tour in 2024. How did that experience feel compared to previous tours?

I’m constantly doing shows - I tend to keep them to weekends now wherever I can. At this stage of my life, I prefer not to spend months away from my family. I absolutely love performing, and that will always be a huge part of who I am, but I also want to be present as a dad. My kids are growing up ridiculously fast, and these are precious years that you don’t get back. So it’s really about finding that balance - I still get to travel the world and perform, which is my favourite part of what I do, but hopefully without missing too much of what matters most at home.

After all these years, what is still your favourite part of making music?

That moment when you know you’ve got something. You can be sitting in a studio with absolutely nothing, and a few hours later there’s a song that didn’t exist before. After all these years, that still feels like magic to me. And then eventually hearing thousands of people sing something back to you that started as an idea in your head; I don’t think that ever gets old.

What would you say has been a highlight moment in your career?

There have been so many moments I’m grateful for, but performing at Madison Square Garden will always be up there. Growing up in Britain, you hear about these iconic American venues, and MSG is almost mythical. So to come from where I came from, cross the Atlantic and eventually stand on that stage performing my own music was one of those moments where I genuinely thought, “How did I end up here?” That one will always stay with me.

You’ve got some exciting things coming up. What can you tell us about them?

A lot is happening. Obviously, there’s more music coming, and I’m really enjoying this new run of records and the sound I’m exploring. But I’m also developing some things outside of music that I’m really excited about -particularly in the TV and podcast space. I’ve spent most of my life telling stories through three-minute songs, so I’m enjoying finding completely different ways to tell stories now too.

At this stage in your career, what does this particular time feel like and what are you most excited about?

It feels like a really nice chapter because I’m not trying to prove anything anymore. I’m incredibly proud of what I’ve achieved, but I’m also still hungry creatively- just in a different way. I get to make music because I genuinely love making music, explore new ideas, help other artists and still walk onstage and do what I’ve loved doing for over 20 years. There’s a freedom in this stage of the journey that I’m really enjoying.

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Stream darkest secrets / CHAKAM Here 

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Genre-fusion DJ and cultural tastemaker Uncle Bubu steps into a defining new chapter with the release of his explosive two-pack darkest secrets / CHAKAM, featuring two of the hottest young voices shaping African music right now: Kemuel and Cupidszn. The project captures the energy of a new generation pushing Afrobeats and alternative African sounds into exciting new territory. 

Across the two records, Uncle Bubu showcases his ability to merge worlds, blending emotion, rhythm, youth culture and global influences into a cohesive sonic experience. 

Produced by acclaimed hitmaker Telz, darkest secrets delivers a smooth and intoxicating Latin-inspired vibe layered with emotional melodies, atmospheric production and undeniable chemistry between the artists. Sensual and immersive, the record feels both intimate and global, balancing vulnerability with rhythm in a way that feels refreshing within today’s Afrobeats landscape. 

On the other side, CHAKAM, produced by Bill Fyre, bursts with youthful Gen Z energy. Infectious, carefree and charismatic, the record captures the spirit of young African creatives shaping culture in real time. With playful melodies, vibrant production and magnetic performances, CHAKAM feels built for parties, festivals and viral moments alike. 

The release arrives at a pivotal cultural moment for African music, bringing together a powerful mix of emerging voices already making serious waves across the industry. Cupidszn continues to rise as one of the most exciting new talents signed to Mavin Records, while Kemuel has established himself as one of the standout voices of the new generation through collaborations with major names including Wizkid, Spinall, Olamide, DJ Tunez and more. 

Known for his genre-bending mixes, cultural influence and ability to connect communities through music, Uncle Bubu has steadily built a reputation as one of the most exciting young DJs and curators emerging from Lagos’ new creative scene. With darkest secrets / CHAKAM, he now takes a major step forward artistically, delivering a release that feels youthful, global and deeply connected to the culture. 

More than just a two-pack, darkest secrets / CHAKAM is a snapshot of where African music is headed next, driven by fearless collaboration, genre experimentation, and a new generation of creatives building movements from the ground up. 

For more information on Uncle Bubu, please visit: 

Instagram | TikTok | YouTube

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It’s 2026 and the average tune booming in the playlists that define Lagos’ nightlife circuits is no longer the usual pop-frenzy. Nowadays, it’s a lot of sounds, including soul.

After nearly a decade of chasing raspier beats and hypermelodic grooves, Nigerian artists are now making room for sounds that favor mood, storytelling and experimentation, creating alternatives to the familiar formulas that have defined the country’s global pop moment.

This means only one thing: listeners have more ways to discover music, and artists have more ways to reach them. 

Part of that consumer behaviour shift is technological. TikTok has become a discovery tool for music, while Spotify and Apple Music allow artists to reach listeners directly without relying entirely on radio or major-label machinery. 

In fact, since Spotify launched in Nigeria in 2021, the number of Nigerian artists on the platform has more than doubled, while R&B streams have grown more than twenty-sevenfold. Nigerian listeners have also created over 25 million playlists.

Now, it’s glaring that with more accessible production and distribution tools, emerging artists can create, package and release music with fewer traditional gatekeepers. Basically, they no longer have to make a club hit first to find an audience.

Withloveru._ is one example of the sound taking shape in that space. Her music centres on love, uncertainty and the messier parts of relationships, with songs that leave room for her vocals and songwriting to carry the weight. Her just-released debut Silk EP offers a glimpse into that approach, while her other earlier releases this year, including “Woman” and “I Think I Love You 2” featuring Magixx, have continued to build on it.

Another artist working with a similarly soulful pace is Demi Mulla. His 2026 releases,  “Distance” and “Pretty Girl Summer (Birthday),” lean into atmosphere and emotion rather than chasing a formula built around immediate impact. His music fits into a growing space for Nigerian artists whose appeal comes as much from the world they create around a song as from its potential to become a hit.

The soulful troubadour Tiimie takes another route, blending contemporary Nigerian rhythms with softer songwriting and alternative influences. His  2.5g EP arrived in March 2026, followed by “Iworiwo”, Nakanamo ft Niphkeys” and “Fish Pond” in April. His  growing catalogue shows how artists can remain connected to the sounds around them while making space for vulnerability, restraint and experimentation.

However, the new wave is not defined by quiet music alone. Ema Onigah represents a more expansive approach, moving through different influences while placing musicianship and storytelling at the centre of her work. His 2026 project ITEM VII and releases such as “Many People” demonstrate an artist more interested in building his  own musical vocabulary than staying within one established formula.

Another force majeure in this new shift is Strei. The young bard pushes that experimentation into darker territory. His seven-track NIGHT EP, released in May, includes “Anxiety,” “Sugar,” “Surplus” and “Obobe,” while “Catapult” adds to his 2026 output. His music brings a sharper edge to the conversation, showing that the alternative space can accommodate rap, darker production and emotionally charged writing without needing to sound like mainstream Afrobeats.

Meanwhile, the softer-toned Taves shows that experimentation does not always have to happen outside Afrobeats. His music brings together familiar Nigerian rhythms with guitars, percussion and more direct songwriting. His 2026 releases, including “Simone,” “Bad & Boujee” featuring Shoday and “Pressure” with Show Dem Camp, demonstrate how organic textures and contemporary Nigerian pop can exist in the same space.

Elsewhere, NELLO MXL and Serøtonin are taking the idea of genre fluidity even further. NELLO MXL’s 2026 releases, including “Melodian” and CURRENTS, continue his movement between melodic songwriting and Nigerian-influenced sounds. 

Lastly, Serøtonin, on the other hand, has built a more unconventional musical identity around Afrofusion, folk influences, ambient textures and elements of Nigerian oral tradition. His work resists easy categorisation, making him another example of how far outside conventional pop structures some emerging artists are willing to go.

Overall, what connects these artists is not a single genre, tempo or aesthetic. It is the willingness to experiment with what Afrobeat can feel like.

As Afrobeat continues to dominate globally, Nigerian artists are increasingly treating genre as a starting point rather than a boundary. As a result, there’s a boom in Afro-fusion, where genres like R&B can borrow from Afrobeat, Rap leaning into soul, and pop can make room for experimentation. The quieter wave may not always command the loudest conversation, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. And for all the right reasons. 

Ravyn Lenae’s Blue Island begins with the single ‘Handle”, the second single from the album. Ushering in the album, it signals a shift from her previous album, Birds Eye, and once again shows her ability to infuse several genres into her musical palette. From then on, she continues to showcase not only the sonically expansive music styles present on the album, but also brings her signature vocal and ethereal tone to the project.​

From top to bottom, the album plays flawlessly. Moving between genres of indie rock, funk, R&B, soul and psychedelic rock. Everything she brings across the 14 tracks melds together and becomes something that sounds authentically hers. Across her career, Ravyn has never been an artist who is trying to chase a moment or follow a trend; instead, she has developed her own musical style in a way that is unique to her. She is somebody who has been able to take the space and room to create something that continues to showcase her strength as an artist going from album to album.​

Moments on the album that stand out include “Familiar Dreams”, which has a nostalgic feel to it as she sings about reconnecting with an old flame after a long period of time. The feeling brings a somewhat whimsical feel to the song and an aspect of remembrance. “Never Let Me Go”, which follows immediately after, feels like the alternative R&B sound that people will be familiar with. The song ends with a voicemail from her grandfather and adds a special touch to the song's essence. “Potential”, the lead single that ushered in this new era for Ravyn, also shines in the context of the album with her melodies that come into a distortion of sounds and create a different sonic that one might have been expecting from start to finish. With this being one of the two lead singles, it very much displayed how this would be introducing a different soundscape for Ravyn. Further down, another standout moment on the album is  “Babygirl”, which includes vocals from Doechii, someone who is no stranger to collaborating with Ravyn on the Xtsay remix back in 2022. This time around, the two opt for something much gentler than one may have expected, with both giving a soft, melodic vibe to the song that speaks to confidence and self-empowerment for girls.

Overall, the album really showcases Ravyn's freedom of creation and not being forced to subscribe to what others may expect of her, especially following the success of “Love Me Not”. Ultimately, she is following her own bliss and showcasing her ability to genre-blend and discover more within her artistry that others may have confined her to. Blue Island delivers a refreshing sound and body of work and delivers on the mission she set out for it.

In 2021, Ayra Starr released 'Bloody Samaritan' and made it immediately clear that she was not interested in being palatable - she was 19 years old, already fully formed in her attitude and her sound, and the record announced both things at once without apology.

Born Oyinkansola Sarah Aderibigbe, she signed to Mavin Records in 2020 and released her self-titled debut EP in January 2021 before 19 & Dangerous arrived in August of that same year - a debut album whose title captured exactly the energy she brought to every stage she walked onto during that period. The project established not just a voice but a specific kind of fearlessness that has remained the most consistent thing about her across every project since.

The Year I Turned 21 followed in May 2024, her second studio album and the project that expanded both her sound and her reach significantly. 'Gimme Dat' with Wizkid earned a Grammy nomination. 'Who's Dat Girl' with Rema, released in October 2025 as her first official collaboration with him, asked the question this piece is trying to answer. In July 2025, she signed a management deal with Roc Nation while remaining at Mavin for recording - a positioning that placed her within two of the most powerful music infrastructures in the world simultaneously, and one that reflected the kind of long-term career thinking that has quietly distinguished her from many of her contemporaries.

What makes Ayra Starr particularly compelling beyond the music is how genuinely she loves the journey - the process of making records, building sonic worlds, finding collaborators who stretch her. She has spoken consistently about music not as a destination but as an ongoing creative practice, and that enthusiasm shows up in the range of what she has said yes to: Wizkid, Rema, Angélique Kidjo, FOLA, NPR Tiny Desk, The Jennifer Hudson Show. The breadcrumbs leading to Starrgirl have been buttery and deliberate - 'Where Do We Go' in March 2026, an Afropop and electronic track about a hidden romantic relationship released on Women's History Month; 'Tornado' with FOLA in June, Latin-percussion-inflected Afrobeats produced by Skillies, Shizzi and RiotUSA, premiered live at NPR Tiny Desk before its official June 12 release; a feature on Angélique Kidjo's 'Aye Kan (Are You Coming Back)' in March. She has covered significant ground this year before the album has even arrived.

Then came the album cover - a purple gele, a nod to her Yoruba roots, shot by Paris-based photographer Axle Jozeph with creative direction by Peter Famosa, Richie Igunma and Ola Badmus. The image landed quietly and then everywhere at once - not a viral explosion but a slow, sustained wave of responses that kept building. Within days it had spawned animations, paintings, reimagined concepts, a purple star filter, a Starrgirl game, and young Nigerian men wearing geles in solidarity in lecture halls, opening a conversation about expressive masculinity that the cover had not explicitly invited but clearly made possible. The campaign has been placed alongside Rema's HEIS as one of the strongest pre-release moments in modern Afrobeats - a comparison that speaks to how deliberately the visual identity of Starrgirl was constructed.

On July 30, Ayra revealed via Instagram Story that she had undergone major surgery a few days prior, more complicated in its recovery than she had anticipated. She did not disclose the nature of the procedure, and the silence was enough for the internet to begin filling in the blanks - the speculation arrived quickly, as it tends to when a young woman in the public eye has a medical procedure and declines to explain it. She addressed none of it. From her hospital bed, she asked her Mobstarrs to pre-order Starrgirl, started an 11-day countdown to the album, and assured everyone she simply needed rest before returning.

Starrgirl is 16 tracks spanning Afrobeats, R&B, alternative R&B and dancehall, with confirmed features including Wizkid and Rema. She has described the album as being about existing in multitudes - a broader creative statement than the age-and-numbers concept that gave her first two projects their structure. The purple gele on the cover places her Yoruba identity at the centre of her most globally ambitious project to date, The purple gele on the cover places her Yoruba identity at the centre of her most globally ambitious project to date, and it is a choice that feels entirely natural given how consistently she has moved through both worlds - the local and the international, without treating them as opposites. Starrgirl drops August 14.

For three days last weekend, Montreal’s Parc Jean-Drapeau was overrun with fans from across Canada and beyond to attend the 19th edition of Osheaga. The lineup varied widely in terms of genre and notoriety, but Canadian artists were notably prioritized. This year, DEEDS attended for the first time, and we had a lovely time!

In order of appearance, here are the Osheaga sets that transformed our festival experience.

PARTYOF2

If there’s one thing PARTYOF2 are going to do, it’s immerse the viewer in their world and throw a great party. It’s clear in everything from their music videos all the way to their stage performances. With coordinated fits and choreography, Jadagrace and SWIM took us through their budding discography, including the TikTok-viral hit, “POSER”. They’ve had a whirlwind last couple of years with the exit of band member TJOnline, and the release of debut album, AMERIKA’S NEXT TOP PARTY! but you wouldn’t know it by the way they performed. The earnest resilience that’s laced through all their songs makes it hard not to root for them, plus they give a great show!

Little Simz

Ten years since her last performance at Osheaga, Little Simz returned to a bigger stage and a truly excited crowd. Even before the show started, I could tell the competition to be in front was getting serious. With the coolest-looking band members I’d seen all festival, Little Simz gave us a multilayered set - part rap performance, part DJ set, all party. Unlike some artists at the festival, she didn’t rely on any backing tracks even for her denser verses. As Little Simz performed a litany of her hits including “Point & Kill” and viral feminist anthem “Venom”, you could tell she was having so much fun - that made two of us. 

‍Sofia Isella

The 21-year-old dark pop artist may still be early in her career, but her performances are already must-see spectacles - just ask Taylor Swift and Florence + the Machine, two major artists she’s opened for. At the Osheaga Scotia Forest stage, Sofia Isella emerged to much fanfare, covered in grime from head to toe, with emphasized dark circles and hair hanging loose. A woman possessed, the multi-instrumentalist enthusiastically performed many of her hits, including “Out in the Garden”, TikTok favourite “Hot Gum,” and “The Chicken is Naked and Afraid,” which was featured on the COLORS Show. It’s impossible not to feel the angst that fills her songs; Isella has shared that her music is her way of portraying the “gore of womanhood,” and boy, was this performance gory (in the best way possible).

‍Zara Larsson

Zara Larsson’s performances have gone viral many a time, but the real thing is still hard to beat. Hours before her set, the Bell River stage was packed with fans eager to see the headliner, wearing various shades of pink, orange, and florals. As we chanted her name, the pop singer arrived, opening with mega hit “Midnight Sun”. The crowd went wild and stayed that way throughout her performance. Memorable moments include her performance of “Symphony”, “Ain’t My Fault,” and of course, “Lush Life”, complete with the official dance. To perform the latter, she called on a young fan named Olivia who gave it her all. That heartfelt moment has already captured hearts beyond the festival through social media. Zara Larsson has already had a stellar couple of years, but I have a feeling this is just the beginning.

Lorde

There’s something so romantic about ending the festival with Lorde in the rain. Fans online even hoped the forecast would stay gloomy so they could have a repeat of the last time she performed at Osheaga ten years ago. Her return was much anticipated, and in return, she gave us her all. Her performance was so visceral; she never stopped moving, and she clearly felt every word. When delivering the show, Lorde’s dancers and stage techs successfully found a balance between performance art and a rave. The crowd was also extra loud when she played classics like “Liability”, “Supercut”, “Greenlight”, “Team”, “The Louvre” and her verse on Charli XCX’s “Girl, so confusing”. Before her set ended, she made sure to thank us many times for coming, and even said, “I think this is one of the coolest festivals in the world…I love Osheaga.” We love you too, Lorde!

In 2020, Rema told Dazed he posts what people need to see, not what they want to see. He said it in passing, in the context of not sharing photos with 2 Chainz - the opulence would have felt wrong for where he was then. Six years on, that same instinct is behind a Spider-Man themed cinema experience, a third studio album confirmed complete, and a title delivered not as an announcement but as a riddle. The philosophy is unchanged. The world it is operating in has grown considerably.

The aesthetic Rema occupies now did not arrive suddenly. His debut EP covers in 2019 and 2020 already carried it - colourful dystopian imagery, UFOs, figures falling from the sky, a futurist visual language that was specific and deliberate before most people were paying the kind of attention that would have noticed. The tension between euphoria and something darker was present in the music from early on. 'Rave & Roses' named it. 'HEIS' chose a side. The wardrobe shifted, the sound shifted, the smoking entered the visual language, and what settled was a persona that has held consistently across every appearance since. On his Instagram broadcast channel, he reposts fan artwork of himself - paintings, illustrations, graphic interpretations of his image - alongside his own photography. The visual world is collaborative in that specific way:

Rema establishes the aesthetic, his audience extends it, he acknowledges what they build. The conversation is ongoing and deliberate.

The rollout for the third album is a continuation of that conversation. A select group of fans at a cinema, an album confirmed complete, a puzzle distributed across social media with a window to solve it - the internet settled quickly on a verdict. Gimmick. The word gets applied most reliably when engagement is required rather than just consumption. Nigerian music rollouts have largely operated on directness: a single, a cover, a date, a drop. An artist who withholds, who builds mystery, who asks the audience to work, produces friction inside that expectation. The friction is called a gimmick. The actual gimmick would be an artist doing all of this with nothing underneath it. 'HEIS' exists. The body of work exists. The visual consistency exists. The riddle connects to something real.

The London listening party on August 7 added another layer to the rollout. An exclusive gathering that drew Odeal and Stonebwoy alongside industry leaders, the event gave a select room an early taste of 'Tea' alongside several unreleased tracks from the third album. Before playing the new music, Rema addressed the room directly: "I'm gonna play some new music, you gotta promise me it won't go out. If it goes out it cannot drop, I don't drop sh*t that's leaked."

The album has no confirmed title or release date yet. The listening party made clear it exists and is close.

‍'Tea' - produced by Mustard and his longtime collaborator London - is his first solo release of the year, arriving after a run of international collaborations including Don Toliver's 'Secondhand', which peaked at number 29 on the Billboard Hot 100, and 'Goals' with LISA and Anitta at the FIFA World Cup 2026 opening ceremony. When he posted the cover art - a close-cropped, surreal image with gold lips and the title in bold pink - he added two words: "no AI." In a moment where AI-generated artwork has become a recurring conversation in music, the clarification was deliberate. The single does not resolve the mystery of what comes next. It begins the musical argument the project will eventually complete.

What has been consistent across six years and three albums is the sense that Rema is building something with an internal logic, and that the rollout is part of the build rather than separate from it. The gimmick debate is, in part, a delayed response to that - the recognition that something deliberate has been happening, met with the suspicion that deliberateness is performance. 

IG:@sophiannadozie

Energy, energy, energy.

When I tell you, it felt like a total Nigerian explosion in the heart of New York City! From the moment you stepped into the Amber Room, the atmosphere hit you immediately it felt just like home. Between the pulsating crowd, the curated Martell cocktails (like the Nigerian Swift Sour and Martarita), and an unmatchable warmth in the air, the night was pure magic.

The fashion throughout the room was an absolute headline in itself. Attendees stepped out in their absolute best a masterclass in playfulness with bold patterns, rich textures, layered jewelry, and striking statements in their hair. Yet, standing at the center of it all, Davido embodied pure royalty. Wearing a sleek off-white suit topped with a golden crown, his look commanded the room while setting the perfect tone for his much-anticipated sixth studio album, ORIADÉ.

Organic, Unscripted, and Pure Family

At most major industry events, there’s usually a dramatic, stuffy ritual: the music stops, a booming voice announces "the man of the hour is here," and a grand, rigid entrance breaks the vibe. Here, it was completely different. When Davido walked in, everything felt intentional and effortless. There were no rehearsed spectacles or forced announcements just him moving naturally through the room, hugging his friends, greeting people like family, and sharing genuine laughs. It removed all the typical industry pretense and turned the night into one massive, loving family gathering alongside his wife Chioma, DJ ECool, manager Asa Asika, and close community.

What stood out most was the undeniable sense of presence and real connection. Sure, the phones came out for a brief minute at the very beginning when Davido took the mic to introduce the music. But once the sound kicked in, something rare happened: the screens went down. Instead of recording every single track through a lens, people chose to actually experience the album in real time. In a culture often obsessed with capturing content, this generation is quietly shifting back to what truly matters embracing authenticity, seizing the moment, and grounding themselves in community. That intentionality was palpable throughout the room.

A Track-by-Track Vibe Through ORIADÉ

The album itself is consistent energy and non-stop vibe from start to finish. Exploring themes of legacy, destiny, and his 15-year journey in music, ORIADÉ is a powerhouse 13-track body of work that hits all the right notes. Davido seamlessly bridges the global diaspora across the project, bringing along an impressive roster of collaborators including Black Sherif, JAZZWRLD, GL_Ceejay, NO11, Mayorkun, FOLA, Leon Thomas, Aya Nakamura, and Llona.

Davido is simply one of those rare artists whose music touches your heart. The way he consistently sings about love with that signature raspy vocal style is unmatched, and experiencing these highlights live was something special:‍

 “On the Road”: The opener sets the perfect tone smooth, grounded, and introspective. Davido reflects on his lifestyle and where he’s at, but reminds us that life is so much deeper; it was relentless hard work and diligence that brought him to this exact moment.

“Amazing Grace” (feat. Black Sherif): Fast-forward to the second track, which already feels like a future 2027 hit wedding anthem. The peak of the night arrived when Black Sherif made a surprise appearance on stage to perform it alongside Davido, sending shockwaves of energy through the room.‍

“Gimme Dat Ting”: The minute this track dropped, staying still was non-negotiable. I felt it straight in my soul first my hips started moving, then my hands, and then my feet. It completely took over, forcing everyone in the room to just vibe.

 “Tell Me” (feat. Leon Thomas): Their voices complement each other so seamlessly it puts you into a trance. Listening to it transports you straight to the middle of an island dance floor surrounded by people catching a vibe, enjoying life, and living in the moment.

Unforgettable Night, Unmatched Spirit

Watching the room vibe out together, with genuine smiles radiating across every face, truly encapsulated the unifying power of Afrobeats. As DJ ECool took over the decks and Davido took the mic to sing along, it became an intimate, unforgettable first look into the world of ORIADÉ a night that felt distinctly like Lagos, beautifully reimagined through a New York lens.

In a world that often feels heavy and chaotic, ORIADÉ is a reminder of what music is supposed to do: make you feel good, bring people together, and let you lose yourself in the movement. It’s more than just a 13-track project it’s an invitation to step into Davido’s world, reconnect with joy, and feel the energy for yourself. Press play on ORIADÉ on all streaming platforms today and be a part of the experience.

Photography credit: Emmanuel Agbeble, apmworldmag.

Davido released his sixth studio album, ORIADÉ, on July 31, 2026 - a date chosen deliberately to mark exactly 15 years since he launched his professional music career.

The 13-track project is his shortest to date, a focused body of work that follows 5ive, which peaked at number two on the Billboard World Albums chart in 2025. The album title is derived from the Yoruba words ori (destiny) and adé (crown), translating to "the crowned head." When Davido announced the project in June, he captioned the cinematic teaser - in which he appeared in regal Yoruba attire soundtracked by a Yoruba eulogy - with: "The kingdom expands. Chosen long before the throne."

The tracklist brings together a carefully selected lineup of African and international collaborators. 'Amazing Grace' features Black Sherif, 'B4 B4' features Mayorkun and FOLA, 'Tell Everybody' features Leon Thomas, 'Yaya' features Aya Nakamura, and 'My Light' features Llona. JAZZWRLD and GL Ceejay appear on the lead single 'I Know Who I Be', while No11 features on 'Gimme Dat Ting'. The remaining tracks - 'On The Road', 'Julie', 'Constantly', 'Already Falling', 'Zanzibar' and 'Guide' - round out the project.

Ahead of the album's release, Davido hosted two listening events for close friends, collaborators and industry figures. The first took place in Lagos, sponsored by Martell, Ajoje and The Plug - an intimate gathering that gave attendees an early experience of the full project. The second followed in New York City at the Amber Room on July 31, presented by Martell, where Davido's wife Chioma, manager Asa Asika and longtime collaborator DJ ECool were among those present. ECool played the album in its entirety before Davido joined him on stage to perform selections from the record. Black Sherif made a surprise appearance to perform 'Amazing Grace' live - one of the evening's standout moments.

In a recent interview ahead of the release, Davido described ORIADÉ as a return to his "original high-energy African sound," recorded over two years while balancing an extensive international touring schedule. The album is set to be performed live for the first time at an exclusive show at the O2 Forum Kentish Town in London on August 11, with a wider world tour expected to follow.

ORIADÉ is out now on all streaming platforms.

IG: @sophiannadozie

This Friday marks DEEDS’ first time at Osheaga. The 20 year old music festival takes place every summer at Parc Jean-Drapeau in Montreal, Quebec. The multi-day event has hosted the likes of SZA, Childish Gambino, Travis Scott, and more. It is one of the biggest music festivals in Canada. 

This year’s lineup at Osheaga is stacked with heavy hitters including Lord, Gunna, Zara Larsson and Tate McRae. But amidst this lineup lies various amazing Black Canadian acts that we can’t wait to see in action. 

Avenoir

Raised in South Africa but now based in Edmonton, the dark-R&B crooner caught our attention with his sultry, entrancing melodies and smooth vocals. The release of his debut album, Mirage, last year, definitely established him as one of the most exciting R&B acts out right now. We can’t wait to see how he translates his music onto the stage!

BAMBII

Ain’t no party like a BAMBII party (if you know, you know). The Toronto-raised, Jamaican DJ and producer captivates every stage she graces with her unique blend of electronic genres and  dancehall. She also made her mark this year after featuring alongside Madison Beer on Zara Larsson’s deluxe album, Midnight Sun: Girls Trip. We can’t wait to move with her!

Fernie

Known for his vivid storytelling and vulnerable lyricism, the Brazilian-born, Montreal-raised artist builds lush soundscapes across pop and R&B. With a falsetto that just won’t quit, Fernie seamlessly transforms painful experiences into beauty through his music. We can’t wait to be serenaded by him!

The easiest thing to do with Siraheem is not listen. Son of Chief Razaq Okoya, billionaire industrialist and founder of the Eleganza Group, he arrived in the Nigerian music industry carrying a last name that preceded every opinion about him. The naira abuse scandal. The bowling centre charges $5,000 membership. The "nepo baby" label that followed him from comment section to comment section. By the time 'Bad Bitch Syndrome' went viral in 2024, the internet had already decided what Siraheem was - a rich kid playing musician, backed by money that made the playing field anything but level.

Then he sat in front of a Glitch Africa microphone and performed 'Iseoluwa', 'Soweto', 'Kowope' and 'Brazil Bounce' without the armour of production, without a crowd to feed off, without anything between the voice and the listener. Eight days later, Twitter is still processing it.

The reactions have a specific texture - not the usual "this is good" but something closer to recalibration. People who had dismissed him are going back to 'By the Order of the City', the debut EP he released May 1, 2026, hearing it differently now that they have heard him sing directly. The performance did not introduce a new Siraheem. It created the conditions for people to actually hear the one that was already there.

This is what Glitch Africa does at its best. The platform strips the music back to its most honest form - no production armour, no engineered atmosphere, just the voice and the song. Asake's 'Baba God' session is the clearest precedent in recent memory - a live performance that revealed something about his vocal control and emotional range that the studio version had almost obscured. Siraheem's session is doing the same kind of work. The surprise in the comment sections is not that he has suddenly become something he wasn't. It is that the version of him that already existed has finally been seen.

‍'Soweto' live is a different thing entirely. The line that opens the EP - "me I'm not from ghetto but na me dey run your ghetto" - lands harder without the beat carrying it. 'Iseoluwa' is the track that does the most work live. The vocal control exists on the studio version but stripped of production it becomes harder to argue with - you hear it differently when there is nothing else to credit. 'Kowope' and 'Brazil Bounce' confirmed that the range across the EP was not a producer's doing. He moves between sounds and stays himself throughout.

The people who decided Siraheem should not be making music have too much invested in that conclusion to let a Glitch Africa session change it entirely. The noise around this man is considerable and it does not dissolve overnight. What the performance did is something more specific - it gave the people who were willing to listen a reason to do so, and it is sending them back to the EP with ears that are no longer filtered through the label that preceded him.

IG: @sophiannadozie

LADIPOE has been making the case for technical rap in Nigerian music for over a decade - patiently, consistently, and without compromising the craft that defines him. Born Ladipo Eso, he studied Biology and Chemistry at the University of North Carolina before returning to Lagos to pursue music, a decision that surprised people then and continues to inform his work now. His debut album T.A.P (Talk About Poe) established him as one of the most lyrically rigorous voices in Afrobeats' ecosystem. Revival, his sophomore project, deepens that argument - a Pan-African record that pulls collaborators from Nigeria, South Africa, the UK and the US, and opens with a voice note from his mother. We spoke about craft, conviction, and what it actually takes to lead a revival.

For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and your music?

 I'm Ladipoe, the leader of the revival, and I write lifelines.

You studied Biology and Chemistry in the United States before coming back to Nigeria to rap. What was that decision like choosing art over what most people would consider the safer path?

It wasn't a single decision.  It's something that happened over time. You know, I got my degree.  I also went and got a job and eventually I did come back to Nigeria and also got a job here too.  So I was doing that while also pursuing musical aspirations.  And over time, you know I went back to school again, came back, and I eventually made the choice to choose one over the other. But pretty much all the while I was pursuing music, I was working. When I decided to choose between the two was when I got signed, because I now felt at this point in time, I had to do it professionally. I had to do it just only music if I wanted to, like, take advantage of being a side artist. That's the first time I made that decision where it was only music that I was doing, so it wasn't a quick decision. It's just that my creative life started to become the main part of my life over time.

You call yourself the “Leader of the Revival.” That’s a bold claim in a landscape where Nigerian hip-hop still struggles for the mainstream attention Afrobeats gets automatically. What are you actually reviving and who are you reviving it for?

 I think my revival is not about the genres, not even about the music. It's itself. It's about self. It's about identity. It's about who you are as a person and who you need to become to do the things in life that you are meant to do. And for me, I'm in music, so it's more about self, not about hip hop, not about Afrobeats, not about Nigerian music per se. It's about the person.

You are one of the most technically gifted rappers in Nigerian music, operating in a space that consistently rewards melody and hooks over bars. How do you navigate that tension without compromising what makes you distinctly you?

It's because believing that the value of this thing is not based on its popularity, maybe that's not the accurate thing to say. Think of what I want to say. I think that people ask this question that you're asking because, you know, they feel like there's some kind of competition because people like that, you know, you can only choose one. Because people like…What did you say?  Melody and what was it?

Hook over Bars.

Melodies and hooks over bars. Maybe people ask this question because they feel like if people like that, it means they don't like bars, you know, or lyrics. And by bars, what they are just talking about is like lyrics and things that have meaning, punchlines and stuff like that and wordplay. But I think because I don't see it in black and white, I feel like this is an audience that likes many, many things. And they have wild taste and they're really smart, you know, and there's people who are seeking things, that want things just like me. And when you really think about it, because I feel like I like what I like and I'm probably not the only one. I'm not the only one just like me who likes these things, because I really believe that.  That's why I know that it's. That's how I navigate it.  Because I know that there's other people that like this stuff out there in the world. Sophia there’s almost 300 million people in Nigeria. If a lot of them like hooks and choruses, melody, there's still how many millions that would like, you know what else is out there? At the end of the day, we are not eating rice every day?  You know, everybody likes different things.

‍Revival has a Pan-African outlook - collaborations spanning Nigeria, South Africa, the UK and the US. How intentional was it to make the album feel like an African conversation rather than just a Nigerian one?

You know, it was, I'd say it was intentional. It was mainly organic. It really happened organically.  And I think the reason why it has a Pan African feel is because that's the nature of my life and my career.  Music has kind of taken me beyond the shores of my country and as a result, I'm meeting people from different spaces now and just reflecting on my music.  So it was kind of.  It was organic, but at the same time, even me, I only realized it maybe like a few months before we dropped the album, like everybody's from different places, you know.  But yeah, I think it's more of a true reflection of where my music is at and where it has taken me as opposed to. Hey, man, I had to make sure that they know that it's Pan African.

But yeah, this time was organic.

“Motho Waka” with Maglera Doe Boy stood out as a genuine cross-continental rap moment. What excites you about the growing connections between rap scenes across Africa?

You said, what excites me about growing. Right.  I think it's always been there. I actually think these connections have always been there.  Even before our own contemporary music industry, dating back to the artists that came before us.  I think they've always had these collaborations with their brothers and sisters in different African countries. And I think what excites me is that it's still alive.  If anything,  I don't just think it's growing. I think it's always been there and it's still alive. And I'm happy to contribute my own songs into these connections. Long established connections, you know, the relationship musically between Africa, I mean, Nigeria and South Africa is deep. Everybody knows this, you know, so this is me adding another one to it, you know. And between Nigeria and Ghana, everybody knows. I mean, I think what excites me is one, that they're still alive and two, there's more that we can bring in to make the show. Connecting now with new places, I think will be even more.  That'll be exciting to me.  Places that people are not used to seeing, you know?  Yeah, that could be interesting.

Actually I do like the song, it’s something I can hum anywhere..

It's such a groovy song. What I've noticed is that now that the album is out, you know, before people heard it as a single, but now they're hearing it inside the album with other tracks. And I think they're appreciating it even more because after many people, they don't even know when their waist is starting to move, when Motho Waka's bass line comes inside.

The opening track “Chosen” ends with a voice note from your mother. That’s a deeply personal creative decision. What made you include that moment on the album?

They found each other. I'd had this message, you know, like, I see people joking online.  Anybody that sends Ladipoe voice note is in trouble, they're going to be looking for their voice on the album. But It really isn't like that. And I know rappers have a reputation of doing that, you know, but for me, it was a message I'd always kept with me when. When she sent it, I had kept it with me because it felt important for my own spirit. And it just made sense for a song that talked about being chosen to let you know. Sophia, when you're making music, there's the music, there's the lyrics. I'm always seeking to find more ways to bring you into my world until there's layers to it.  So this message and voice from somebody else is another way of letting people understand how I know I'm chosen.  

Should I say it’s also a reminder?

Exactly.  And, you know, the biggest thing now is if, let's say you're listening to it and it makes you feel chosen, ah! Something powerful is really happening, you know, and I think that's really the biggest part of it. And the most amazing part of music is the fact that somebody can own this song in a way where they're not thinking about me, thinking about themselves.

‍Revival tackles fatherhood as one of its themes. How has becoming a father changed what you want to say with your music?

I mean, has it changed?  I don't think it's changed things. It added to it. It added more of a perspective of the world. To my music.  I just wasn't capable of seeing before, you know. I care about my son in a very specific way that I don't know if you can feel that way, unless you actually do have.  I'm sure there's ways you can feel something similar. It opens up a whole new way of thinking about the world and thinking about what is important in the world, you know?  So, yes.  It added to my music.

Actually I swapped this number eight question because I was very unsure.  I had to go back to the album's description.  Then I saw Father.  Of course, I was like, I don't want to pass wrong information.  So it was surprising to know that you are a father. 

I hear that a lot. But yeah, life happens, right?  Life is happening to people.  The songs that you like and, you know, between this article you write and the next article you write, stuff happens, right?  Yeah, you know, exactly.

African artists are reaching global audiences at an unprecedented rate. In your view, what does it truly take for an African rapper not an Afrobeats artist, a rapper to compete on the world stage while remaining authentic?

I think that now, you asked this question last time and I said all the things that it really does take. You need to have an unshakable vision. You need to have a team that sees that vision. You have to have a direction that you know you guys are going and alignments. All of those kind of things are true.  And.  But even before that, you need to have a mindset that has never asked this question that you're asking me.  Like, you should not need to ask yourself, what do I need to do?  How do I need to be?  To be global. You are that already.  All it's missing is maybe visibility by default.

You already have what it takes to be an artist. I mean, there's certain artists that I think cross the threshold of being gifted. And it's like, you already have what it takes to be on a global stage.  What you're missing is visibility. And I say that because before the thinking was, I can't even imagine how it would be if I knew so I was on the level of Drake or these things are like, because we couldn't when we're younger. We couldn't see how it was possible. That's a kind of thinking that doesn't even need to exist anymore. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I don't really think about the idea of being global. I think more of how far can I push my music? And I know that my music belongs in every room. Yeah, I know that. Like, I already know that. I already know I can walk into that room. I fit in those settings. I already know that. I don't think to myself, how do I need to balance authenticity? I already know. I came prepared for that. So it's like, the only way to do that is to know the music you make as an artist, keep making that music and pushing it as far as it can go. Period. There's nothing like going global. Like, you push as far as you can go.  When you're in that space, you'll know what to do. I don't know. I feel like I haven't answered it in a way that you can fully. I fully understand what I'm trying to say, but I just know that I don't ask myself this question.

Yeah, I do.  I do understand.  It's just more of how the audience will receive it.

Yes, exactly.  I don't exactly.  I don't know how we're gonna translate it in a way that they can get it, But I feel like for an artist to stay authentic and be global, they should not have to ask themselves, how do I go global?  They just need to be authentic and push it as far as they can go and connect the dots where they can.  If you know where you want to go, you're always aiming for that direction. 

But you don't have to change a single thing about yourself.  And when you ask yourself this question, it almost feels like you need to change something to balance.  No, no.  Just be you.  That music is what it is.

Like this popular saying, I am him.

Yes. It's now a matter of timing. And if you see Sophia, let's not take luck. Luck, but it's not just luck is just opportunity and timing. The opportunity came and we were ready.

How do they say this?  Preparedness?  Yeah, I think that is it.

Yes, yes, exactly.  That's it.  I think that's it. If you stay true to who you are, you will be prepared.  And also, you have to be caught doing in motion, caught doing something. I think the only thing an artist needs to do is to be themselves and be actively doing what it is you love to do the best.  So when the timing is right, you will be prepared to take advantage of it. That's your center.

As we wrap up -  what do you want people to understand about Revival that a first listen might not fully capture?

You have all it takes to lead your own revival.

IG: @sophiannadozie

Music that promises relaxation often risks slipping into background noise, but on her debut project Feels Like Home, Osé achieves something far rarer: a quiet, grounding presence that demands your full attention. Across the tracklist, her vocal execution feels like butter smooth, effortless, and radiating a calm, sultry confidence. It is a body of work infused with touches of jazz, R&B, and rich cultural rhythms, offering listeners an immediate sense of peace and an escape to a poolside sanctuary, complete with a glass of wine and room to breathe.

From the opening moments of "24HRS" , Osé sets a tranquil tone. The track serves as a vibrant oasis where ocean-like melodic waves drift seamlessly over a subtle jump beat. When she asks for more time with a lover, her delivery feels completely unforced less like a demand and more like an effortless, magnetic request. Throughout the project, a quiet confidence emerges as the primary common thread: an artistic energy that feels remarkably soft, yet strong at the exact same time. Even on "Bother Me" (featuring Victony), where the tempo shifts upward into a swaying, infectious rhythm, the production remains remarkably smooth and non-intrusive, bringing movement to the tracklist without disrupting the EP’s delicate equilibrium.

As the EP progresses, Osé uses her vocal control to explore emotional clarity. On “Cease and Desist “, her questioning of a partner avoids any sense of confrontation; supported by a warm tempo and a soothing melody, her inquiry sounds like a person who has already found peace with whatever answer comes next. This intentionality shines even brighter on "Gently", a standout track where she claims the space to be her full, vulnerable self. In an industry that often tries to box in Black female artists or confuse volume with strength, Osé’s power lies in her soft authority. Her songwriting feels poetic and deliberate, turning self-assurance into something sonically restorative.

That feeling of freedom reaches a cinematic peak on "RAMBO". Driven by warm, atmospheric drums, the track teleports the listener directly to a coastal sunset—a scene where different hues hit the water, glasses are raised, and the crowd moves in shared euphoria.

By the time the project closes with "STUPID!" , the narrative arrives at a satisfying exhale. Rather than ending on bitterness or lingering regret, the song functions as a final release. Osé acknowledges past foolishness, comes to terms with the truth, and lets go with complete grace.
Feels Like Home leaves you with a lingering sense of calm a beautifully crafted body of work that proves peace can be the ultimate artistic statement.

Spotify brought its immersive Greasy Tunes experience to Nairobi, marking the Kenyan capital as the latest city to host the platform's community-driven cultural activation. Running from July 15 to July 26 at Heltz House, the 12-day residency transformed the venue into a gathering place where music, food, fashion, comedy and conversation converged, reflecting the vibrant creative energy that continues to define Nairobi.

Originally launched in Johannesburg before making its way to Lagos, Greasy Tunes is inspired by the idea of the neighborhood "greasy spoon" café – a familiar space where people naturally gather over good food and conversation. Rather than centering solely on live performances, Spotify has reimagined the concept for Nairobi by creating an environment that mirrors how young Kenyans experience culture: fluidly moving between music, storytelling, fashion, food and digital communities.

According to Spotify, listeners between the ages of 18 and 24 account for more than half of all streams in Nairobi, with listening habits peaking during the evening hours. Those insights helped shape the residency, which offered visitors a packed calendar of events spanning multiple creative disciplines instead of traditional concerts alone.

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The program featured collaborations with some of Nairobi's most recognizable creative communities, including The BAG, Studio 18, Ongeza Volume, Strictly Soul, The Standup Collective, The Fisherman's Experience, Culture Club Podcast and 30 Percent Podcast. Each partnership brought a different perspective to the residency, highlighting the diversity of Kenya's contemporary creative landscape.

Among the standout moments were a Karibu Night inspired by Spotify's Made In Kenya playlist, live performances from Buruklyn Boyz, conversations led by producer Eric Musyoka, Larry Madowo and more, a women-in-music workshop designed to spotlight female voices in the industry, comedy showcases, fan experiences with Nyashinski and a closing celebration hosted by Strictly Soul.

Food also played an important role throughout the activation. Working alongside local culinary partners, Spotify incorporated Kenyan-inspired menus and communal dining experiences that reinforced Greasy Tunes' central idea: that music often serves as the soundtrack to everyday moments shared around the table.

The Nairobi edition reflects Spotify's growing investment in connecting with audiences beyond the streaming platform. Rather than focusing exclusively on playlists and algorithms, Greasy Tunes creates opportunities for listeners to experience music in physical spaces where creativity extends into conversations, fashion, food and community-building.

For Nairobi, the activation also serves as another acknowledgment of the city's growing influence within Africa's creative economy. Over the past few years, Nairobi has become an increasingly important destination for artists, creators and brands seeking to engage with East Africa's youthful and culturally engaged audiences. By choosing the city for the latest edition of Greasy Tunes, Spotify joins a growing list of global companies recognizing Nairobi as a hub where music and culture continue to shape one another.

While the residency has now concluded, Greasy Tunes leaves behind more than memories of performances and events. It reinforces the idea that streaming platforms can play a role beyond digital listening, creating real-world spaces where communities connect, collaborate and celebrate the cultures that inspire the music they hear every day.

Releasing her highly anticipated sophomore album, Tyla’s A*Pop arrives with a clear mission to push her sound further into the global pop arena without letting go of the South African rhythms that made her one of music's most exciting new stars. The result is what she's time and again dubbed as Popiano – a sleek blend of contemporary Pop with the unmistakable bounce of Amapiano.

At 14 tracks long, the record is undeniably her most pop-forward release yet. Songs like ‘Double Blind’ and ‘That Girl’ are built with global radio in mind, embracing the glossy songwriting and infectious hooks that Western labels often seek from artists crossing into mainstream markets. But Tyla never strips away the identity that got her there. Beneath the shimmering production lie the familiar log drums, rhythmic bounce, and vocal flourishes that make her music unmistakably from the continent. Even something as subtle as the ad-libs that close out ‘Kiss’ serves as a reminder to listeners of where her sound was born.

Elsewhere, collaborations with Mawhoo on "Crazy of Me" and the nostalgic pairing with Liquideep on "Fairytale," inject the album with warmth and authenticity, balancing its commercial ambitions with distinctly African musical textures.

Perhaps A*Pop's greatest strength is its versatility. The two-time Grammy winner effortlessly shifts between flirtatious, groove-driven anthems made for packed dance floors and softer, synth-drenched ballads that reveal a more vulnerable side. It's a satisfying mix of music to dip low to in the club and songs to sit with long after the night ends.

Yet, despite its strengths, A*Pop never quite reaches the creative highs of Tyla's self-titled debut. Even with already-proven standouts like ‘Chanel’ and 'She Did It Again’ featuring Zara Larsson, and stunning visuals from other singles, the album feels more refined than revelatory leaning a little too comfortably into familiar pop formulas, making the project feel safer than its ambitions suggest. Where her debut thrived on the excitement of introducing a fresh voice and sound, this follow-up misses that.

Still, that's hardly a criticism severe enough to overshadow what Tyla accomplishes here. A*Pop feels less like a reinvention and more like a confident expansion of her musical universe. It's the kind of album that will resonate most with listeners who've already squeezed every last replay out of her earlier discography and are ready to hear where Popiano goes next.

Nippa’s music has always been rooted in authenticity, but his latest chapter marks a powerful evolution—one that has seen him go deep into himself and open up more. His latest release, “Homegrown,” is an indicator of this chapter in his musical journey.

Joining forces with friend and US Rapper Blxst, it's more than a song for the Tottenham rapper; it is a celebration and celebration of his family as well as an anthem for his day-ones and supporters who have been alongside him for the journey.

As he gets ready to embark on a new chapter in his career, he opens up about the making of his new project, how family and community have shaped his journey, and why coming full circle means more than just success—it’s about redefining what it means to represent where you’re from.

I know, obviously, you just put out the single with Blxst. How did that collaboration come about?

Blxst and I have been tapped in from the start of my career. I supported him in 2021 when my single “Situation” came out. He just showed me love and put me on the stage, so we've been tapped in since then. We actually made Homegrown in LA. I needed help on the hook, so I called Blxst to come and help me, but by the time he came here, I'd already got a hook. He told me that he loves the song and he’d love to jump on the second verse. I think it made sense for the message. It's about family, coming from nothing, sticking with your day ones, all things that sit in my moral compass. Blxst has been there since day one with me, so I thought, why not? It just makes sense for him to be on a song that's about being with your day ones.

Even in terms of, like, I know you guys did the video, and just, you know, having that sort of link and that collaboration already having. Relationship. How did you feel like working with him?

For me, it was a full-circle moment. It's been good to see Blxst's journey. I've been seeing it from before I even knew him; he's inspired a lot of my sound choices. So, it good to work with him. As I said, we've known each other for a while, so it was seamless, man. The video was seamless; it was just fun, man. You know, he knows my people. It was kind of like a family barbecue

In terms of the specific inspiration of the song and how you made it, where did that come from?

I actually had heard the beat sometime last year, and I just felt that the beat was just so spiritual. I knew from the moment that it had to be about family, my mum, my grandma, my sister, and I just felt that it had to feel like a spiritual hug. But I just couldn't get it. I couldn't get it for so long. I just kept on making a lot of rubbish songs on the beat. And then one day I was chilling with Sam, I gave him a melody and we finally got somewhere. We were going back and forth on the writing and didn't really get anywhere. I went to Camper's Studio, and I just started spitting the flows out, and we had the whole song done that day. I called Blxst to come help with the hook, but before he'd even come, I'd already spat it all out.

It's a big moment, and even just in terms of it being the song for Tottenham Hotspur and that whole situation. And so even in terms of like what you said about, you know, it is representing like where you're from and like, you know, your family and everything like that, like, how does that feel like in terms of even being a part of such a big moment?

So, I've got a love-hate relationship with my hood. It’s a proper full circle moment to see myself as the face of the soundtrack for Tottenham Hotspurs. Being from Tottenham, knowing that I've strived, suffered, cried, been happy, all in this area, and now I've got the main football team of this area behind me and representing me. It's definitely inspirational to see how far I've come. I also feel a responsibility to show the next generation of kids in Tottenham that we can do it without doing what they expect us to. We’re more than what they  label us as, we're more than just the statistics. I'm happy, it’s definitely a full-circle moment.

‍Getting to this point in your career, and being on this journey how key that's been for you in getting to this point, like, your support of your family, and all of that?

100% man, it's super important. I'd say it's the most important thing, especially for this next chapter. I wanted to take a deep dive into myself and who I am.  All my friends around me I've known for 24-plus years. My family know me, everyone around me knows the true, authentic version of me and I take pride in that. Having them around me keeps me grounded, keeps me from losing myself, and keeps me true to who I am.

What does this moment feel like in terms of where you are in your career and just the journey that you're on right now?

Right now, I try not to take in a lot of the distractions.  I kind of want to keep it on the work. For me, I'm just loading out new music. I try to stay in that creative mode, whether it's with my visuals or with my music itself. Of course, I'm happy that the love is getting there, but for me, it just shows me that it's time to show them what's next. I need to keep going and one-up myself in everything that I do.

You have new music that you're working on at the minute. This new era that you're in what can you tell us about where you are, and how do you think it's shifted from where you were like a year ago?

I think last year, I was in a place where I was finally comfortable talking about my love life and what's affecting me in terms of my relationship with women. This time, I feel like it's got a bit deeper, and it's not about one thing. It’s about what affects my life as a whole. Who is Nippa behind the mic, you know? What does Nippa stand for? Who does he hold dear to him? What's made Nippa who he is today? And I think that is the key thing in this project and this next era. I want to show the world who I am behind the mic, and what makes me, me. That's obviously my ends, my community, my family, my friends. It's just all the intricate stuff, and the things that people really don't talk about as much, innit.

“Oh Yeah?” is a Soft Confessional Arc of a Bisexual Narrator

After four years of absence, Steve Lacy finally returns with a new project titled ‘Oh yeah?,’ a slow ambient ballad exploring his colourful love journey thus far, or the lack of it, revealing the challenges of modern dating through a Black queer lens, specifically as a bisexual fellow. With guest appearances from SZA, Erykah Badu, and more, Steve introduces an intricate sonic dance accompanied by minimal instruments such as a classic guitar, drums, and airy vocals; an approach that has since become his signature sound.

Steve Thomas Lacy-Moya, better known to the world as African-American Steve Lacy, is a 28-year-old singer-songwriter and producer who began his music career with the alternative group The Internet while still in high school. Perhaps what is most interesting about him, aside from his collaborations with the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Tyler The Creator, and more, is that he recorded all his earliest songs with an iPhone. His 2022 project ‘Gemini Rights’ earned him multiple groundbreaking awards, while he currently has almost 30 million monthly listeners on Spotify. Thus, Steve Lacy has become one of the most sought-after voices of his generation.

Steve’s first single ‘The Feeling’ set up the tone for the rest of the project to follow. From the first listen alone, it appears as if Steve is going through the ember stage of heartbreak, but as one pays closer attention, the song can be interpreted as the painful grieving process of a one-sided love never explored, a common experience in the bisexual community. Its intimate, obsessive lyrics that seemingly address a male muse, from the verse, “When you start writing songs just to stop thinking about him,” coming at the final bridge, really gave us the first hint of a fluid turmoil Steve has been meaning to soft launch. Similarly, Steve chooses to start ‘Is It Cool?’ with the words “Never needed a man,” which really comes across when one goes through the lyrics word for word.

This jumpy, avoidant approach to same-sex attraction is nothing new, as in his 2022 song “Static,” Steve Lacy sings, “Looking for a b*tch because I’m over boys,” to a seemingly majorly hetero interaction with a woman of interest. It is that notion that bleeds throughout the project; Steve is not actively trying to hide his sexual identity through lyrics; he is trying to balance it, inside a universal language like music that offers little to no bisexual love narration.

Another standout track is ‘show you me,’ where Steve confronts his muse with the following line: “Are you even gay?” Steve showcases his longing for love at full display, whether with a man or woman, admitting to himself that the drive for this search is loneliness. A central theme to this project can be traced in the lyrics, “As of late, I guess I’ve been leaning closer to D.” It also becomes apparent that, whereas in the past, songs directed to his female muses were lived experience, his songs directed to men are a distant companionship, often with the male muses unaware that Steve has unresolved feelings with them.

In a track that reminds one of ‘Californication’ by Red Hot Chili Peppers, Steve Lacy really paints the modern dating scene well in ‘doom.’ In a time where sex is more accessible than ever, and social media encourages validation over authenticity, there is little room for genuine affection. However, Steve doesn’t run away from reality, also admitting that he’s been a willing participant in this ordeal. The nihilistic lyrics paired with the uplifting instrumental are the perfect recipe for disaster.

Perhaps one of the most underrated tracks from the project, which really encapsulates the longing of a bisexual individual, can be felt in ‘nothing.’ Accompanied by a solo guitar, the simple lyrics establish the intensity of Steve’s one-sided infatuation. There is a certain atmosphere of delusion coupled with obsession that perfectly captures the narrow lines of fluidity. Intimacy with one was accessible, yet on the other end, it is unattainable, often self-inflicted, a love he finds difficult to explore in the open.

Steve Lacy’s latest project, ‘Oh yeah?’ contains all of the complexities, delusions, obsessiveness, and overall confusing emotions surrounding queer fluidity in today’s dating climate. In its cover, where a circle in the colours of the bisexuality flag emphasizes Steve’s wondering gaze, it already foretold the loneliness and anguish that awaits. Steve Lacy is not just dealing with a longing for queer love; he is struggling to keep afloat in an environment where temporary satisfaction and distant glaze have replaced meaningful connection. This is Steve Lacy’s most vulnerable and honest piece of work yet.

Before Banggz became Banggz,the emerging  rapper/producer extraordinaire based in Canada’s capital city, Ottawa, he was Damilola Isa Salaudeen, a young boy raised in Lagos, Nigeria, with a persistent love of beats and bars. Through life’s challenges including immigration struggles and grief, his love of storytelling remained a constant way for him to get out of his head and uplift his community by telling their stories and speaking life into them. These sentiments inspired Banggz’s debut album, 4 THE BANGGERZ (2024), a project which proved his ability to craft infectious party starters including “OUTSIDE” and “WAKE UP”. “The whole idea [of 4 THE BANGGERZ] was escapism…making sure everyone was good, but I realized that I can't really do that if I don't help myself first,” he said. Followinghis debut came a few years of deep reflection amidst inner and outer turmoil, prompting him to write his new album, Love, Banggz, a coming-of-age story that plots a path between the formative stages of his life through love, loss and grief. “I wrote a love letter to my childhood self, he explained.” 

One of the main tenets of Love, Banggz is the inherent nostalgia that comes with the retelling of a life story. Many of the songs speak candidly about love, a theme which Banggz says is central to his identity, particularly on “Pretty & Gorgeous”, “Love Letters” and “Blackberry Luv”. On the album, he embraces everything that comes with it, including heartbreak, while acknowledging his own flaws. “It's really important for me to tell my younger self that I love him, and it's really important for me to give myself another chance at love romantically, friendship-wise, [and with my] faith.” To capture finding love in the early digital age, Banggz wrote “Blackberry Luv” with the help of past Ottawa resident and rising afro soul/jazz singer Anaïs Cardot. 

In this quest for love, Banggz is entirely inspired by his faith in Allah. After escaping insurgent violence in Jos, Nigeria, at the tender age of 3, he was changed forever, but it wasn’t until his faith was rekindled at the age of 25 that he fully surrendered to divine will. Since diving deeper into the Islamic faith he was born into, he’s found inner peace and defined his values, which he calls “unshakable”. Banggz has also been able to navigate loss and grief through his faith, especially through the loss of his grandmother 4 years ago, another prominent theme on the record, especially on the introspective first track, “Don’t Leave Me, Please”. As he makes peace with life’s curveballs, Banggz is no stranger to feelings of regret or failure, but he remains grateful for it all. “When you say failure, I immediately think gratitude…I feel blessed to have become the person that I am today.” 

To create his most authentic music yet, Banggz leaned on live instrumentation to capture the jazzy, R&B inflected hip-hop soundscape that most of the album lives in. As executive producer, he made sure the production reflected the realities of the songs, most of which were initially written as journal entries and poems. “If you write an album called Love, Banggz, you know, you better make sure that you know it's really 100% honest, and the best way for me to do that was to just make it myself.” A star instrument that he made sure to include was the talking drum, which is prominent in the Yoruba storytelling tradition. “I needed [the talking drums] to move around the album a bit, because I'm talking about my life story. I wanted the instrumental to talk in that sense too.” For features, he picked people who inspired him, including his good friends jev. and Anaïs Cardot, two Ottawa acts whose talents have gone global. To Banggz, jev. is the kind of rapper and friend who motivates him to see his own worth. “[jev.] trusts his taste so much, watching him really helped me, and listening to him helped me trust my own taste too.” On the previously released “JAM ME!,” jev. and Banggz combined forces to create a highly captivating track, perfect for the dance floor. Banggz’s best friend Anaïs Cardot also has a similar commitment to her own taste. “You’re almost scared when working in the studio [with her], and it's because her ear does not lie. If one note is off, she knows.” Both remain personal and professional sources of motivation for Banggz; their recent successes do not intimidate him. “I don't really see it as [an] ‘I wish it was me’ type of thing, because for me, it's even great. If I didn't have somebody to look to who's my peer, I think I'll be in a worse situation.” 

Speaking of Ottawa, Love, Banggz is also a love letter to Canada’s capital. Though Ottawa is often derided as a boring city with no entertainment offerings, artists like Banggz have bucked against those expectations. “Shout out to Ottawa, very underrated city… I love this place, man. The support is wild.” Though his sophomore project is less community-centric than his last, it still pays homage to his community, which has supported him unconditionally even when he finds it hard to ask for help. Part of Banggz’s offering to his community on this project is the phrase: “It’s your duty to learn how to enjoy yourself”, which is repeated on the second track, “Worldwide Banggerz!”. He believes that enjoyment is not just something you receive; it’s something you have to learn how to bring from within to those around you. To sum up his convictions, he says, “At the end of the day, the reason why I'm doing the things that I do, it's all gonna boil down to God, my guys, and love.” 

Banggz hopes that this new record causes listeners to feel and listen more to those around them. He recommends listening to it in totality, in order to grasp its full message. “This project is one of those ones that years from now people will look back, and then they keep hearing new things as you grow because I grew to make this album.” As he prepares for the release of the project and a potential tour, he is fully focused and excited for what’s to come.

We are already halfway through summer in the UK, with two heatwaves under our belt and performances from British Summer Time in Hyde Park, Piano People in the Park, Cross The Tracks and City Splash. However, we still have a month of summer left, and with exactly one month till All Points East is among us, the excitement and countdown begins with all the fantastic vibes still to come.

The lineup features Jorja Smith and Tems, who will be kicking off the festival this year. The double headliners have put together a lineup for R&B, Soul, and Afrobeats music lovers. We can already predict that the opening day of the festival is set to be one for the books and will be worth braving the dusty terrain of Victoria Park. Joining them will be the likes of KWN, Uncle Waffles, Elmiene, Odeal, Ayra Starr, Bellah, Nia Archives and more who are set to provide a great day of musical vibes.​

​Tyler, The Creator will also curate a two-day lineup across Friday the 28th and Saturday the 29th of August. With his extensive catalogue, he is sure to bring two distinctive sets that will have Victoria Park going off.

Joining him across the two nights will be Yebba, Dijon, Clipse, Khamari, Mariah The Scientist, Jim Legxacy, Ravine Lenae, Vince Staples, Natanya, Syd, SexxyRed and so much more.

​Before we call a wrap to the end of summer, there is still something to look forward to as All Points East promises another stellar lineup of music that will no doubt be a highlight of the festival season.  

Before taking the stage at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, opening for the phenomenal Bad Bunny, Puerto Rican group Chuwi entertained a sold-out crowd with their first-ever London headline show, presented by Hennessy. Bringing the essence and vibe of Puerto Rico to the London heatwave, the crowd embraced the energy from start to finish.

​The show took place at the peak of a heatwave and gave a strong Puerto Rican summer feel as the group took to NT’s Loft, playing to a sold-out crowd and entertaining the masses ahead of their opening slot on Bad Bunny’s DeBí TiRAR MáS FOToS world tour.

For the group, made up of siblings Lorén, Wester and Willy, alongside childhood friend Adrian Lopez, it was their first time playing in London. The energy they brought and received from the crowd was a real moment for them. The show lasted just over an hour, showcasing their musical style and Puerto Rican flavour to the London crowd.

Formed during COVID, they have released music since then, including several EPs and singles that have grown their fanbase and popularity over the years. A significant moment in their musical journey came with the inclusion of Bad Bunny’s 2025 DeBí TiRAR MáS FOToS, on which they featured on WELTiTA. Since then, they have garnered international attention. They joined him as part of his No Me Quiero Ir de Aquí residency and the subsequent world tour, which is currently underway.

Beyond Bad Bunny, they have won fans over with their indie-electric sound and a musicality that blends with the vocals of Loren, Willy and Wester. Earlier this year, they featured on Tiny Desk, a sneak peek of what they have to offer.

Now, with their headline show, the energy was amplified, and the whole room was singing along, making it feel more like a jam session than a show.

The setlist included tracks like Uwu, which they opened with, as well as Judy, Durmiendo, Mundi, Bipal Falta Algo and Tierra, before closing with WELTiTA. As an introduction to the group for a London crowd, there is no doubt that their energy has travelled well beyond Puerto Rico, representing their current impact and everything that has unfolded over the last year. As somebody who is a fan of music in general despite the language barrier, there is nothing that speaks greater than the feeling that music gives and how it moves, and the performance Chuwi gave was a strong representation of how that was brought to the UK.

​The sweltering heat and crowd energy were felt as you came up the stairs into the venue, and it was a memorable feeling from entering to leaving. As we continue to watch the group, we look forward to their next show.  

There is a distinctive, unmistakable energy that belongs strictly to New York City. It is an effortless transition between high-fashion luxury and raw pavement that balances immense swagger with unyielding grit. But in an industry that constantly copies and capitalizes on this cultural footprint, true authenticity is rare. Most chase the wave; very few actually create it. Queens-born artist Lloyd McKenzie Jr., known globally as Bay Swag, is one of those rare creators. Coinciding with the highly anticipated premiere of his new documentary, ‘The Story - The Sound’ Presented by Nothing Bout Us Regular and directed by Bonsu Thompson (@bonsudreamz)

Through his pioneering role in the high-energy, infectious "Sexy Drill" wave, Bay Swag has flipped the traditional, dark drill formula on its head, proving you can float over hard-hitting New York beats with feel-good energy rather than standard, aggressive themes. Yet beneath this vibrant sound lies a heavy personal reality including his mother’s battle with breast cancer and his father’s 85-year prison sentence. " Refusing to let trauma break him, Bay Swag uses his acclaimed album, Damaged Thoughts, to turn ‘pain into champagne" He leans directly into the vulnerability of his journey, showing fans that raw honesty is the only real path to longevity. Below, the artist breaks down the blueprints of his grind, his brotherhoods, and his refusal to ever have a Plan B.

The title of the film is ‘Bay Swag: The Story - The Sound’. In a music industry that constantly tries to copy and capitalize on New York’s style, how does this film show your audience that you and your crew are the ones actually defining the currency, rather than just chasing it?

It takes people behind the music so they can see where the sound actually comes from, the people around me, the city, and the process. Once you see that, you see we’re not following a wave, we created it. It's a blessing, of course. You know, you gotta thank God first and foremost. Actually, it’s a good thing. There's nothing wrong with it. Some people don't like that, and they’ll start, saying stuff or try to diss people about it. Like ‘I don't know why you sound like me’ or this and that, but we actually appreciate it and really acknowledge it because that means you're doing something good. You know, you started a whole new sound, and now everybody's messing with it and liking it and now everybody’s doing it. It's a good thing. I feel really good about it. It actually makes me happy.

‍Your latest album Damaged Thoughts was a massive turning point because you were willing to show the trauma and stress that a lot of artists hide behind a confident exterior. What was the hardest part about letting the documentary cameras into those exact same dark spaces, and why did your fans need to see that side of you?

It's actually crazy because it's not hard for me. I'm not scared to speak about the truth and my life. A lot of people are scared to speak the truth and talk about things that they're actually going through in their lives. It’s hard for them to talk. To talk about things that they go through, their trauma, or things that hurt them or things that broke their hearts. I'm not really afraid to. I guess that's just me. But I actually feel a lot of artists should do that because it'll make things way easier. It’ll make the music way easier. It’ll make life just way easier. Just be honest and speak your truth. That's why it's so easy for me to go in the studio and record, because I'm always speaking the truth.

There’s a heavy quote from you where you mention that "being an artist is the most dangerous s**t in the world" because you always have to be seen and posted. How does this documentary give fans an inside look at the anxiety and paranoia that comes with that lifestyle and things the average listener never gets to see?

It can be dangerous. You have to post where you’re at, you gotta post the time, you gotta post the location. You gotta post literally everything. Imagine you have problems with some people and they literally know exactly who you are and where you are. If somebody's hating on you and you don't even know, they could just be jealous of you, come up to you acting like a fan and you and you’re just being supportive thinking they're fan and then they could just be on some whole other type of time. It's crazy. Really imagine that.

You’re known for driving the "Sexy Drill" wave music that is purely about good energy, dancing, and having fun without the violence. Yet, your reality includes heavy personal chapters like your father’s 85-year sentence and your mother beating cancer. How does the film explain that intentional balance using high-energy music to heal and escape deep personal pain?

I'm trying to show that you can turn the pain into champagne. No matter what you’re going through, you can't let it stop your motion or let it stop you from doing the things that you're supposed to do. A lot of people, when things happen like that, like something crazy - they get crazy news or bad news or somebody passes away or like me, my mom got diagnosed with breast cancer, my dad got sentenced to 85 years in jail. Some would take that and have a whole totally different way in life and just cry about it or just be sad about it. Nah, you gotta turn that pain into champagne.

You’ve openly stated that you don’t believe in using life's tragedies as an excuse to stop elevating, saying "that’s supposed to motivate you". How does this film capture your growth as a man who chose to carry the weight of his family on his back, rather than letting it break him?

Looking back, we really created something that changed the world. We created a whole new genre. I dropped a great album, performed on big stages, got a gold RIAA plaque. Everything in that way has helped me.

A massive lesson in your journey has been pure, unadulterated patience. You’ve said, "I don’t have a plan B, I'mma make sure that plan A work." Looking back at the footage of your early grind, what do you think that relentless mindset says to the kid watching this documentary who feels like their own dreams are taking too long to happen?

As you can see, patience is key. Just keep grinding, keep working as much as possible. I'm not a loser, you gotta have that winning mentality. Tell yourself like this 'I gotta make this work. This has to happen' Once you actually put that into your regular life, every day, it'll work. Not necessarily everything will work out, but I would rather try my hardest and fail rather than just sitting back and not doing anything. At least try. At least you'll know you put your all, you tried your hardest. Its better to know you put your all into it rather than going halfway with it.

Most music documentaries are made twenty years after an artist hits their peak. Why was it vital for you to give your audience an inside look at the blueprint right now, when your career is taking off and your future is still being written?

I feel like now is the time to give people that motivation. My documentary is obviously not the end. I'm not done. To be continued. It's just my journey from then to now, and showing what's possible.

On the album Damaged Thoughts, you collaborated with heavyweights like Young Thug, Meek Mill, and Quavo. Beyond just making hits, those are men who have stood by you, with Thug even offering to pay for your father’s lawyer. How does the documentary pull back the curtain on those genuine, behind-the-scenes brotherhoods that go way deeper than a studio session?

Honestly, I have a second part to the documentary and I got Cash Cobain in it. He talked a bit, but I want to do a part three to really dive into the artist side and get their look on everything. But I feel like those are my big brothers and I'm blessed to be able to call them that. I'm blessed to get calls from them. Blessed that they answer whenever I call. I can call every one of the guys that's on my album. It's deeper than music, you know, and they guide me. They give me their thoughts on what I should do, or they used to do this or they should do. I can call Young Thug and talk about life, talk about things I'm going through. Shout out to Future because Future is also a guy that I get a lot of game from, and he teaches me a lot and we have talks. He actually called yesterday. There's a song on the way. I can't say when, but it's on the way.

You’ve pointed out that when a new wave starts, everyone tries to sound like someone else, but your superpower is just being yourself. How does The Story - The Sound prove to your audience that honesty is the only way to build longevity in this game?

‍I feel like it's written, literally. If you go back through the history of rap and hip-hop, you can tell that when people are talking about their life and the things they're going through, people relate to it more. You never know what somebody else is dealing with. Music heals people. That's a fact.

‍When the credits roll on this film, I think people’s perception of Bay Swag is going to be completely different. As you step into this next era of your life and career, what do you want this chapter to say about Bay Swag, and what legacy do you hope it leaves behind?

‍Answer: I want people to know that no matter what you're going through, and no matter what you went through, keep going. The devil will always try to come and stop you when things are going good, man, but you got to overcome that, and keep God first, man. Just keep God first and just keep grinding no matter what. When you're going through those hard times and when you get out of it, you'll be like, wow. God is real, man. I did what I had to do. I kept grinding. I kept putting my foot on the gas.

Looking Forward

Ultimately, Bay Swag’s journey is a masterclass in holding onto your identity when the world demands you dilute it. As his story unfolds in real-time, Nothing Bout Us Regular Presents Bay Swag: The Story - The Sound leaves us with a sharp, undeniable truth: longevity is earned through honesty, and there is no substitute for standing firmly in your own lane.

Cover Credit: cozzylens

Embracing his heritage has always been one of the things Ayetian holds closest to his heart. Raised by Haitian parents and born and brought up in Jamaica, he grew up in a deeply cultured environment that shaped the person and artist he is today. Proud of both his Haitian roots and Jamaican upbringing, Ayetian carries the spirit of the Caribbean into everything he does. Deeds Magazine caught up with him to talk about his upbringing, music, creative process, collaborations and the journey behind the name.

Hi Ayetian, it's a pleasure meeting you. I'm Ruqayyah, a writer with Deeds Magazine. Let's start with your background. Could you tell our audience who Ayetian is?

Ayetian is more than words can describe. You have to experience me in person. My charismatic spirit, vibrant personality, humour, kindness, and genuine energy make me unforgettable. I embody the Caribbean.

It's known that your parents immigrated from Haiti to Jamaica, and that you were born there. What was your upbringing like? and how did it shape you into the person you are today?

I was raised in a deeply cultural environment shaped by my parents, where lessons were not meant to be changed, but understood and adapted. In my household, there was no wrong way of teaching. While alternative paths weren’t discouraged, they weren’t indulged, so it was either follow the foundation laid out or take full responsibility for becoming something else. That upbringing shaped me into someone independent and creative.

How did your collaboration with Rvssian, Moliy, and Tyga come about?

The collaboration with Rvssian, Moliy, and Tyga came together organically. It was purely a vibe, with no overplanning, yet executed seamlessly. Rvssian saw the vision and brought me onto the track to add a Caribbean flair, tapping into the energy of dancehall and soca.

You're known for your freestyles. What's the best freestyle you have ever made, and where was that made?

One of the best freestyles I’ve ever made was back in Grade 11, under Cornwall’s iconic towering almond tree. It was raw and authentic. It reflected my lifestyle, touching on girls and money without being explicit.

How does your name Ayetian connect to your Haitian roots?

I wanted something distinctive that connected to the Haitian side of my background. “Ayetian” felt right; it's one of the best names I could have chosen.

How does your name Ayetian connect to your Haitian roots?

My creative process isn’t a secret. It’s driven by vibes, music, and a little bit of magic.

What's a must-do daily routine you do every single day?

One habit I always maintain is reading; it helps expand my vocabulary and sharpen my expression.

In an interview with Television Jamaican, you’ve talked before about staying consistent with your craft, dropping something every month, and not wanting to be a seasonal artist. How has that been going?

As you can see, my name stays in conversation, there’s a presence attached to it. Say my name, and something happens.

Which artists would you love to collaborate with in the near future?

I don’t limit my catalog or collaborations. If the energy aligns and the business makes sense, I’m always open to working.

Final Question: What’s a side of Ayetian that fans don’t usually get to see?

My alter ego: Nino Espartarno.

Credits:
Ayetian Credits
Photographer & Creative Director: Zekaria Al-Bostani
Lighting: Nicola Sclano
Stylist: Ramario Chevoy
Styling Assistant: Rudina Brika
Hair Stylist/Grooming: Lauraine Bailey
Writer: Ruqayyah Sadiq
Design: @dianeadanna
BTS: Blair Watson
Studio: @blankboxstudio
PR: @myblaqbook @giovannamae

Fave has been one of Nigerian music’s most quietly consistent presences since “Baby Riddim” established her in 2021. RnBling, her third body of work released July 8, 2026, is six tracks of a singer fully settled into who she is - moving between vulnerability and confidence without losing the thread of either. The EP is produced across a tight circle of collaborators, with Dunnie and Deeyasso handling the bulk of the production, and features Chike and Yemi Alade as the two guest artists.

“Body Talk”, produced by Dunnie, opens the project on a warm, mid-tempo note - Fave establishing the EP’s emotional register immediately. “Miss You” follows, with Chike joining for a record built on longing - his signature emotive vocals sitting naturally against Fave’s soulful delivery, the two voices occupying the same emotional space with ease.

“Dance”, produced by Damie, is where the EP finds its clearest footing - rhythmic, easy, and impossible to sit still through. Of the six tracks, it is the one most likely to find its own life outside the EP. “Drown”, produced by German trio 255, takes the EP into its most vulnerable territory - Fave examining the consequences of falling too deeply into something, the production darker and more textured than what precedes it. It is the EP’s most emotionally direct moment

“Paparazzi” featuring Yemi Alade carries the kind of energy that recalls Yemi’s 2016 Maleek Berry-produced single ‘Want You’ - that same unbothered confidence, the awareness of being watched and the complete refusal to shrink from it. Yemi’s swagger and Fave’s warmth occupy the same space without competing, the collaboration feeling immediate rather than arranged.

“La La La” closes the project on its lightest note -  a feel-good record that sends the listener out exactly as the title promises.

‍RnBling is an enjoyable, cohesive project that moves through emotional range without losing control of its tone. The third track alone is worth the listen.

IG:@sophiannadozie

Meet Enfant Précoce, a Cameroonian-born artist who stunts the art as much as the music world.

It is not often that the cover of a song makes you stop and stare at the masterpiece before you. So, when ‘On My Mind’ by Adekunle Gold and Yamê first dropped, and the cover was revealed, looking just as good as the song sounded, with its vibrant cloudy pink and uniquely styled black figures, it was as though the whole package was gold served on a platter. However, who is the artist behind the artwork? And what do we know of the story that brought all three heads together?

Francis Essoua Kalu, better known to the world as Enfant Précoce, meaning precocious child in English, is a 37-year-old Cameroon-born painter and dancer based in Paris, France. Growing up, Francis first discovered art through his uncle, Malam Essoua, a sculpture artist, whose free-spirited life deeply inspired him. After settling in France at the age of Nine, he began his artistic journey as a dancer before pivoting and falling in love with painting, devoting his professional career to the creative field in 2013.

If Francis’ face may appear familiar, it is because, alongside both dancing and painting, he has also dabbled in modelling. Just to name a few, he walked for Pharrell Williams' first Louis Vuitton runway show in 2023, appeared in a Ralph Lauren campaign, and even posed with his own daughter for the Walk in Paris fashion brand. Truly, Francis is a virtuoso of many gifts. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that his artwork for ‘On My Mind’ happens to be one of the many occasions we’re in awe of what he is capable of creating. 

Enfant Précoce’s visualscape, when looking at his characters, appears to almost always remain in movement, which could be a nudge to his past as a dancer or merely an artistic choice. Engulfed in bright and vibrant colours, his paintings are never boring, often depicting a beautiful chaos, where every interaction between objects and figures feels intentional. Besides, sometimes, direct visual context, it would appear that Francis draws inspiration from his childhood memories in Cameroon. With instances showing African women in an embrace or a crowded bus, it gives us insight into Francis’ psyche of how he absorbs small details in everyday life we tend to overlook and turns them into an immortalized image worth remembering.

The artwork titled bébé by Enfant Précoce was first shown to both Yamê and Adekunle Gold in person at his atelier in Paris. In a short clip shared on social media, Yamê introduces Francis as his friend, explaining that the art piece was made for them. When Francis fixates on the painting on the wall, he unveils that the ensemble portrays a female figure in duality. Where perhaps one option could offer materialistic gain, whereas the other may bring emotional balance. Although it may not directly align with the lyrical content, bébé exists as a storyline to admire on its own.

In a time when artists place less and less thought behind cover art, it is refreshing to view an example where both the beauty and substance behind it are preserved. Francis’ artwork not only brings life to the single, but it also reminds us how pivotal visuals are to the elevation and understanding of an artist’s sonic world. Surely, we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but what does little care and effort placed on one’s visuals say about a recording artist?

Take ‘The Sugar Shack’ by Ernie Barnes, for example, a painting that accompanied Marvin Gaye’s incredible 1976 record ‘I Want You.’ Barnes’ painting of stylishly dressed, elongated black figures dancing to a silent tune, with closed, tender eyes, in what looks to be a barn, reimagines a memory from Barnes’ early childhood in the South. The eclectic ambience and warm colours almost erase the thought that Barnes was born in Jim Crow North Carolina. In contrast, Marvin’s record is a sensual delight, busted erotic intimacy, encapsulating the purest form of vulnerability.

To this day, the masterful skills of both worlds intertwined as one have become an all-time classic and even outlived their creators. Despite transcending centuries, the imagery and sound still resonate strongly, capturing a defining moment in history that aged like wine, surpassing expectations and settling into timelessness. Although the depth between each creative expression may be in a different weight class, they blend perfectly with one another like milk & honey.  Thus, making it into the hall of fame, should there be a categorisation for the most honourable music cover art.

Enfant Précoce’s cover contribution to Adekunle Gold and Yamê’s collaboration brought a similar feeling back. One where the cover art accompanying a well-woven track could triumph against the test of time. Surely, in twenty years from now, the artwork could be presented in museums, revisited for the music era of two phenomenal artists. Not only would they stand out, but they also took the road less travelled. In this new era of the internet, where instant gratification has become more important than depth and artistry, whether painters or musicians are directly affected by this change.

One of the cheap tricks that modern artists have utilized are A.I. generated covers. This is a complete shift from the well-thought-out, sought-after cover arts from the generation that came before the millennials. Perhaps the A.I. art piece can be visually appealing, but it can never replace the soul of an artist. And like we’ve seen with examples of the past and present, the story behind an artwork can matter just as much as the execution. Not to mention that this takes the opportunity away from an illustrator or a painter who could have given the musical project a new dimension.

If ‘On My Mind’ could have brought any kind of reassurance, it is that collaborations and layers to one’s image are still intact. Even through the cracks of loud noise and attention-seeking displays, some will stick to their guns and ultimately deliver, just as Enfant Précoce in his own time.

Afro Nation Portugal was back for its sixth edition, returning to Praia da Rocha in Portimão from July 3–5 with another blockbuster lineup of Afrobeats, R&B, hip-hop, and global pop stars namely Burna Boy, Wizkid, Tyla, Asake, Mariah The Scientist, Gunna, Kehlani, Olamide and more. As expected, the festival's biggest names have dominated conversations online, but a closer look at this year's bill reveals another story unfolding.

Beyond the headliners, Afro Nation 2026 continues to spotlight the breadth of African music by bringing together artists from across the continent's distinct musical landscapes, alongside voices from the wider diaspora. The result is a lineup that reflects not only where African music is today, but how interconnected its regional scenes have become.

Among the artists drawing attention is Kenya's Bien, whose solo career has continued to flourish following Sauti Sol's hiatus. The Grammy winner whose catalogue as a songwriter is buoyed by collaborations spanning East, West and Southern Africa–arrived at Afro Nation as one of East Africa's most recognizable musical exports, representing a region that has become increasingly visible on international festival stages.

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Uganda's Joshua Baraka also joined this year's lineup, extending a breakthrough run that has seen his music resonate well beyond East Africa. His inclusion speaks to the growing presence of artists from countries that have historically been underrepresented at major global festivals centered on African music.

South Africa's amapiano movement remains one of Afro Nation's defining pillars, with DJ and producer Uncle Waffles, Kelvin Momo, Focalistic, MaWhoo and Madumane leading a deep roster that also includes Zee Nxumalo, Felo Le Tee, JazzWorld, Thukuthela, GL_Ceejay, Nkosazana Daughter, Royal MusiQ and Success. Rather than treating amapiano as a passing trend, the festival has consistently dedicated significant space to one of the continent's most influential genres. This year's lineup reflected that commitment, bringing together chart-topping performers, influential producers, DJs and vocalists whose collective impact has propelled the South African sound from its township roots to a global audience. 

Additionally, the lineup also embraced the diversity of the African diaspora. UK-Nigerian artist Darkoo and hitmaker Young Jonn joined the bill alongside Ghanaian duo R2Bees and veteran singer Wande Coal, while France's Niska and Brazilian superstar Ludmilla further expanded the festival's international reach; showing the many directions African and diaspora sounds continue to evolve.

That broader representation has become one of Afro Nation's defining strengths. While fans may have initially traveled to Portugal for arena-filling stars like Burna Boy or Tyla, the festival has increasingly become a space where audiences encounter artists from different regions, genres and cultures in the same weekend. It's one of the few events where East African pop, Nigerian Afrobeats, South African amapiano, Ghanaian hip-hop and Francophone rap can comfortably exist on the same lineup.

As African music continues to command global attention, festivals like Afro Nation are evolving alongside it. This year's lineup suggests that the story is no longer solely about a handful of internationally recognized stars. Instead, it reflects an ecosystem where established artists from across Africa and its diaspora are sharing one stage, introducing fans to the depth, diversity and dynamism of the continent's music scene.

Afro Nation Portugal 2026 ran through July 5, with performances spread across its main stage, Piano People stage and Afrotronic stage, reaffirming its place as one of the world's premier celebrations of African music and culture.

IG:@_stanleykilonzo

His Second Single of the Year is Both a Dance Anthem and a Call for Action

At this stage, we trust that you have listened, partied well, and whined your waist thoroughly to Tiakola’s new summer banger “Mélo Décalé.” Whether it was during Fête de la Musique or ongoing festivals, we hope the mélo vibe fused with Coupé-Décalé, an Ivorian music staple, has brought you joy and a great time every chance it was played.  Now, unless you haven’t been paying close attention, Tiakola is one of the few French-Congolese artists who managed to reach global listeners beyond his core Francophone audience, notably his feature with Asake “BADMAN GANGSTA” landing him number one on the Nigerian Top Turntable Charts, the first artist from the Congolese diaspora to ever do so.

Behind the dance moves, the cityboy aesthetic, and the fun music video that was released alongside the single, there is a hidden message Tiakola wanted to convey. And that is the lack of monetization by streaming services for African artists. As of now, what the soft campaign through the song reveals is that out of 54 African countries, a shocking number of only 13 countries are officially eligible for the YouTube Partner Program. This includes Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, Tanzania, Senegal, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Africa, Tunisia, Uganda and Zimbabwe.

Why is this important, you may ask? While African music is growing exponentially at a rapid pace, now ever more away from just English-speaking nations, African artists must receive the support they need to sustain their craft. Since foreign investments are frugal and unreliable, online monetization is a key aspect in which artists from the continent can not only grow their careers, but also make a decent living for themselves. Although hacks are floating online on how to profit from monetisation, even if, due to your region, you’re ineligible for such, there is a clear underlying reason why those in control of these streaming platforms want to pick and choose what is deemed valuable and what is not.

Because if we’re speaking of numbers, then they are evidently there. In Ivory Coast and Congo alone, you can name more than 10 artists who reach at least a million monthly listeners, not to mention the number of supporters they gather during concerts, whether it is in each of their respective regions or abroad. What this decision shows, which has been in place for decades, is that there is a lack of understanding of the nuances of how culture spreads and travels, aside from Western norms. If execs understood how music listeners on the continent have to resort to alternatives such as pirating just to listen to their favourite artist, because online services are not accessible to them as it would in the West. This pivots a large number of potential streamers that would add to the existing numbers.

But truthfully, nothing could explain this phenomenon. Every month, there seems to be a new African artist breaking records, whether it is on stage, at awards shows, or even in music charts, so to sit there and pretend African music does not deserve the fruit of its labours is ludicrous. That is to say, the lack of monetization as well as lower revenues based on someone’s nationality should be abolished. Surely, platforms such as Spotify, which had an entire lineup of artists of African descent during FDLM, could use the same logic and decision-making in public as in private, understanding that there is a growing demand for  African music, as a collective, and fair compensation for everyone allows for their platforms to continue to benefit from just as much, right?

The song was danced to during the World Cup and was played everywhere at Fête de La Musique: “Pilé” by Mauvais Djo has the world in a frenzy. Yet, little is known about the artist behind the song of the summer, and what the lyrics actually mean. With honourable mentions like “Pélélé” by Fally Ipupa and, recently, “Fimbu” by Felix Wazekwa making rounds, they all seem to have something in common: their Congolese rhythmic and simple lyrics are memorable and make you want to dance along.

The Artist

Mauvais Djo is a Congolese-French artist who began releasing music in 2020. His early entries always focused on party music and football references, ironically calling listeners to dance to “Ballon D’Or” and “Maradona,” for example. It was in the year 2023, however, that he got his big break with “Y a une meuf”, reaching 7 million streams at the time. His biggest career move was forming the group Triangle des Bermudes with MC YOSHI and Kokosvoice.

Although “Pilé” has reached massive heights, it is interesting to note that Mauvais Djo himself has fallen under the radar, only accumulating roughly 13k followers on Instagram as we speak. This phenomenon can be explained as many established artists have performed and reinterpreted the song without giving credit to the original artist. This shows a grave issue in the music industry where sometimes a song becomes bigger than the artist, and their career may not benefit from the momentum.

The Lyrics

There have been many debates online on what the word Pilé means. In this particular context, it sounds like a double entendre. Firstly, when taking a look at the following lyrics, “Les billets toujours empilés, pilés, pilés, pilés,” the signification of the word pilé here is the shortened version of “empilés,” which means to pile up. So what Mauvais Djo is trying to say is that his money keeps on getting piled up.

Secondly, as the following lyrics state, “Michael Jackson a pilé,” this suggests that pilé here means “beat it,” but just mispronounced. This is very common in both Congolese and francophone circles, where most of the population does not primarily speak English. So instead of pronouncing the correct word, they will come up with their own, sounding similar yet not quite the same. Often enough, bringing a new definition into classic English words in music.

So what is Mauvais Djo actually saying? Like much of his previous songs, Pilé is a call for celebration. Mauvais Djo is celebrating his victory and asking, where are the haters who thought he would not succeed. This is evident when he states, “Où sont passés ceux qui nous disaient d’faire la queue?” This translates into where are those who told us to make a line, meaning Mauvais Djo should wait for his turn to be at the forefront. Those same people who doubted are not the ones who have to witness him piling up his money, which symbolises the fruit of his labour.

The Reaction

As mentioned before, the song that had been circulating across social media, mainly resonating with members of the African continent and its diaspora, became a global phenomenon during Fête de la Musique and the World Cup. Many artists and fans alike are hitting the trendy moves during their set and at popular events to show their appreciation for the viral song. A notable moment was Tayc during FDLM, who performed Pilé in front of a massive crowd, something he had already done in his own concerts.

The same can be said about sports teams, dancing to pilé on football fields or even in the changing rooms like the Paris Saint-Germain handball team. The song has become the perfect tune to celebrate one's victory with comrades. Those celebrations go even further, being played also during weddings where the married couple and friends take on the dance floor to show their pilé moves.

As of late, a DJ played the song during his set in Atlanta, and everyone in the crowd knew the lyrics word for word. What Pilé represents is a great moment in history, where it just happened to take off during the most important cultural occurrences, which are the World Cup, Fête de la Musique and many more gatherings planned for the summer.

Home has always been central to Mayra Andrade's music. Not simply as a place, but as a language, a rhythm and a memory that follows her wherever she goes. Across nearly two decades, the Cape Verdean singer-songwriter has built one of contemporary music's most distinctive catalogues, weaving together Morna, Batuque, Jazz, Afro-pop and Brazilian influences into songs that feel both deeply personal and universally familiar.

As Cape Verde experiences a defining cultural moment on the world stage, Andrade finds herself reflecting on the ideas that have shaped her work from the very beginning: identity, belonging, creativity and the quiet responsibility of representing a nation that has long introduced itself through its artists.

In conversation with Mayra, she speaks about vulnerability, motherhood, language, fashion and why, for her, home has always been something carried in song.

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Your music has always felt deeply intimate without becoming confessional. How have you learned to balance vulnerability with privacy in your songwriting?

"It took me years to start writing directly about my own life. In the beginning, I didn't think my stories were interesting enough, so I wrote about other people, their realities, the countryside, fishermen. I imagined lives that weren't my own because I wasn't yet ready to tell mine.

Over time, that changed. I first found a way to speak about myself through ethereal, almost cryptic poetry that people couldn't fully decode. But as the years passed, I learned how to express those personal stories more clearly while still leaving enough space for listeners to bring their own experiences into the music.

I realized that when I write from a place of deep personal truth, people don't just hear my story—they hear their own. They project their lives onto the songs, and in that way, the music becomes both deeply personal and deeply universal. My songs remain a little coded, but they're coded differently for everyone who connects with them."

It's really been a journey of embracing vulnerability. Instead of hiding behind complicated metaphors, I've learned to simply call things what they are to call an egg an egg and a giraffe a giraffe. I try to avoid making the writing too poetic that people lose sight of what I'm trying to say.

For me that came with maturity. It came with accepting who I am, accepting everything life brought me, and being willing to stand in front of the world with that honesty. I'm still discovering where I want to reveal that vulnerability and where I prefer to keep it for myself.

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Cape Verde has captured the world's attention through its remarkable World Cup journey. As someone who has spent decades representing the country through music, what has this moment felt like?

I think the whole world already knows that for us, it goes far beyond football.

When we watch our team walk onto the pitch, we don't just see athletes, we see resilience. We see sacrifice. We see generations of people who built something extraordinary without the support or infrastructure that many larger nations take for granted.

That fills me with immense pride.

I'm part of a generation that constantly had to explain where Cape Verde was. I remember people asking me to point to it on a map, and sometimes it wasn't even there. Music helped change that over the years, especially through artists like Cesária Évora, who introduced Cape Verde to so much of the world.

But nothing compares to the visibility the World Cup brings.

This moment allows the world to finally see that we exist to see our history, our culture, our resilience and our unity.

Cape Verde is an archipelago, yet we've always found remarkable ways to remain connected. We often say that our diaspora is our eleventh island. Cape Verdeans living abroad aren't separated from us—they're part of us. We nourish one another. They carry the islands with them, and the islands continue to carry them.

That's why this moment means so much. It's a pride that's difficult to put into words, and I'm incredibly grateful to be living through it.

"The diaspora is our eleventh island. They are not separate from us, they are part of us."

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You recently described the team's success as a reflection of "the greatness of Cape Verde." What does greatness mean to you beyond sport?

For me, greatness has never been measured by awards or numbers.

It's measured by the impact you have on people's lives.

This World Cup is already changing lives. It's changing representation. It's influencing the economy. It's expanding what's possible for young people growing up in Cape Verde and showing them they can dream bigger than they ever imagined.

That's what greatness is.

It's staying true to your values while creating something that genuinely moves people—not only through what you achieve, but through the hope you leave behind.

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Music has always been one of Cape Verde's greatest cultural exports. Do you feel this World Cup is allowing the rest of the world to discover another side of Cape Verde?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, for many people, Cape Verde really starts with music, but now they can also discover our Athletes , our culture, our resilience, our talents, our ambition as well.

 I mean, "Ambition is something many Cape Verdeans have had to wrestle with. When you come from a small country, its size can sometimes shape the size of your dreams.

I hope our national team's Cinderella run at the World Cup changes that. I hope it expands what young Cape Verdeans believe is possible for themselves and gives us a new standard for how boldly we dream.

Beyond football, I hope this journey inspires people to discover Cape Verde more deeply. Our culture holds an incredible richness, and the human experience here is unlike anywhere else. That's something I'm immensely proud of."

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Cape Verde has always existed between continents—African by geography, yet deeply connected to Europe, Latin America and a global diaspora. How has that in-between identity shaped you creatively?

I've lived in several countries since I was six years old. I've experienced Cape Verde as a child, as a teenager and now as an adult looking back on those experiences from different places in the world.

Being able to understand Cape Verde both from within and from afar has shaped everything I create.

It has deepened my appreciation for my own culture while making me open to others. I've always been curious about different sounds, different traditions and different ways of seeing the world.

I've always believed music is a gift from God, and I've known for a long time that I wasn't here simply to repeat what already existed in Cape Verdean music. My journey has been about discovering what my own voice can contribute to that tradition.

Every album, every performance and every stage of my personal growth changes how I understand creativity. It's rooted in where I come from, but it's also a deeply personal journey.

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Are there sounds from your childhood that continue to find their way into your music?

Without question.

The rhythm of our Creole language is probably the strongest influence on my music. The way we express emotion, history and identity through Creole has its own musicality. It's a beautiful language, and that naturally shapes how I write and sing.

Then there are traditional instruments like the ferrinho, which is central to funaná. One of the things I'm most proud of is introducing that sound into contexts beyond traditional funaná groups and blending it with other musical worlds.

I also love working with the txabeta, the percussion used in batuque, where women sit together in circles creating rich, polyrhythmic rhythms. That sound has stayed with me since childhood.

The Cape Verdean cavaquinho is another instrument that's deeply connected to my identity. Even if I hear only the guitar for a few seconds, I can recognise whether it's Cape Verdean, Brazilian or Cuban. Our musicians have a very distinct musical fingerprint.

I always try to carry that identity into my music, no matter how experimental the production becomes.

At the same time, I never want my roots to become a limitation. They should be a foundation, not a boundary.

Like so many Cape Verdeans, I feel a responsibility to represent where I come from because, for so long, the world didn't know we existed.

I remember being asked to point to Cape Verde on classroom maps as a child, only to discover it wasn't even printed. Experiences like that stay with you. They shape how you move through the world, and they remind you why representation matters.

"My roots are my foundation, but they should never become my limits."

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You've always chosen to sing in Creole. Is preserving the language also a way of preserving Cape Verdean identity?

Absolutely.

Our language is one of the strongest expressions of who we are.

It's also what keeps Cape Verde connected across the world.

Cape Verdeans in the United States might speak English and Creole. Those in Portugal speak Portuguese and Creole. In France, it's French and Creole. In the Netherlands, it's Dutch and Creole.

Creole really is what unites us all.

No matter where we live, it reminds us that we're part of the same story.

That's why preserving the language isn't just about communication. It's about preserving identity, memory and belonging.

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Over the years, your visual language has become just as distinctive as your music. How intentional has fashion been in shaping your identity as an artist?

It's been a very conscious evolution.

Everything really shifted around the release of Manga. I wanted the visual world to reflect the music and, more importantly, the person I had become.

I've never been interested in following trends simply because they're fashionable. What attracts me is style, elegance and comfort. I want to feel feminine, powerful and completely at ease in what I'm wearing.

Where I come from, fashion wasn't traditionally part of conversations around music. But over the years I've come to appreciate how much clothing can communicate before you even sing a note.

I enjoy discovering pieces that tell stories, celebrate craftsmanship and carry a sense of history. Fashion has become another language for expressing emotion. It amplifies the mood of the music, but it also reveals another layer of who I am.

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Is there an aspect of Cape Verdean craftsmanship that you believe deserves greater international recognition?

Absolutely.

Our weaving traditions and embroidery are incredibly beautiful and deserve much more global recognition. Many of those techniques have roots that connect us to West Africa, particularly Guinea-Bissau, and they're part of a rich cultural heritage that's slowly becoming rarer.

One designer doing remarkable work in preserving that tradition is Angela Brito. She has lived in Brazil for more than two decades and became the first Black female designer to earn a place on the São Paulo Fashion Week calendar.

Every year she returns to Cape Verde to draw inspiration from its people, landscapes and traditions, incorporating local craftsmanship into her collections in a way that feels contemporary while remaining deeply respectful of its origins.

She's helping tell another side of Cape Verde's story—one that's rooted in craftsmanship, artistry and cultural memory.

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Looking back, what do you hope people understand about Mayra Andrade today that they may have misunderstood ten years ago?

I've always been a very private person.

I grew up in the public eye, so learning how to protect parts of myself became necessary. I was fortunate to begin my career before social media completely transformed the relationship between artists and audiences. There was more space to discover yourself without constantly performing your life online.

At the same time, social media has created incredible opportunities to connect directly with people who listen to your music.

One thing that always makes me smile is how surprised people are when they meet me.

They often tell me, "You're much funnier than I expected."

Because I protect my personal life, I think some people imagine I'm distant or reserved. But in reality I'm warm, I love people and I genuinely enjoy connecting with others.

The things that matter most, though, have always come across in my music.

Freedom has always been essential to me. Integrity has always been non-negotiable.

When I look back at my catalogue, what makes me proud isn't success or recognition—it's knowing every song was honest.

I love the fact that music allows complete strangers to feel closer to one another. It's one of the greatest gifts I've ever received, and I never take that for granted.

Whatever people misunderstood about me ten years ago, there's still time for them to understand it. I'm still growing. I'm still changing.

That's part of being human.

"Freedom has always mattered more to me than perfection. Integrity has always mattered more than success."

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ReEncanto feels less like a live album and more like a conversation between the artist you were twenty years ago and the woman you've become today. What surprised you most about revisiting those songs?

ReEncanto arrived at one of the most transformative periods of my life.

I conceived the project while I was pregnant, and by the time we recorded it my daughter was just five months old. I was exclusively breastfeeding while touring around the world, so it was both physically demanding and spiritually profound. That project reconnected me with something much deeper inside myself. I realised the songs had grown alongside me.

Motherhood changed my voice, not just physically, but emotionally. Songs I'd written twenty years earlier suddenly carried new meaning because I was singing them through completely different life experiences.That made me incredibly proud.

I've always believed that recording an album is only the beginning. You spend months, sometimes years, performing those songs before you truly understand them. By the end of a tour, the music has evolved. Your relationship with it has changed.

ReEncanto gave me the opportunity to tell those stories again with a new voice. That's really what the title means to me.

A re-enchantment.

A rediscovery.

Not only of the songs, but of myself. It's rediscovering my own voice and rediscovering my own songs and, and feed from them, which was really a beautiful, beautiful experience to do

Your music has always moved effortlessly between Morna, Batuque, Afro-pop, Brazilian influences, Jazz and electronic textures. Do genres still matter to you, or have they simply become different languages for telling stories?

I've always thought of genres as languages.

Just as you can move between different spoken languages in a conversation, music allows you to move between different sonic worlds without losing your identity.

Genres help people organise music, but they don't define how I create.

That said, I still feel a responsibility to honour the traditions of Cape Verdean music. Sometimes I'll consciously say, "This is a funaná," or, "This is a batuque," because our musical heritage is still being discovered by much of the world.

We're still writing new chapters for these genres.

I've never been overly interested in analysing exactly where every influence comes from. I absorb what moves me, it becomes part of me, and something personal comes out the other side.

That's the creative process.

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You're entering a new chapter of your career. What can we expect from what's next?

I'm entering this new chapter with much less fear.

Motherhood has changed me. It teaches you how powerful you really are. It also teaches you to trust yourself.

Maturity brings a different kind of freedom. You realise you don't have to explain yourself all the time. You don't have to please everyone. You simply have to create work that feels honest.

That's what I'm chasing now.

I want to experiment more. I want to keep discovering sounds that feel closer to who I am today, while continuing to honour where I come from.

Every project asks the same question: What do I want to leave behind?

Especially in a world that often feels uncertain, I want my music to offer something lasting—something rooted in beauty, curiosity and hope.

This year is about renewal.

It's about writing.

It's about building.

It's about beginning again.

And I genuinely believe the next album will be the best work I've ever made.

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Listening to Mayra Andrade speak, it becomes clear that Cape Verde's extraordinary World Cup story is only one chapter in a much longer narrative. Long before football drew the world's attention to the archipelago, artists like Andrade had been carrying its language, traditions and imagination across continents, quietly reshaping how people understood a nation many once struggled to locate on a map.

Today, that story is being told on a much bigger stage.

For Andrade, the moment isn't about proving Cape Verde belongs. It's about celebrating what has always been there: a culture defined by resilience, creativity and an unwavering sense of identity.

If the world has finally arrived at Cape Verde's doorstep, its artists have been preparing the welcome for decades.

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Ruth B has been making intimate music since before the platforms existed to carry it. Born in Edmonton to Ethiopian parents, she built her career on Vine with nothing but a piano and an instinct for honesty that has never quite left her - not through "Lost Boy" going platinum, not through "Dandelions" crossing 6.2 billion streams on TikTok years after its release, not through a surprise appearance at Barclays Center with Rod Wave that reminded an entirely new audience exactly who wrote the song they had been singing. Her new single "Didn't I" is out now. Her album Peace To Make arrives August 21. Ahead of its release, we spoke about writing music that outlives the moment it was made for, what it means to evolve without losing the thread, and what peace actually looks like when you finally find it.

‍Hello

Hi. How’s it going?

Fine. I’m great. How are you?

For anyone reading this and discovering you for the first time, how would you introduce yourself and what you do?

I would introduce myself as Ruth. I'm a singer, songwriter from Alberta, Canada.

"Dandelions" went viral years after it was released, on a platform that didn't even exist when you wrote it. What does it feel like to watch a song you wrote in one emotional state become the soundtrack to millions of strangers' completely different moments, years later?

It was absolutely incredible. It did kind of happen years after I had released the song, so it was totally crazy to see. I'm so thankful for TikTok for being able to spread it to the masses. I still love watching people's videos making use of the song.

You're Ethiopian, raised in Edmonton, and your sound draws from a very specific kind of intimate, diary-style songwriting. How much of that vulnerability comes from growing up between two cultures, and how much of it is just who you are regardless of where you're from?

I think that's such a priority for me, to make sure that it's all about the lyrics and story. A lot draws from my upbringing and my life in Canada, the simplicity and complexity of that, and the journey that I went on years later to do music. I think all of it plays a part in the vulnerability in my music.

The Barclays Center moment with Rod Wave was a surprise. What did it feel like to stand on a stage built around a song you wrote years ago, now belonging to a completely different audience that found it through someone else?

That was incredible. It was definitely the biggest crowd I'd ever played for. I wrote that song ten years ago about a whole different life I was living at that point, to see it come to life like that years later in such an iconic moment with Rod - it was absolutely unbelievable. It's one of my favourite memories.

Peace To Make is a title that suggests resolution, or at least the pursuit of it. What's the actual peace you were trying to make while writing this album?

The common thread between all the songs on the album is that they all kind of have a question mark - they're yearning for peace, or answers, stability, whatever you want to call it. That's the ultimate message of the album: trying to make peace with things. And ultimately, in the end, I do make peace with it.

When people discover you through "Dandelions" on TikTok, then go back and find "Lost Boy" from 2014, what do you hope they hear in the distance between those two songs? What's actually changed in you as a writer?

As a writer, it's kind of the same thing as evolving as a person - we grow, we learn. I have definitely evolved a lot and my writing has become so much better, and you can hear that in the music now. But I think it's similar in the sense that it's still very honest, lyric-driven, piano-driven, vulnerable music. I never want to get lost in the sauce and become overproduced. My goal is to continue to make intimate music.

"Didn't I" is your first single since this resurgence. Did knowing that "Mixed Signals" had just found new life through Rod Wave change how you approached writing for this new chapter, or did you deliberately try to separate the two?

I don't think I deliberately tried to separate the two. I just wanted to make a bridge between my first and second album and this album. I still wanted to keep it piano-focused, like "Mixed Signals" and like my first album, but just kind of evolve the production and evolve the writing as well.

‍"Lost Boy" started on Vine, basically the opposite of how artists are taught to build a career today. Looking back, do you think that accidental, unpolished beginning gave you something a more deliberate rollout never could have?

Definitely. The whole process of being on Vine and on the internet kind of taught me how to self-write, produce and create - it built an independence in me. Adding a team was like a major bonus versus a necessity. I think I'm very lucky. My roots definitely push me to be as creative as I can be.

Six JUNO nominations, one win, billions of streams. Is there a specific moment in this entire run where you actually felt like you'd arrived, or does that feeling keep moving further away the more you achieve?

I think it is constantly moving. In those moments, I feel such gratitude and it always blows me away. This was always my wildest dream as a kid, to have certain accolades. It still doesn't feel real, but I think your goals are ever-evolving and ever-changing.

"28" with Dean Lewis crossed 188 million streams. What does a successful collaboration actually require from you as a songwriter, versus what you need when you're writing entirely alone?

I think with collaboration, most importantly, I really want to feel connected with the person I'm working with. Music and songwriting is a personal thing for me - it's kind of hard to open up. If I can work with someone that I feel is like a friend, someone I get to know outside of the studio, that definitely helps me with that process.

As we wrap up, what would you like to say to the people who've stayed with you through all of this, and what should they be excited about next?

I want to say how thankful and how grateful I am for them. I know everyone says it, but I do mean it. I never take for granted the people who give me the opportunity to continue to make music. I just want them to be excited for my album coming out August 21st. I have worked so hard on this music and I hope that they leave it feeling empowered and just a little bit lighter

IG:@sophiannadozie

From Morocco, Nigeria, to South Africa, A Playlist to Light Up Your Entire Summer

If you’re still looking for the playlist to lighten your summer, look no further! We have compiled our favourite new artists from the continent and beyond who are currently killing it in the music scene. Not only are those acts up-and-coming, but they have proven themselves to be promising new voices, bringing forth a unique sonic soundscape we haven’t heard before. Whether it is Bongology, Moroccan Gwana, or Jamaican Dancehall, they have distinctly fused their sound with household names such as Neo Soul, Konpa, and so much more.

Deeds Magazine has compiled the discovery list you do not want to miss. Unless you haven’t heard them throughout Fête de La Musique or on social media, this is the perfect opportunity for you to learn about them before they get big and it is too late.

Che Mario

Ché Mario is a South-African Jamaican emerging musician from North West London with a touch of golden riddim. Produced by yo Caleb!, “U Da Cake,” which catapulted online through a breathtaking cypher, has since become a club anthem everyone can’t stop vibing to. Its unique Dancehall and modern electronic vocals make him a feared component in his league. Co-signed by Nigerian sweetheart Ayra Starr, its reach has only garnered greater heights, making Ché Mario a new artist everyone should absolutely pay close attention to.

(D) Juno

(D) Juno is a Congolese-French emerging singer who has taken the Parisian streets by storm. Ever since she dropped her Bongo classic “BB Bringue,” everybody just can not get enough of her. Produced by Panafriqana, a member of the Bongology collective, the song first appeared on socials as a teaser before exploding into stardom, surpassing 1 million Spotify streams as of late. Co-signed by the likes of Theodora, the single has only become bigger since its release. We would advise you to keep an eye on her.

Ino Casablanca

Ino Casablanca is a Moroccan-French artist who knows no sonic limitations. Truth be told, the starlet has been grinding for years. It is his 2025 hit single; however, “DIMA RAVE” sparked an interest among global listeners and is being played throughout this summer. Often nicknamed the French Bad Bunny, Ino’s music style takes a nudge at his Moroccan roots, Spanish background, and French inheritance. For most, this is their first impression of Gwana, mixed with Caribbean sounds and so much more. Ino is someone you can’t look away from.

Pz

Pz is a Senegambian vocalist from Atlanta who is just one of the most exciting new rockstars to come out recently. His latest project, “No Turning Back,” has everybody watching with excitement, including Opium king Playboi Carti, who has co-signed him numerous times. Often interpreted as avant-garde, his experimental trap sound is the new talk of the town, spreading throughout cool kids' Gen Z circles and fashion scenes. Pz is definitely destined for greatness.

Solana

Solana is a Nigerian singer-songwriter where Yoruba traditions meet the new wave. Her song “Okunkun,” through its tasteful visuals and alternative sound, has garnered massive attention since its official release. She almost feels familiar yet different, encapsulating a rhythm uniquely hers. There is no one like her right now.

Overview

It seems like every other week, there is a new artist coming out of the shadows of the internet, but only a few manage to persist and remain on our playlist. Not only have those emerging acts maintained relevance, but they also offer something new to the table, only growing into the hearts of global listeners. It is too early to determine where their artistry may go from here; however, one thing is sure: we’re expecting the most gut-wrenching bangers to continue to wreck our speakers all summer.

From Davido and Tyla to Ayra Starr, here's a look at the African albums set to define the rest of the summer.

With the heatwave in full swing, this summer is shaping up to be hot as is African music. While Afrobeats and Amapiano continue to dominate playlists and festivals stages around the world, some of the continent's biggest artists are preparing to either release new albums or build on projects that have already sparked a conversation.

From South Africa’s Tyla entering her sophomore era to Davido’s promise of a return to his signature sound, here’s a look at some of the releases fans should have on their radar. 

‍Tyla – APop (July 24)

After introducing herself to the world with her Grammy-winning breakout era and the global success of ‘Tyla,’ the South African star is ready for the next chapter. Her sophomore album, ‘A*Pop,’ has been positioned as a more mature evolution of her sound, blending amapiano, pop and R&B while showcasing how much she has grown since the "Water" days to become one of Africa's biggest crossover stars. The record album arrives upon enormous expectation with a rollout that already includes the hit singles ‘Chanel’ and ‘She Did It Again’ featuring Zara Larsson, signalling a project that leans confidently into a mainstream sound  without abandoning the South African influences that first made her stand out.

Davido – ORIADÉ (July 31)

Davido’s Album Announcement Trailer | Courtesy of Davido’s Youtube

Just a year after ‘5ive,’ Davido isn't slowing down. His sixth studio album, Oriadé (a Yoruba portmanteau for "ori" meaning head/destiny and "adé" meaning crown) arrives at the tail end of the month–preceded by a lead single, ‘I Know Who I Be,’–as the Nigerian superstar celebrates 15 years in music. The Grammy-Nominated artist has described the project as a return to the African sound that first made him a household name. At 13 tracks, it will also be his shortest studio album to date. Expectations are naturally high following his previous, which produced the hit ‘With You’ featuring Omah Lay and earned a nod from the Recording Academy.

‍Ayra Starr – Starr Girl (August 14)

Following ‘The Year I Turned 21,’ Ayra Starr’s upcoming LP ‘Starr Girl' promises an even broader sonic palette. The rollout has already included singles such as ‘Tornado’ and ‘Where Do We Go’, while previous releases including ‘Gimme Dat’ featuring Wizkid and ‘Who's Dat Girl’ with Rema have fuelled anticipation.

Between her Roc Nation partnership, expanding global collaborations with reports suggesting features with Doechii, Leon Thomas and Zayn, and increasingly adventurous production choices on the new record–all which could mark another major leap in her already impressive career–underlining ‘Sabi Girl's’ increasingly international ambitions.

Tiakola – WPOINTM (September 25)

French-Congolese artist, Tiakola also has his next studio album, ‘WPOINTM,’ confirmed. The hitmaker is expected to build on the melodic rap and R&B sound that has seen him featured on Asake's ‘M$NEY’ and Wizkid's latest, in addition to being one of Europe's most exciting artists, with fans already counting down to the release. In the meantime, read our 2022 Deeds cover story with Tiakola for a closer look at the artist behind the music before this next era begins.

Wizkid – Sexy (TBA)

A new era from Wizkid might be near as well. During an exclusive pre-release event hosted by Deeds in Paris last week, the Afrobeats superstar revealed that his seventh studio album will be titled ‘Sexy,’ ending months of speculation about what would follow 2024's ‘Morayo.’ While he stopped short of confirming a release date, the announcement immediately sparked excitement among fans eager for his next full-length project. With little known about it beyond its title, it is certainly one of the most anticipated African releases still expected before the end of the year. 

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Burna Boy – (TBA

Following the success of his 2025 album ‘No Sign of Weakness’ Burna Boy has already set the stage for his next era, confirming that a new project is expected before the end of 2026 alongside a major global tour. While details around the album remain under wraps, anticipation is high after a year that has seen the Grammy-winning artist continue expanding his international reach. 

Part of that momentum comes from his prominent role in the 2026 FIFA World Cup soundtrack. Burna Boy teamed up with Shakira on ‘Dai Dai,’ the tournament's official song, which premiered during the opening ceremony in Mexico City and introduced his music to one of the world's biggest sporting audiences. With a new album on the horizon and another blockbuster global collaboration under his belt, fans will be watching closely to see where the self-proclaimed African Giant takes his sound next.

With confirmed releases from Tyla, Davido and Ayra Starr still to come–and highly anticipated albums from Wizkid and Burna Boy expected later this year; ‘26 is shaping up to be another landmark year for African music on the global stage.

IG:@_stanleykilonzo

To be a part of the crowd at Bad Bunny’s DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS World Tour as part of his London stop playing to a sold out crowd at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was to witness something truly special. It should come as no surprise that the Puerto Rican superstar put on a show that surpassed any sort of expectation anybody would have seeing him live. The sneak peaks given from his 2 month No Me Quiero Ir de Aquí Puerto Rican Residency which took place last year and then again earlier this year as part of his incredible Super-Bowl Halftime Show performance indicated that this tour was going to be worth attending and a show not missing.

In support of his latest GRAMMY Award winning album DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS he came out and brought the album to life in a way that was exceptional and then some. The show which ran for a total of 3 hours felt more of a party and celebration than something which had been crafted specifically for the show. Yet there was an intentionality behind the whole show and everything he brought.

Beginning the show on the main stage donning a suit which considering the previous heatwave that has swept across Europe was a brave move. He was accompanied by his Salsa band behind him, one of the many displays of his cultural heritage he brought to the show. Not to mention the strong musicianship that each of the players brought to stage. 

There was something to be said about the fact throughout the entire show he only spoke in Spanish and even though most of the crowd would’ve been Spanish speaking even for those who weren't there was nothing that felt disconnected as you could very much feel and hear the sentiment as to what was being said. For the reality of him being a boy coming from Puerto Rico and finding himself on stadium shows around the world it was very clear that that moment and this particular moment in his career is one for the books. The album which is so clearly rooted in his love for Puerto Rico and the cultural heritage it has brought to his artistry and his fans not only locally but internationally across the world. The show was a beautiful display of that and felt like the witness of a moment that will forever be significant to his career.

The setlist was also a strong display of the catalogue of music he has built throughout his career since his almost decade long appearance with the release of his debut album back in 2018. Whilst the show was heavily consistent with tracks off DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS he brought out favourites and other songs from his catalogue. Crafting the show from start to finish there was rarely a moment to sit down and take a break as the energy rose from start to finish. Starting on the main stage which set the introduction of the vibes. The show began with  LA MuDANZA off the album before going into a Salsa version of “Callaíta” he was also joined by opening act Chuwi for their collaborative track “WELTiTA” which they had previously played during their own headline show that took place on Friday night. Giving an ode to their surroundings They played Wonderwall by Oasis as an instrumental on the Cuatro before going into to TURiSTA. Plenty of favourites had their time on the setlist including BAILE INoLVIDABLE, NUEVAYoL, VeLDÁ, VOY A LLeVARTE PA PR and of course the standout song DtMF. Also bringing through his other fan favourites was “ LA CANCION" off his joint project with J Balvin, Ni bien ni mal which was an exclusive for this show. DÁKITI and even had a guest appearance by Blur and Gorillaz man Damon who joined him on the piano for Tormenta and Clint Eastwood. Even with the show that ran for 2 hours and 45 minutes tracks that were missed meant it could have kept going for longer. 

The production and everything that accompanied the music only served to enhance the experience as well. Before fans entered the stadium those that arrived when doors opened were given a piece of memorabilia which was a cut out of a camera fitted with a light that served as the flash on a lanyard which lit up at various points throughout the show. Not the mention the dancers who also accompanied him on stage. His second stage which also known as “La Caista” and is a full scale pink replica of a traditional working class Puerto Rican home also brought that flare as a space which housed VIPs and fans who were immersed within the show with him performing among them as he stunted in a full Adidas hoodie and shorts combination and using its roof as another stage. 

One thing that is evident and prominent is the connection that he has to his fans. As well as being immersed within them he also took the time to greet those that were at the barriers and not just just giving quickfire interactions but holding a meaningful connection that clearly meant something. By way of translation he addressed the crowd many times throughout the show expressing his love and gratitude and speaking about uplifting each other living in the moment, loving each other and ourselves. As well as embracing and enjoying the moments of life and creating memories and moments which captures the essence of the themes and messages addressed on the album. 

As this moment stands with the release of the album and all that followed by way of the residency, winning the GRAMMY for Album of the Year, a historic Super Bowl Half-time Show and now the DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS World Tour. It truly does feel like this is a special and significant moment in his career. And as crowds cheered Benito following DtMF he was visibly emotional and taken in with all the love he received from the crowd. Bad Bunny is truly in a league of his own and best believe we will be present the next time he touches down in the UK which hopefully won't be for too long. 

CREDIT ERIC ROJAS

Credit: Cassidy Velmech

Wizkid has confirmed the title of his seventh studio album as Sexy. This was announced to a room full of music and culture’s brightest and biggest stars during an exclusive pre-release party hosted by Deeds Magazine at Cova Club in Paris on Thursday, June 25.

The Grammy-winning singer, born Ayodeji Balogun, took to the mic himself to break the news. “Paris, let me hear you say ‘yeah yeah.’ Yeah, we got the new album coming out,” he told the crowd. “Real soon, and the name of the album is ‘Sexy,’ baby.” No release date or tracklist has been confirmed. The reveal followed weeks of speculation after Wizkid posted a single cryptic word on X - “Album” - alongside studio photos taken with Pharrell Williams in France.

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The Paris event, part of Deeds’ Fashion Week takeover, drew a packed room of heavy-hitters from the world of music, culture, and sports including Shallipopi, Alvin Kamara, Quavo, Blaqbonez, Musa Keys, Young Jonn, Tiakola, Pasuma, Smallgod, BabyDaiz, Baby Wacko, and many more. Despite being billed as an album listening party, attendees reportedly heard no new music from Sexy itself  - Wizkid spent much of the night dancing to older records, including a moment vibing alongside Shallipopi to the rapper’s hit “Laho.” One fan summed up the mood online: “Only Wizkid will do an album listening party where no songs on the album are played or listened to. Lmao, he’s still as unserious as ever.”

Fans have already begun theorising about the album’s direction based on the title alone. Several pointed to a possible R&B turn, while others connected the reveal to a line Ayra Starr dropped during her press run for their collaboration ‘Gimme Dat,’ when she crowned Wizkid “the king of sexy Afrobeats.” That nickname now reads less like a compliment and more like a preview.

Sexy will be Wizkid’s seventh studio album, following ‘Morayo’ (2024), which honoured his late mother Jane Dolapo Balogun. His catalogue spans ‘Superstar’ (2011), ‘Ayo’ (2014), ‘Sound From The Other Side’ (2017), ‘Made In Lagos’ (2020) and ‘More Love, Less Ego’ (2022). The announcement arrives during a milestone year for the singer, who is marking 15 years since his breakout and will headline Afro+ Fest in Washington, D.C. this September to commemorate the anniversary.

Credit: Cassidy Velmech
IG: @sophiannadozie

Few artists have had a front-row seat to Afrobeats' global rise quite like Wizkid. Fewer still can claim to have helped engineer it. Over the last fifteen years, the Lagos-born artist has evolved from a teenage sensation into one of the most influential figures in contemporary music, building a career defined by chart-topping records, sold-out arenas, industry accolades, and cultural milestones that have helped reshape perceptions of African music worldwide.

What began with local radio hits and regional acclaim eventually became something much larger. Alongside a generation of African artists pushing the genre forward, Wizkid emerged as one of the defining faces of Afrobeats' international breakthrough, helping carry sounds born in Lagos to audiences across Europe, North America, Asia, and beyond.

Today, his legacy extends far beyond streaming numbers or chart positions. It can be found in the global appetite for African music, the doors opened for younger artists, and the growing recognition of Afrobeats as one of the defining musical movements of the 21st century.

Ahead of our upcoming album pre-release listening experience in Paris, we revisit the milestones, records, and defining moments that have shaped Wizkid's remarkable rise and cemented his place among music's most important global stars.

The Superstar Era That Started It All

When ‘Superstar’ arrived in 2011, Nigerian music was entering a period of rapid transformation. The country's pop scene was becoming increasingly ambitious, driven by a generation of artists determined to create music that could compete on an international level while remaining distinctly African.

At just twenty years old, Wizkid found himself at the center of that movement. The album produced a string of defining records, including ‘Holla At Your Boy,’ ‘Pakurumo,’ ‘Don't Dull,’ and ‘Tease Me,’ songs that quickly became staples across radio stations, clubs, and university campuses throughout Africa. More importantly, Superstar introduced listeners to an artist whose instincts extended beyond conventional pop stardom.

His ability to blend Nigerian influences with contemporary R&B, dancehall, and pop created a sound that felt both local and globally accessible. That balance would later become one of the defining characteristics of Afrobeats' international appeal. For many fans, Superstar was simply the arrival of a promising young artist. In hindsight, it was the foundation of a career that would help redefine African music's place within global culture.

How "Ojuelegba" Changed Everything

Still on the rise, ‘Ojuelegba,’ is perhaps Wizkid’s career’s turning point. Released on his self-titled 2014 LP, ‘Ayo,’ the song reflected on his journey through one of Lagos' most recognizable neighborhoods, documenting ambition, struggle and perseverance with a level of vulnerability that distinguished it from many contemporary hits.

The record resonated deeply throughout Africa, but its influence soon expanded far beyond the continent. After attracting the attention of British grime star Skepta and eventually Drake, 'Ojuelegba’ received an official remix that introduced Wizkid to a wider international audience. Its significance cannot be measured solely through streams or chart positions. The song became one of the earliest modern Afrobeats records to demonstrate that African music could travel globally without abandoning its cultural identity. Rather than adapting himself for international audiences, Wizkid watched international audiences adapt to him.

Looking back, ‘Ojuelegba’ represented more than a successful single. It served as a bridge between regional stardom and global recognition, helping establish a pathway that countless African artists would later follow.

The One Dance Effect

Come 2016, and ‘One Dance’ dominates. The Drake global smash featuring Wizkid and Kyla became one of the defining songs of the streaming era. The record topped charts across multiple countries and ultimately became the first song in Spotify history to surpass one billion streams. For Wizkid, the collaboration represented a dramatic shift in visibility. Audiences who had never encountered Afrobeats suddenly found themselves dancing to rhythms and melodies rooted in African music traditions. What made the achievement particularly significant was that the song's success wasn't framed as a niche cultural moment–it was mainstream popular culture at its absolute peak.

The industry's response was immediate. Major labels increased their investment in African talent. International media outlets began paying closer attention to Afrobeats. New audiences became curious about the artists shaping the genre's future. Nearly a decade later, the ripple effects of the hit remain impossible to ignore.

The momentum generated by 'Ojuelegba' and 'One Dance' eventually led to Wizkid signing a landmark global deal with RCA Records, positioning him among the first African artists to secure major-label backing on that scale. 

Collaborations That Expanded the Map

As Wizkid's profile continued to grow, so did the scale of his collaborations. Over the years, he has worked alongside some of the biggest names in music, including Beyoncé, Chris Brown, H.E.R., Justin Bieber, Skepta, Ella Mai, Brent Faiyaz and more. Yet what makes these collaborations notable isn't simply the star power involved. It's the fact that Wizkid managed to maintain his artistic identity throughout them.

His involvement in Beyoncé's ‘The Lion King: The Gift’ project marked a particularly important milestone. ‘Brown Skin Girl’ won Best Music Video at the 63rd Grammy Awards, earning Wizkid his first Grammy and further cementing his position on the global stage. The achievement reflected a broader shift taking place within global music. African artists were no longer being invited into international conversations as occasional guests. They had become central contributors shaping the direction of contemporary popular culture.

The Made in Lagos Phenomenon

While Wizkid had already achieved international success, ‘Made in Lagos’ elevated him into an entirely different category. Released in 2020, the album arrived during a period of global uncertainty and quickly established itself as one of the defining projects of the decade. Built around understated production, rich melodies, and a refined sense of confidence, it showcased an artist operating at the height of his creative powers.

At the center of its success was ‘Essence,’ featuring Tems, the song evolved from a fan favorite into a genuine global phenomenon. Its rise felt organic, fueled by listener enthusiasm rather than traditional industry machinery. Eventually, it became the first Nigerian song to reach the Billboard Hot 100 Top 10, helping introduce Afrobeats to audiences on an unprecedented scale. More importantly, the track changed perceptions by demonstrating that African music didn't need to conform to existing industry expectations to achieve mainstream success. Instead, the industry was beginning to adapt to Africa. The album also became one of the longest-charting African projects in Billboard history, further demonstrating Afrobeats' growing commercial power outside the continent. 

Conquering the World's Biggest Stages

Streaming success tells one story. Live performance tells another. Throughout his career, Wizkid has repeatedly demonstrated an ability to convert popularity into real-world audience demand. From selling out London's Royal Albert Hall to becoming  the first African artist to headline three consecutive nights at the O2 Arena, his live achievements have consistently expanded expectations surrounding African artists.

In 2023, he reached another historic milestone when he became the first African artist to headline Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. The significance of the moment extended beyond attendance figures. Stadium performances occupy a different category of live entertainment altogether, reserved for artists capable of mobilizing massive audiences across countries, demographics and generations. By reaching that level, Wizkid wasn't simply breaking records. He was redefining what was possible for African performers on the global stage.

The Legacy of the Blueprint

More than a decade after his breakthrough, Wizkid's influence extends far beyond music. His career helped create pathways for a new generation of African artists seeking global audiences. He demonstrated that international success did not require abandoning local identity. He proved that music created in Lagos could resonate in London, Los Angeles, Paris, and beyond.

Even as he enters a new chapter, Wizkid continues to evolve. His 2024 album ‘Morayo’ offered one of the most personal projects of his career, revealing a more reflective side of the artist while reinforcing the creative versatility that has defined his longevity. 

Today's Afrobeats landscape is larger, more visible, and more commercially powerful than ever before. While many artists contributed to that growth, Wizkid remains one of its most important architects. His achievements can be measured through awards, streams, sold-out venues, and chart records. Yet his greatest accomplishment may be something far less quantifiable. He helped change the way the world listens to Africa–and in doing so, helped reshape the global music landscape itself. 

IG:@_stanleykilonzo
Cover Credit: Kevin Amato / GQ South Africa

Take a look at the long history of the Parisian most famous Summer street party, and where it may head in the future

Every year since 1982, on June 21st, the vibrant streets of France come alive, taken over by musicians and DJs alike, with some performing just outside their apartment windows and creating a gathering where everyone is welcome. This phenomena is called Fête de la Musique, also known as FDLM, and it has created a massive cultural hub across the country as a big f*ck you to institutions and bureaucracy within French creative circles, which for a long time, have made it difficult for emerging talents to persevere in the creative industry However, in light of recent editions it’s worth examining if one can still make that claim.

‍Fête de la Musique was an idea first derived from American musician Joel Cohen in 1976. It was then developed by the Ministry of Culture, which discovered through a 1982 study that 5 million French people, including one in two young people, played a musical instrument. The premise is simple: if you have a musical gift, take it on the street and let the world know what you’re made of.

In recent decades, the event gained extreme popularity among diasporic communities. The gatherings, filled with emerging musicians and rappers, extended to include up and coming Djs trying to make a name for themselves. This, in turn, resulted in many local artists receiving their “big break” in the music industry through the free marketing and exposure Fête de la Musique brings to their communities. One of such artists is Kim, a French-Martinican Zouk and Afropop singer who rose to prominence during the festival in 2004. Guinean-French artist MHD also utilized the traction of the festival to upscale his Afrotrap series, and eventually became France’s national treasure back in 2016. Both of these acts were French locals with a story to tell who came from communities often disregarded by society.  For the first time, artists from the banlieue had the opportunity to be discovered and garner an audience by circumventing the music industry politics that made it difficult to reach the masses. 

The 2026 edition was arguably the biggest Fête de la Musique we have seen yet, with streets packed to the brim with attendees celebrating under the hard-hitting sun. It is safe to say it has never been this popular. However, the festivities did not come without complaints. The first wave of backlash came before the event started. Locals took to socials to complain about Londoners bringing their sense of excitement, which is fairly different from French culture, with them to FDLM. Regardless of that, most hosts were still welcoming.

The second wave of backlash began due to foreign organizers beginning the festive days earlier than planned. These organizers came with their own lineup, often not including local DJs and artists. This was taken by the locals with mixed reactions. Some expressed shock at the organizations, stating that Londoners were taking over Fête de la Musique, while others credited the organizers for their strategy, stating local organizers should take notes and follow suit. Whether one was for or against the change, it was clear the festive would be overcrowded.

This then hints at the final backlash, Fête de la Musique moving away from what it originally represented. With a lot of investors and established artists taking the stage, it leaves little space for emerging local acts to get involved and noticed. What once felt like an opportunity to discover new artists has visibly shrunken. Arguably, this year had more street parties than ever, and as a result, those who were supposed to receive their big break ended up underwhelmed. Many locals felt like it had begun resembling a commercialized festival, and no longer felt like the street parties many grew up adoring.

Noticeable acts who performed but fell massively under the radar during the 2026 Fête de la Musique were, for example, 63OG, a Cameroon-French rapper with incredible musical range. Another was Jeune Morty, an Ivorian-French new-gen vocalist who had one of the most memorable French bangers of this year with Ivoire Feeling”. Another worth mentioning was (D)Juno, a Congolese-French singer who has done remarkable numbers with her breakout hit BB Bringue”. Some might say they were all overshadowed by the presence of established artists, such as Tayc, Tiakola and Theodora, who performed amongst them.

Like past occurrences, this moment should have been their big break, their rise to stardom, but it seemingly did the opposite. Local artists, emerging musicians, and small-time DJs were not the center of this Fête de la Musique. Instead, established artists, commercialized events, and foreign organizers took over. It left little room for new acts to find a new audience. This is a vast shift from its origins and what FDLM initially intended to do, making participants wonder where the festive is heading in the coming years and whether it still holds a place in the heart of their community.

Credit: Marvyn Ngikila (marvyn_07)

Released with support from Amnesty International, the new anthem is part of a wider campaign exploring how music continues to serve as a tool for civic engagement and youth mobilization in West Africa.

West African music veterans Kajeem, Didier Awadi, and Soum Bill have joined forces on ‘En toute liberté', a new human rights anthem released in partnership with Amnesty International. More than a typical music release, the track forms part of a broader campaign aimed at encouraging civic participation and protecting youth civic spaces across Côte d'Ivoire. Through a combination of digital platforms and university outreach, the initiative positions music not only as a cultural product but as a vehicle for activism, dialogue and collective action. 

Backed by the global human rights organization, ‘En toute liberté’--which translates to "In Complete Freedom"--is intended to resonate widely. The artists behind the anthem bring longstanding histories of social engagement to the effort. Kajeem has consistently used reggae as a vehicle for civic awareness and social commentary, while Didier Awadi remains one of West Africa's most influential political hip-hop voices. Alongside them, Soum Bill brings decades of cultural influence in Côte d'Ivoire, helping anchor an initiative that extends beyond the music itself. 

Rather than ending on streaming platforms, the campaign will reach university campuses across the country, where discussions around freedom of expression and democratic participation will form part of its broader outreach. The focus on campuses is significant. Across Africa, universities have long served as incubators for political thought, social movements, and cultural change, making them a natural setting for a project that seeks to connect music with civic engagement. 

Their collaboration also sits within a much longer tradition of politically conscious music in West Africa. For decades, artists have used songs to educate audiences, challenge authority, and encourage public participation. Fela Kuti transformed Afrobeat into a platform for political critique, while Alpha Blondy and Tiken Jah Fakoly used reggae to address governance, democracy and social justice. In this context, ‘En toute liberté’ is less a departure from tradition than a continuation of it. The anthem reflects the enduring belief that music can do more than entertain–it can inform, mobilize and inspire.

The release arrives at a moment when African music enjoys unprecedented global visibility. Yet while international audiences often encounter the continent's music through entertainment-focused narratives, ‘En toute liberté’ highlights another dimension of its cultural power. Across the region and much of Africa, musicians have long occupied roles that extend beyond performance, acting as educators, commentators, and advocates within their communities. For Kajeem, Didier Awadi, and Soum Bill, the anthem serves as a reminder that music remains not only a soundtrack to social life but also a platform for participation, dialogue and change. In doing so, the project reinforces the enduring relationship between culture and civic engagement, demonstrating how artists continue to use their platforms to encourage reflection, discussion, and action. 

IG:@_stanleykilonzo
Cover Image Credit: Amnesty International/Digitafreeka

The 18th edition of The Headies is going to Toronto. The announcement was made on June 15, 2026, at the Grand Ballroom of Eko Hotel in Lagos - which is, ironically, in Nigeria. The ceremony itself will not be. Nigerian fans who want to attend Nigeria’s premier music award will need a visa, a flight, and a hotel room in Canada. Everyone else gets a watch party.

The Headies have earned that weight over twenty years. Established in 2006 as the Hip Hop World Awards, the ceremony has hosted some of Nigerian music’s most unforgettable nights. Olamide remains the most decorated artist in its history with 15 wins. Wizkid, Davido, Burna Boy, Rema, Ayra Starr, Tems and Simi have all built portions of their legacy on that stage - the same artists now filling arenas across Europe and North America, the same artists Canada’s Deputy High Commissioner would later cite as evidence of Nigerian music’s global reach. Wande Coal’s sweep at the 5th edition - Album of the Year, Artist of the Year, R&B Album of the Year, and Hip Hop Revelation of the Year in a single night - is still talked about. The 2015 clash between Olamide and Don Jazzy over the Next Rated category split the internet for weeks. In 2025, Qing Madi became the youngest female artist to win Best Songwriter, accepting the award in tears, dedicating it to her mother watching from home. The same edition carried a posthumous tribute to Mohbad, whose loss in 2023 still sits heavy over an industry that never got to see him fully embraced while he was alive. These are not small footnotes. They are the moments that turned an awards show into a cultural institution - one built, performance by performance, winner by winner, entirely on Nigerian soil.

This is the third time in four editions that ceremony has left that soil. The awards moved to Atlanta in 2022 for two consecutive editions before returning to Lagos in 2025 under the theme “Back to Base.” They are not at base anymore.

Founder Ayo Animashaun cited economics as the primary reason. He drew a direct comparison to the Grammy Awards: “Most of the awards in the world that you see that are big, they have four or five sources of revenue. Here we have only one, everybody talks about sponsorship.” The funding problem is real. The proposed solution is not the right fix.

The Grammys stay in Los Angeles for a specific reason. Animashaun acknowledged this himself: “Grammy left Los Angeles and went to Madison Square in New York because LA was shut down. LA fought to bring Grammy back because it does something to their economy and it is part of their DNA.” That comparison undermines his own decision. Los Angeles understood that the Grammys belonged to the city. The city built the financial relationship that made losing the event unthinkable. Nigeria has not had that conversation yet. The Headies are boarding a flight instead.

The economic argument actually strengthens the case against the decision. A platform that cannot sustain itself financially in Nigeria has an infrastructure problem. Geography does not solve an infrastructure problem. Going to Toronto relocates the funding gap temporarily. The structural issue remains untouched. The same conversation will likely happen again next year, or the year after.

Animashaun also pointed to Nigeria’s large diaspora community in Canada as motivation for the move. That ambition is legitimate on its own terms. Taking Nigerian music to the world and taking Nigerian music away from Nigerians are not the same decision. The Headies has been making the second one while describing it as the first. The Nigerian diaspora in Toronto did not build The Headies. Nigerian fans, Nigerian artists, and the Nigerian industry did - across twenty years, fifteen wins for Olamide, a tearful debut win for Qing Madi, a posthumous tribute for Mohbad. Taking the award abroad to reach a diaspora audience, while the home audience receives a livestream, reads less like expansion. It reads like a concession dressed as strategy.

Canada’s Deputy High Commissioner Carlos Rojas-Arbulu welcomed the decision warmly, noting that Wizkid, Davido, Burna Boy, Olamide, Reekado Banks, Shallipopi, Asake and Ayra Starr had all visited Canada in the past eight months. Nigerian artists touring Canada is not evidence that The Headies belong there. Nigerian artists tour London, Paris, and New York with similar frequency. The Grammys are not hosted in any of those cities either.

Animashaun’s real question should not be which international city offers the most convenient venue. It should be why Nigeria has not made The Headies part of its economic and cultural identity the way Los Angeles did with the Grammys. That conversation belongs with the Lagos State Government, with Nigerian banks, with local corporate sponsors, with the Federal Ministry of Arts and Culture. It is a harder conversation than announcing a Toronto venue from a ballroom in Lagos. It is also the only conversation that solves the actual problem.

The decision has already sparked debate among entertainment followers, many questioning why a Nigerian music award platform keeps relocating outside the country. Those questions deserve answers. An award that repeatedly leaves its home country has failed to convince that country it is worth investing in. The case for keeping The Headies in Nigeria has never needed sentiment. It only ever needed money.

Credit:The Headies Award 18th Edition

“See better song wey AFCON just waste.” That was Paul Ifiora on X, two days into the 2026 FIFA World Cup, reposting the music video for “Le Show” to 892,000 views, 19,000 likes, and a comment section full of people hearing the song for the first time -  six months after it dropped.

‍“Le Show” by Ayra Starr, Davido and French Montana, produced by RedOne, was released in December 2025 as part of the official AFCON 2025 soundtrack. From the opening moments, the record sets a triumphant tone, driven by bold production, infectious rhythms, and a chorus that feels tailor-made for big stages. The recurring phrase “on va commencer le show” meaning “we’re about to start the show”,  acts as both a declaration and an invitation.  It is celebratory, exciting, and enchanting. It sounds like winning. It sounds, specifically, like a World Cup song. 

RedOne, the Moroccan-Swedish producer behind some of the biggest pop records of the last two decades, including the Qatar 2022 World Cup anthem, built “Le Show” with the same architecture. Ayra Starr shines as the emotional and melodic core of the song, her vocals smooth, commanding, and effortlessly catchy. Davido, who is known for his ability to turn any record into a celebration, adds a familiar spark as he delivers his verse with charisma and authority. French Montana bridges the continental and the global.  It is a record built for a stage larger than AFCON and it sounds like it. But “Dai Dai” has Shakira and a FIFA marketing budget. “Goals” has LISA, Anitta, and Rema on a global rollout. “Le Show” had AFCON - a tournament that, for all its cultural significance, does not move music the way the World Cup does. The song did not fail. It was under-promoted into obscurity by the infrastructure around it.

This is not an African music problem. It is an entertainment industry truth: the product that gets heard is rarely the best product. It is the best marketed one. “Dai Dai” and “Goals” will soundtrack highlight reels, closing ceremonies, and personal playlists for years. “Le Show” is being discovered on someone’s timeline in June 2026 - six months after it dropped, during a tournament it was never invited to.
That is not the song’s fault.

IG:@sophiannadozie

In a world that rarely slows down, the noise of everyday life can feel overwhelming, and the pressure to perform is constant, finding a genuine sanctuary is a rarity. You cannot simply buy a space to just breathe and be yourself. It has to be intentionally built from the ground up.

Two years ago, a small project called CULTUR FM launched in East London with a precise, urgent argument: the pioneers of Afrobeats and Afro music were being structurally undervalued. Today, CULTUR FM has scaled from a hyper-local passion project into a global cultural platform spanning international cities, communities, and institutions. Yet, its truest metric of success isn't just its massive growth or its sold-out takeovers. It is the fact that it has engineered a pressure-free, authentic safe space for DJs and music lovers alike a sanctuary that has fundamentally altered the trajectory of the culture.

‍Take us back to the beginning. What gap in music, culture, or community made you realise CULTUR FM needed to exist?‍

The gap was simple. Most DJs are using the same equipment, CDJs, controllers, and mixers. But it felt like some genres gave DJs a clearer path to visibility, while DJs in Afrobeats and Afro music were not always given the same platform. CULTUR FM was born from the belief that our DJs have the talent, the creativity, and the influence to shape culture at the highest level. What was missing was a space built specifically to showcase them properly. CULTUR FM became that space.

‍In just two years, CULTUR FM has grown from a passion project into a global cultural platform. What has been the biggest lesson from that journey so far?

The biggest lesson has been that community is everything, and it can't be faked. The growth hasn't come from trying to scale too quickly or chasing moments for the sake of it. It has come from consistently showing up, building trust, and making people feel like they are part of something both online and offline.

‍CULTUR FM operates across cities, communities, and institutions around the world. How have you managed to scale globally without losing the authenticity that built the brand?

Being clear on who we are and what we represent has helped us grow without losing direction. For us, scaling has never been about taking the exact same experience and dropping it into different cities. Every place has its own culture, its own audience, and its own way of doing things. We try to understand that first, respect it, and then find a natural way to connect it back to the platform. A lot of that comes from research and real relationships with people on the ground. We work with local DJs, creatives, and partners who understand the city properly. That helps us stay close to the community and keeps the brand feeling authentic wherever we go.

You've often said CULTUR FM is about more than music. What cultural legacy are you ultimately trying to build?

We want the platform to be remembered as something that opened doors for DJs. For us, it is about creating opportunities that did not always exist before. DJs in Afrobeats and Afro music have always played a huge role in how the music travels, how songs break, and how people experience the culture. We want that contribution to be recognised properly. Long term, we want to play a part in how Afro music and DJ culture is seen, valued, and respected around the world.

‍From sold out takeovers to major brand partnerships and support from global figures, what moment made you realise CULTUR FM was becoming something much bigger than you originally imagined?

It was not one single moment. In some ways, we always believed there was space for what we were building. Our music and culture had become so big, but it still felt like there were not enough platforms representing it with the intention it deserved. What surprised us was how quickly people connected with what we were doing. The sold-out events, brand partnerships, and support from different figures have all been amazing, but the moments that stand out most are still the personal ones. When DJs tell us that the platform helped them get seen, get booked, or take their career more seriously, that is when it really hits home. Those moments remind us that the platform is not just growing in numbers it is actually impacting people.

‍A major part of your success has been turning digital engagement into real world community. What do you think people are truly looking for when they show up to a CULTUR FM experience?

People are looking for connection. They want to feel part of something that feels real, not forced. I think that has always been at the core of the brand. People come because they love the music, but also because they want to be in a safe space where the energy, the people, and the culture all feel connected. Especially in the world today with so much going on, having a restful environment where you can step away from the pressure and just be yourself is entirely priceless. It is something money can't buy, it just has to be intentionally created. Our experiences are curated to feel immersive, energetic, and welcoming. The music is always important, but the feeling in the room matters just as much. People come for the sound, but they stay for the community.

DJs have become a central part of the CULTUR FM ecosystem. How has the platform helped reshape the role of DJs as cultural tastemakers rather than just performers?

‍We have always been intentional about how we position DJs. To us, DJs are not just people who play music. They are curators and tastemakers. They play a huge role in how songs travel, how records break, and how people experience new sounds. A good DJ can shift the energy of a room, introduce people to music they have never heard before, and help shape the feeling of a whole scene. That deserves to be recognised properly. Through this ecosystem, we have been able to shine a light on that. We have seen DJs grow their audiences, get booked in new cities, and be taken more seriously for the role they already play in the culture. Collectively, the talent we have worked with has gained over 1,000,000 followers, which shows what can happen when DJs are given the right platform.

Partnerships have ranged from grassroots initiatives to global corporations. What does a brand need to understand about culture before CULTUR FM is willing to collaborate with them?

‍The most important thing for us is authenticity. Culture is not something a brand can just borrow for a campaign. You have to respect it, understand it, and be willing to engage with it properly. For us, the best partnerships are with brands that want to add value, not just take from the community. We look for partners who understand what the movement represents and are willing to work with the culture in a way that feels natural, considered, and respectful.

With the two year anniversary approaching, what excites you most about the next chapter of CULTUR FM, and where do you see the movement five years from now?

‍What excites us most is that it still feels like we are only getting started. In two years, the brand has grown from a small idea in East London into a platform that has travelled to different cities and connected with people around the world. That growth has been amazing, but it also feels like there is still so much more to build. The next chapter is about expanding into more cities, creating more opportunities for DJs, and building experiences that bring people closer to the culture. In five years, we want to be one of the leading platforms for Afro music, DJ culture, and cultural experiences globally.

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Somewhere on TikTok right now, someone is doing the ‘Copines’ dance. The choreography is precise, and the “bombarder, bom bom” chorus plays underneath it all. In the comments, the same questions “What is this song? Who sings this?” keep appearing. 

“Copines”,  French for “girlfriends”, was released in August 2018 as the second single from Aya Nakamura’s breakthrough sophomore album Nakamura. Now in 2026, the “2020 vs 2026” comparison trend is all over TikTok with a new generation recreating the original choreography alongside a new version, keeping the song alive without knowing its history. This is not the first time “Copines” has come back. It will not be the last.

The woman behind it has been one of the most significant voices in global music for nearly a decade  and she is still, somehow, a name most of her audience cannot place. Aya Nakamura is the first African musician to have a video with over a billion views on YouTube. 'Djadja' became the fourth French-language song to reach that milestone in February 2025. She has also beaten the record held by Édith Piaf since 1961 as the most-listened-to Francophone woman in the Netherlands.  She is the most streamed Francophone artist in the world. She has performed at some of the biggest stages in Europe. She has collaborated with artists across continents. And she is, to most of the people currently dancing to her music on TikTok, completely unknown. That is the specific irony of “Copines” and it is worth sitting with.

Born Aya Coco Danioko in Bamako, Mali, and raised in the Paris suburb of Aulnay-sous-Bois, her musical identity sits at the intersection of French urban pop, Afrobeat, R&B and dancehall — a sound resistant to easy categorisation. She released her debut album Journal Intime in 2017, found her footing, and then in 2018 released Nakamura. The album spawned the hit singles “Djadja” and "Copines" and launched her international career. 

Released on August 24, 2018, “Copines” peaked at number one in France and achieved Diamond certification.  The production is breezy and synth-led. “Copines” is not a love song or a party anthem whose meaning is incidental. It is a woman calling out a man who disrespects his partner by pursuing her friends. The lyrics are direct -  you want the best of my girlfriends, you want the freshest, but you have already lost. It is a feminist takedown delivered with complete confidence, in Bambara-inflected French, over a beat that makes the whole world want to move.

The language barrier is partly responsible for this. “Copines” travels because you do not need to understand French to feel it. The melody communicates. The energy communicates. “Bombarder, bom bom” communicates  not as meaning but as sensation. And in travelling without translating, the song loses its context to most of its audience.

This is not unique to “Copines”. Songs have always crossed language barriers on the strength of sound alone - “Macarena”, “Gangnam Style”, “Waka Waka”. What makes Nakamura’s case worth examining is the specific content of what gets lost in translation. This is a woman asserting herself, naming the behaviour, and walking away with her dignity intact - a story worth knowing, especially for the millions of women who have been dancing to it without realising it was written for them.

The TikTok trend now has 73.2 million posts and counting. Some are discovering the song for the first time, still asking for the title in the comments. Others are comparing the 2020 choreography to the 2026 version - tracking how the dance evolved alongside the people doing it. And then there are those who are not really dancing at all. They are reliving 2020 - the lockdown, the boredom, the strange collective intimacy of a pandemic that somehow produced one of the most joyful dance trends the internet has ever seen. 

“Copines” has survived long enough to outlast the cultural moments that made it go viral, to spawn a second generation of dancers who will eventually spawn a third. Aya Nakamura has made the song of every summer since 2018. The least the internet can do is learn her name.

Cover Credit: Aya Nakumura

London singer-songwriter Essosa brings a different essence to when it comes to the vibe of R&B. And when you listen to her EP Crush! Everything about it brings a bright, colourful vibrancy that is perfectly presented. The EP, which consists of six tracks, brings together production and songs that feel like an ode to the 90s, yet there is a lightness and airiness that travel through her vocal delivery on the project.

​Across the six tracks, she channels something somewhat unexpected and refreshing for the songstress. From songs like “Crush” to “Signs” to “He’s Not All That”, she brings a combination of relatability and self-awareness to fun and flirtatious lyrics, striking a balance between the EP's essence and what it represents to her. She is bringing something different to the R&B landscape and represents a different kind of artist in modern R&B.

​Speaking to the songstress, we discuss everything from creating the EP to her musical influences, representing her heritage, her upcoming show at London’s Jazz Café, and more.

Hi Essosa, first of all, for those of us who may not be familiar with you, how would you introduce yourself to people who are just meeting you?

​As a lover and student of music!! I’ve been a music nerd for as long as I can remember, and I’ve loved creating and discovering new sonics since I was a child. I love the idea of taking inspiration from the old and making it new. I think that's how I really discovered and honed my sound.

​You are a singer, and so when did you start singing, and how is music something that you gravitated to?

​I started singing, honestly, very young. Most singers have been singing since they were babies, so that's nothing unique. I grew up seeing my mum sing in church, and I always had the personality type to be a performer and share my talent with others.

​In terms of your heritage, you are British/Nigeria, so just in terms of your heritage and how it has impacted your musical taste and ability, what has that experience been like for you?

​I actually wouldn't say it's impacted or shaped my musical taste; however, my heritage has given me a variety of musical sounds around me at all times. My mother listened to gospel, and my dad listened to a lot of jazz and highlife music growing up. I think growing into a teenager or an adult, it just meant that I always had a varied sonic palette, and that allowed me to gain inspiration from songs/artists that are not necessarily just ‘R’n’B’.​

What sort of music did you grow up listening to?

I loved pop music. A lot of Gwen Stefani, Nelly Furtado, Fergie, Rihanna very mid-2000s radio pop. I was obsessed with the radio and would wake up every morning at 6am just to listen to the breakfast show before school. I also loved the ‘Club Classics’ - Show Me Love, Cece Peniston, Crystal Waters, all the club stuff. Disco too, like Diana Ross, Nile Rodgers, etc. Just good music that makes you want to dance and is easily translatable to the masses.

When you started making music, how did you know the type of music you wanted to make?

​I kind of always wanted to make music with a pop/radio structure but make it funkier or bring it back to a jazzier, R&B edge. From a very young age, I always had the idea that I was going to make a blend of Pop, dance, R&B, and jazz. It was more about amalgamating sounds that I wasn't hearing on the radio or in mainstream at all; I wanted to have a sonic USP.

You've been making music for a minute now and released your first EP back in 2021. Talk to us about making that EP as your first body of work, and how your music-making process has changed since then?​

Well, I was making a lot of demos and producing a lot of beats in school. I would produce these demos and try to find producers to polish them up, but I felt like my creative vision kept getting stamped out. At the time I was working on this, I met a mutual friend, Tibo, who was sending me these Kali Uchis-type beats. I was so discouraged when my demos were tampered with by men who didn't understand my vision. So I scrapped my first project and released Dreamworld, which contained all the work I did with Tibo.​

You released your latest EP, Crush!, which is your second EP now, so in terms of this new EP, talk to us about the process of making it and how it came together?

It's kind of similar; I was working on another project and wanted to make music devoid of chords and structure, sounding electronic and abstract. I don’t really know why I was doing this, but I wanted to experiment. Nothing I was making was working, and that’s when I realised that chords are essential to my sound. I was listening to a lot of British soul; Soul II Soul, Incognito, Hinda Hicks, Beverly Knight and then the idea of the sonics of ‘Crush!’ started to come to me.

​Your sound is very much rooted in R&B, but there are a lot of elements to it sonically, so even just in terms of how you got to find your sound and develop it for yourself, how has that process been?​

I mean, as I said, I love radio, I love pop, dance, house, and I also come from the gospel circuit, so it is less about ‘trying’ to make R&B music and more so bringing all the influences of my childhood together to create a new sound. It takes time, and I’m still working on it, but I’m glad that it connects with people and that I have been able to build a fanbase.

​With your latest body of work, what would you say are some of the inspirations behind this EP?

​As aforementioned, British Soul, as well as music from early-2000s producers like The Neptunes, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, Dallas Austin, etc. I love Janet, Kelis and the summery feel they bring to music. I also love Quincy & Michael, so it was genuinely just a big mentoring pot of sounds.

What was your favourite song on the EP to make?

“Missing U!” I wanted to make a song with key changes, like in the old days. We banged out the whole song in one session, and the majority of the original demo made it into the final version.

What does this EP represent about your artistry and where you are in your life right now?

I think I’m becoming more specific with my sound, but I’m also learning how to translate it into this corporate music business world now, so it’s coming across better. All these things are a learning curve. You can have the greatest, most creative ideas and sounds ever, but if you don’t know how to communicate that to the people who are meant to market it, things can fall flat very quickly.

This project is very bright and colourful, with pink as the EP's main colour, both in its association and in the music and vibe. Why was that the essence you wanted to bring to the project?

My sister has synesthesia - I don’t think I do; however, I need to associate certain sonics to a “vibe”. I was feeling super girly, and the songs sounded pink to me. So I went for that vibe; pink, lingerie, feminine, etc.

​You are going to be playing the legendary Jazz Cafe in September. Talk to us about that moment and what you are looking forward to about that show?

​I remember a couple of years ago, I saw Charli XCX play at the Jazz Cafe, and I was obsessed with the idea of playing there one day. I even moved to Camden right next to it. I feel like it’s something I have been manifesting, so I’m super excited to show people what I got!!!

​What else can you tell us, anything else you want to share?

Stream ‘Crush!’ for clear skin & come see me in September :))))

For Mavo and the small, tight-knit team that believed in him before the rest of the world caught on, the now infamous lyric “Hot boxing in the back of the Escaladizzy” became the seed of something none of them could have fully anticipated.

One year ago, “Escaladizzy” dropped on the Nigerian music scene as the work of a young underground artist still finding his footing in an industry that rarely makes room for the unconventional. Within weeks, the track had built up the kind of organic, word-of-mouth traction that labels spend millions trying to manufacture. It took up space inside people’s minds, radio couldn’t get enough, and every few scrolls on social media landed you on the song. However, underneath the streams, features (on the remix starring Ayra Starr, Shallipopi, and Zlatan), and the sudden industry attention something more interesting was brewing. A group of young people who had bet on one person's vision were. 

To celebrate the anniversary of “Escaladizzy”, Deeds Magazine went back to the beginning with Mavo and his team to discuss their most defining moments from that era.

Mavo, Artist

The live performances were probably the most defining moments of that era for me because that's when the scale of it really became impossible to ignore. Seeing crowds know every word, seeing people connect with a song that started from such a specific lived experience was surreal. 

A lot of fans still assume we were signed at the time or had major industry backing behind us, but the reality was very different. Most of what people saw was built on genuine belief, favours, relationships, and a group of people who loved the record enough to contribute their time and talent. We invested a lot of our own personal resources into pushing the project because we believed in it.

Jaye, Marketing, KRL

After the song went viral on tiktok, we’d wake up everyday and see more people had made videos to the song. At the Even in the Day performance, it was great to see how all of the online buzz translated into real life. It was at that point I realised this won’t be just a viral song, it’ll forever be part of culture.

Beverly, Manager & Head of Operations, Kilogbede Records

A lot of people saw the success, the streams, the videos, and the excitement online, but behind the scenes we were still figuring things out in real time. We didn’t have a huge budget. We didn’t have a major label backing us. We didn’t have a machine behind us pushing the record. What we had was a team that believed in Mavo and was willing to do whatever it took to make things happen.

There were days when we were contributing our own money to fund parts of the campaign, trying to balance opportunities with limited resources, and making major decisions while Mavo was still in school. At the same time, the song was growing every day, and the pressure to keep up with that momentum was intense. What stands out to me most is how everyone came together. Nobody waited for someone else to solve the problems. Everybody stepped up. Everybody sacrificed. Everybody believed. That’s what fans probably didn’t get to see.

Looking back now, “Escaladizzy” was more than a hit record. It was a defining moment for the entire team. It tested our belief, our patience, and our ability to adapt under pressure. The song changed Mavo’s career, but it also shaped the people around him and strengthened the foundation we’ve continued to build on ever since. That’s the moment I remember most—not the success itself, but the realization that we were witnessing the beginning of something much bigger than a song.

Tobi Tej, Creative Director & Business Strategist KRL

The element that I’d say that defined the era was marketing. It was the perfect combination of God’s grace, good product, and a good team. Also having a good catalogue was helpful because everything that happened with pushing “Escaladizzy” spilled over to the entire discography. We were so deliberate with how we amplified the momentum. From figuring out the right situation to release the record, to shooting the music video, to doubling down on content to amplify the record & reintroduce fan favorite songs, to the shows (we were making content EVERYDAY! ), to the old Mavo fans schooling the new fans, we put out a dictionary bro lol. I remember getting so many placements on TV & radio with one call, not just because I had the relationships but because it was a great product. We literally strategised and worked every single day since the first snippet spiked on TikTok. It was a great time. It was something fresh the music scene needed. And a lot of gatekeepers didn’t know what to do about it lol. 

Smoke, Videographer & Creative Director

Behind the scenes, it was far from glamorous. A lot of those days were built on long nights, rushed edits, travel stress and figuring things out in real time with a small team. We were shooting content on the move, editing in cars and hotel rooms while trying to keep the energy high even when we were exhausted. There was a little uncertainty, but also a strong belief that the song had something special.

Tenife, A&R KRL

For me, the moment that best defines the Escaladizzy era was the day after the snippet started blowing up online. Up until that point, it was just another record we believed in and were working on. Then overnight, it felt like the song had taken on a life of its own. I remember people I knew personally sending me the snippet and talking about it as if they had just discovered something new, without even realizing I was involved. Seeing work that we'd spent so much time on organically reach people outside of our immediate circle was an incredible feeling.
I think that was also the moment I realized Escaladizzy could be something much bigger than we initially imagined. Before then, there was excitement, but there was still a sense that we were taking things one step at a time. Once the snippet started spreading, the conversation changed. People weren't just reacting to the song anymore—they were anticipating it. There was a genuine sense of momentum building around Mavo and the record.
What fans may not know is that even with all that attention, there wasn't some huge machine operating behind the scenes. A lot of us were still figuring things out in real time, trying to make the most of an opportunity that was growing faster than expected. Looking back now, that period feels like a turning point—not just for the song, but for Mavo's career. It was the first time it felt like the wider public was paying attention, and it showed us that something we'd built with a relatively small team could reach far beyond what we thought was possible.

Photo credit : KRL

Home is a place that's completely different if you have to find it twice. For Akuvi it was never in the cards. Raised between Accra and Oslo, she was never quite Ghanaian enough, nor Norwegian enough. She inhabited an identity that wasn't given back to her by either country. In such a case most people are reduced in size. Yet, Akuvi decided to sing. As a student of life, she had acquired more lessons in her early years than most artists do in years. What she still didn't comprehend was the role she would play in the narrative of African music. That answer came accidentally in Johannesburg. 

It was in a jam session that something hit home for Akuvi. There she discovered that the introspective neo-soul synths by Jhené Aiko and the Afrobeats rhythms by Davido, which she loved while growing up, weren’t enemies. She merged both sounds together and built her artistic image around it. The trajectory that followed is one that is not off the mark. Akuvi was one of the young women invited to the Forbes Under 30 Summit and Forbes Leading Women Summit, where music intersects culture, influence and currency. She was the headliner at Oslo World Festival, an event which was proof enough that her growing fan base already knew her show would be something different, her music, something to be felt in the human body. She was a tour opener for Shenseea, and featured with Stonebwoy. Billboard Africa and GQ Africa were impressed and so was Disney and Netflix. 

Her new EP, Afrobeats for Emotional Gangsters, however, is no celebration of success. It's a rawer, more self-aware account of her experience with heartbreak and the singular pain of watching a cherished thing slowly decay. 

Deeds caught up with Akuvi, to discuss Afrobeats for Emotional Gangsters, identity, navigating the industry and what’s keeping her inspired.

‍For readers discovering you for the first time, who is Akuvi beyond the headlines, streaming numbers and performances? What are the experiences and values that have shaped the artist you’ve become today?

I am a hyper sensitive, deep thinking romantic who loves melancholic Afrobeats and who happens to use music as my outlet for coping with a constant state of overstimulation. I am an explosive entertainer and a philosophical writer who loves to inspire people to embrace their emotions. My love for Afrobeats and alternative R&B were the building blocks of my hybrid genre as the two are a natural choice. I make what I like. My listeners are sexy over thinkers with complex and beautiful backgrounds in Africa and the diaspora. I’m shaped by my family, who are all musicians, as well as my never ending identity crisis with roots in both Norway and Ghana. All my music represents parts of me and my journey. Therefore, you’ll find recurring themes like belonging, purpose, heartbreak and anxiety in my art.

I am an explosive entertainer and a philosophical writer who loves to inspire people to embrace their emotions.

You grew up between Ghana and Norway. How has navigating those worlds influenced the way you see yourself and the stories you choose to tell through music? 

Music has always been the only place that truly feels like home. It has always functioned as an embassy for me, whether I’m in Norway, Ghana or South Africa. Music is where I find belonging, inspiration, and an outlet for my inner world. I grew up extremely insecure about the fact that I didn’t really fit in anywhere, as well as my voice being in the deeper register. I know now that it is all my weirdness that makes me interesting and real. Not fitting in is simply an invitation to lead. It also helps that I relocated to the continent (I stayed in South Africa for 5 years and later moved to Ghana). As I am doing afro centric music, it makes a lot of sense to pursue my dreams in Ghana, the roots!

Afrobeats for Emotional Gangsters is a title that immediately grabs attention. What conversations were you hoping to start with this project, and why did now feel like the right time to have them?

I’ve always wanted to nail the type of Afrobeats for lovers who also love R&B, Jazz and Soul. Sometimes I feel misunderstood when I simply say that I make Afrobeats, as the genre is often associated with jolly, fun, feel-good vibes. I’ve realized that my listeners are similar to me, and I want them to feel seen and proud of being sensitive and emotional gangsters. Many people listen to sad music alone, and fun and fierce music in public. With my music you get to shed a tear and whine your waist at the same time. The gangster inserts some sort of pride in being a cryer haha. Furthermore, I feel the title captures the contrast that inherently lives in my recorded music but also my live performances. There is vulnerability but equal amounts of sass and aggression. I want people to embrace what it is to be human, just like how we allow children to switch from crying to smiling within seconds. Feeling is healing. Thirdly, being emotional and admitting it IS gangsta! 

I’ve realized that my listeners are similar to me, and I want them to feel seen and proud of being sensitive and emotional gangsters.

The EP explores emotional complexity in a way that feels very intentional. What was happening in your life creatively, personally or emotionally that inspired this body of work?

The EP contains songs I’ve written over the course of the last two years, and reflects some deep pain I had to work through as I went through the biggest heartbreak of my life. Heartbreak and grief have many layers and I think the body of work reflects the different stages I’ve gone through. It goes from realizing that the end is near on “No Words”, to grieving the friendship that ultimately is the foundation of a relationship on “Strangers”, to healing and trying again on “Poison” and “Let Me Know”. The project mirrors the process I went through emotionally. 

Nobody talks about how the ghost of past betrayal affects and distorts the hope one goes into a potential new relationship with. How crushing on someone can trigger anxiety rather than hope, or how being in an on-and off again situationship can be addictive. The EP became the only place I felt that I could truly be honest. 

When you began creating Afrobeats for Emotional Gangsters, what was the vision you were trying to bring to life?

I’ve had a lot of breakthroughs in my career over the past year, and my main intention was to introduce myself to my new listeners who recently discovered me through my performances opening for Stonebwoy and Shenseea as well as my viral videos. I wanted a complete body of work that captures my sound. I wanted to capture the emotional and melancholic type of afrobeats as my signature sound, in a way that feels updated and refined. 

The project effortlessly presents a refreshing take on Afrobeats. How do you approach genre in your music, and do you see yourself as part of a new generation of African artists who are redefining what Afrobeats can sound like?

When I started making music more than 10 years ago, I didn’t have any role models who did this particular sound. I had love for afrobeats and neo soul as two separate things. Jhene Aiko, the Internet and Frank Ocean would please my R&B ear, while Burna Boy, Davido etc would be my go-to afrobeats artists. It was through jam sessions in South Africa that I realized that I could mix the two, and so myself and my band did exactly that. It came out so unique and it felt satisfying, delivering vibes AND vulnerability. When artists like Tems, Omah Lay, and Gyakie came up, I felt so happy. It felt like I’d found my people and that I was a part of a very specific wave. I definitely think this niche has come to stay. 

Your lead single, “Woah” featuring Mellissa has become a standout moment on the project. Walk us through how the song came together. 

When Soulbase and I started working on the track, I immediately had an instinct to involve Mellissa. She does her afro-sexy sound, and seeing how smooth, cinematic and sensual the song was becoming, I was convinced it would be a perfect match. We sent it through and she absolutely killed her verse. Immediately, we started envisioning the visuals, and as predicted, it came out steaming hot, hehe. Shout out to Kwame Kodah, my favorite Ghanaian director of all time. 

As a woman navigating the Ghanaian and broader African music industry, what realities do you think are still under-discussed when it comes to building a sustainable career?

I think what for instance Moliy is doing, and what Mellissa and I did with this track, is the beginning of a shift. For a long time it used to be the case that female artists, since we are few, would be compared and baited to compete with one another. I think this generation of female artists in Ghana are actively changing that by rooting for one another and collaborating. Look at Moliy, Shenseea, Moliy and Tyla, Mellissa and myself. We are demonstrating that working together is more powerful than trying to be the only one. I love to see it! 

Do you feel there are expectations placed on female artists that their male counterparts are less likely to face? How have you learned to navigate those pressures while remaining authentic to yourself?

Both are expected to be really good at what they do, but for women, we also have to look extremely good while doing it. Glam, fashion and aesthetics happen to be things I am also passionate about, so for me personally I’m not mad at it. But generally speaking, if you see what kind of packaging women are expected to have for their talent (performances, costumes, beauty standards, bodies) you clearly see a difference. At the same time, I find it useful to view the visual aspect of the art and also the business as an asset. I have fun with the process and enjoy putting together shows, visuals, outfits that make me feel good and that becomes the visual representation of the sounds and my vision. I love putting it all together, especially when working with the right people. 

African music is experiencing unprecedented global growth. As someone operating within that movement, where do you think the industry still needs to evolve, particularly when it comes to creating opportunities for women?

In my opinion, Ghana needs to be placed on the map to a way bigger extent than now. A lot of what Nigeria is credited for now, partially stems from Ghana. Don’t get me wrong, shout out to Nigeria and South Africa for being so assertive with their global ambitions! But what I would like to see is more of the countries represented. We have some global potential that I feel needs a more aggressive export approach. I personally am trying to make that happen by doing collabs, performing internationally and also organizing my own events, bringing together Africa and the diaspora. I’m hoping that my festival, the Dream Big Afro festival, will be a contribution to the export of especially Ghanaian music.

You recently launched the Dream Big Festival, an initiative that extends beyond music itself. What inspired the festival, and what impact do you hope it will have on young creatives and communities moving forward?

I grew up in Norway, a country that for a long time was very white and homogeneous. I’ve personally felt how lack of representation and inclusion does to one’s self image, confidence and identity. So for a long time I’ve been wanting to change the scene in Norway. It started with a headline show that I was hosting when it hit me that I can use this evening and stage to lift up other afrobeats artists in Norway as well. Based on the reception and the engagement coming from all the artists involved, the attendees and also industry people in both Norway and in Africa, I have decided to take this to the next level. Next year, the Dream Big festival will have both local and international acts, bridging the gap between Africa and the diaspora. 

What excites you most about the next chapter of your artistic journey, both musically and personally?

I want to go deeper. We are already working on the next project, which will be Afrobeats for Emotional Gangsters Part 2. On this project, we delve deeper into the dark side of being an emotional baddie. Expect more fire and aggression, alongside the dreamy, cinematic afro soundscape we’ve created in Part 1. In Part 2, we are facing the dragon.

After the release of Afrobeats for Emotional Gangsters and the launch of Dream Big Festival, what can fans expect from Akuvi next, and what dreams are you currently chasing that people may not know about yet?

I’m excited to keep performing the new songs live. My headline show was only the beginning of a series of performances where we got to give the EP a physical manifestation. Bonding with fans through live performances is always very special, and it feels so good to bring choreography into the mix, it’s like I get to express the song all over again but in a physical way. I would never expose all my dreams, as I believe in doing rather than talking, but I will say this: I will keep doing things that scare me. So should you.

Photo Credit: Lydia tefara

The opening track on Therapy Wasn’t Enough sets the tone for the 11-track album by R&B singer Inayah, chronicling the challenges and realities of her relationship with her fiancé. Throughout, Inayah presents her rawest, most vulnerable self, delivering honest, relatable lyrics, melodies, and production that capture a wide range of emotions.

​Therapy Wasn’t Enough is more than just a collection of songs; it's genuine introspection and reflection that also unveil a renewed side of Inayah. Having sung since her youth, her breakout came from a viral cover of Ella Mai’s Boo’d Up, introducing her voice to the masses. Since that moment, her Gospel- and Blues-influenced voice has brought something fresh to R&B.

​As a follow-up to 2024’s Wait, There's More, Inayah’s new album clearly shows her artistic and vocal growth. This phase marks a personal transformation, now reflected in her music. In our discussion about her album release, we delve into healing, chasing dreams, singing in church, the album's making, and more.

Hi Inayah, great to meet you. First of all, congratulations on the release of your new album. Starting from the beginning, where did the idea of you wanting to make this particular album begin for you?

So this album is, collectively, almost six years in the making, because it's the story of me and my now-fiancé. It's me sharing the journey of how he and I have learned to do life together, and all the things that entail. Learning how to choose to do life together has been a journey: the ups, the downs, the good, the bad, the ugly, all of that is in this album.

Therapy is a big part of this album, and so even in your experience of going to therapy, and then also sharing and opening up in the way that you have in your music, like, how did you find the experience?

It was challenging. I can't lie about that. My fans know me for real, raw storytelling about real-life events, but I've never been this vulnerable before. I’m proud of my growth on this album. I love all my projects, but Therapy Wasn’t Enough is the first time I can say I’m a grown woman on a record. People often think that being with your soulmate means all is perfect, but love, though beautiful, has its challenges. We chose therapy instead of giving up, but therapy alone wasn’t enough. We had to apply what we learned—therapy is just a tool, one you must use beyond the session. That’s what this is about, and I’m still learning. I don’t have it all figured out.

The song "Choose" was the first single you released for the project. Why did you want that song to kind of represent the album as the first song people heard?

When you look for a good book, you often read the summary on the back to understand what it’s about. Similarly, I felt “Choose” was the summary of this album. It introduces the main themes and emotions of the album, showing the journey and the different stages of love. The song includes moments of grief, anger, ultimatums, love, and a mix of experiences reflected throughout the album.

The song speaks about being put in a situation where you have to choose between your love and relationship and your music. And so even in having that experience and going through that, in chasing and following your dreams but also dealing with the realities of your life and everything else you go for. How have you felt about managing the chase for your dream while balancing everything else?

I have to be honest, I still haven't figured it all out. Maintaining balance is a challenge, and I'm learning as I go. I started as a little girl with a dream and a love for music, and as I grew up, I put in the work to make things happen for myself, with the help of God opening doors for me. I try to disconnect from work when I'm home with my kids and fiancé, and when I leave home, I fully step into my role as an artist. These are truly two different worlds. At home, I'm a mom—cooking, dropping off and picking up the kids, playing basketball with them. I aim to be present in every area where I'm needed. It's a wonderful responsibility, and I do my best to show up for all of them.

How did you find the overall process of making the album?

I had already healed from the story of the album; I wasn't in that space anymore, emotionally, mentally, and in my love life, in my relationship. I thank God we were able to grow past that, but whenever something impacts my life, I write it down and make a song out of it. I had to tell my fiancé, “You know, I'm gonna write about this; I'm gonna write about this challenge that we faced” because it was impactful.  I know that if I felt it to the magnitude I felt it, somebody else has got to fill me in on this. Somebody else has, I know, somebody else has dealt with this in their love life, or faced some type of challenge in love. So, although the experience sucked, I knew that there was an assignment in it. When I got back into the studio, I had to re-channel and remember the heartache. I had to mentally take myself back to how I felt in those moments, in order to execute the emotion that you hear on therapy wasn't enough, you know, I was crying all over again. I even got mad all over again, like I just rechanneled all of those emotions in order to, in order to nail it, you know, because it's hard for me to do something that I don't feel.

I was able to get with phenomenal producers that I've always dreamed of working with: Underdogs, Camper, and Ghost. There are so many; it's a dream to get into the studio with producers like that. When I wrapped the album, I went home, lay in bed with my fiancé, and I said, "Hey, you know, we're going to take this, listen to the album from start to finish. I want you to hear it first, you know” and after he listened to it he was sad to realise this is where this is where that moment took you, you know. And, but also at the same time grateful for the growth in the fact that we made it out of that, because a lot of couples don't.

As the album has just come out, and now it is out in the world. How do you feel towards the album now, considering the subject matter is so close to home?

It's a beautiful story. I don't listen to it with shock, like, "wow, we went through that." I listen to it more so with an ear of appreciation rather than, like, damn, we did that. I feel like life is an assignment in itself. When we go through these experiences, for someone in my profession, it's part of our assignment to share them and how we got over them. I'm helping so many people, so I listen to it with the appreciation of, like, man, I hope this heals and helps people who are having the same type of difficulty or dilemma in their love life or in their life in general. I hope this is a guide for them. I hope it gives them whatever answers they're seeking, and I hope they try therapy, you know. I hope that therapy can help save whatever they're going through, but they have to realise that if therapy alone isn't enough, and they still have to put the work

Outside of the storytelling in terms of the lyrics and the subject matters, the production on the album is also very rich, so even in terms of creating the sonic tone and having it match with what you were trying to say, how did you approach that?

I went into the studio knowing exactly what I wanted to feel; I think having great communication with the producer is half the battle. I told each producer how I was feeling and what I wanted the song to feel like. I want the instrument to feel the same way as the emotion that I felt. If I was sad in that moment, I need some kind of slow violin. If I'm angry, I need some 808; I need some bass. If I'm, if I'm trying to be soft and sultry, give me a sweet piano. So I would communicate with the producers to give me an instrument that matched the emotion, and I think they did that really well. The two of us, putting our heads together like that, I think we, we nailed.

What did you want people to  get out of this album?

I want them to take away that two things can be true: you can be a lover and a leaver, because, because, honey, I'm both okay. Also, I want them to know that, as cliche as it sounds, anything worth having is worth fighting for. So, you know, give therapy a try if it can save years of history. There's a line in “WTF” which goes 'Is this really what we want? Is this house not a home? I don’t, but you keep blowing up my phone? So it's like if I don't have the idea of.. can this be saved? Can we even make it past this? Some people are opposed to therapy, especially in the black community. Growing up, therapy was one of the best decisions I've ever made for myself and my relationship, but it only works. If you're honest, and it only works if you're going to do the work. You don't just get a reward without the work, and you also just learn how to be a better communicator. The one thing that I've learned from this album, even though I'm the one telling the story, is that there was more benefit in being a listener rather than a talker, you know, because that type of shit don't work when you're trying to do life with somebody.

Going back to your musical beginnings. What would you say was the thing that first initially drew you to music?

‍So my mama tells this, this story of when I was a baby, I was two years old, and there was the 20th Century Fox theme song that you hear at the beginning of movies, and she said that every time it would come on I could be in the playroom, but then I'll come tee tottering into the other room, running just to catch that intro. So she said she caught it very early on that it was something that really spoke to me, and it was something about that specific melody. She was also a songstress. She used to sing as well. She had musical dreams, so I have to thank her for that guidance and nurturing my gift. She and my Aunt Rosalynn were the two who really took care of my gift. I learned riffs and runs from my Aunt Rosalynn, who was the music director at our church, and they put me in the choir, and I started there. Church is my core; that's where it all started, at Church of God in Christ, and I would travel with the choir, and do you know a bunch of congregation guest appearances, and I ended up taking music into me well into my adult life. I ended up working with a jingle company, which I still work for. I never quit my job; a lot of people are surprised when I say that. And I would play around with that's where I learned how to rap. My brother Terry Allen taught me how to rap, and I remember going home one evening and playing around with Ella Mai's “Bood Up”, and I freestyled to it, and I was like, post this and see, just see, you know, I posted that video. I had about 4,000 followers when I posted that video. I woke up the next morning to over 200,000 followers, quite literally viral overnight. So a lot of people made the mistake of thinking, oh, she just came out of nowhere and went viral, you know, but I have been singing my entire life literally, and then I went on to sign with Empire in early 2020, and I'm still with them today.

Even in your experience of singing in the church and being a part of the choir and then going out and branching out and singing on your own. How did you find that experience in terms of that transition?

It was, but you know, my mama was such a protector of me. She didn't even allow us to listen to secular music until I was an older teen. She really kept a lot of that from us until we got old enough to understand it. And then once I was able to, you know, kind of come into my own, I just one wanted to know what that other side of music was like because I would listen to my mom's blues albums, my mama had Johnny Taylor, Johnny Taylor and Barry White were two blues albums that my mama had, and I was sneaking, playing when she was gone, and that's how I came to fall in love with blues, and then eventually over into R&B, Johnny Taylor is still my favorite male singer until this day. I learned a lot of the structure of storytelling from artists like Johnny Taylor and Barry White, because, you know, blues is stories, And when I was able to, grow into my adult life, and was able to explore different types of music, the R&B side, and then get over into the jingle company, I said I think this is something I would like to do this for a living. I've never seen myself doing anything other than music. God showed me very early on that I would have a career in music. Coming up through gospel, I say, into where I am now, some people would understand the soul in my voice, that background, and I, I got to give it all to church and blues; that's really the core, that's truly the core.

So overall, to wrap up everything. Just in terms of where you are in this space, creatively, musically, etc. What does this moment feel like for you?

I'm in a space where I want to do everything that scares me. I want to conquer it all, you know. I don't want to leave this life with no fears. I want to be able to say I've done all the things, and I've gotten so much inspiration of bravery from this album. Again, because it was a scary thing to speak from such a vulnerable space. So now I want to do other things on my checklist of things that scare me, like skydive. I want to, I want to get in a hot air balloon- things that terrify me. I want to go on a camping trip and actually stay overnight in the mountains. You know, I'm so scared of bugs. I'm super inspired to be brave now because of this album.

The most exciting movements in music rarely begin at the top. They emerge quietly  in bedrooms, home studios, underground venues, and across digital communities:before eventually shaping the wider cultural landscape. Across the UK, a new generation of artists is doing exactly that, building worlds of their own through fearless experimentation, deeply personal storytelling, and a refusal to be confined by genre.

Today's emerging artists are creating in an era where boundaries feel increasingly irrelevant. R&B blends with drill, gospel intersects with rap, alternative pop sits comfortably alongside soul, and vulnerability has become just as powerful as bravado. Rather than following established formulas, these artists are defining their own, creating music that feels reflective of modern Britain in all its complexity, diversity, and creativity.

What connects this new wave is not a singular sound but a shared commitment to authenticity. Whether exploring love, identity, faith, heartbreak, ambition, or self-discovery, these artists are using music as a vehicle for honest expression, inviting listeners into experiences that feel both deeply personal and universally relatable. Many have built loyal communities through consistency and genuine connection, proving that cultural impact is no longer determined solely by commercial success.

From viral breakthroughs and critically acclaimed projects to underground favourites steadily building momentum, the artists featured in this list represent some of the most compelling voices currently emerging from the UK. Each is carving out their own lane, contributing to a broader creative shift that is redefining what British music can look and sound like.

These are the artists on our 2026 radar and if their current trajectory is anything to go by, they won't stay under it for long.

TR GOBRAZY 

TR GOBRAZY is a South-East London rapper known for his gritty delivery, raw energy, and street-driven storytelling within the UK drill scene, and is one of the newer names coming out of the UK underground rap scene. Emerging from the underground, he built attention through his authentic voice and direct approach to music, often reflecting real-life experiences with intensity and confidence. He first started getting attention as a producer, with credits connected to tracks like Central Cee and Dave’s “Sprinter,” along with several drill records, before stepping out properly as a rapper himself. 

He continues to build a reputation for consistency, bringing a raw and unfiltered energy. Tracks like “Handbag,” “Bagged,” “Homeless,” and “Finesse My Bro” helped him build momentum. “Handbag,” especially, became one of the songs people kept on rotation within UK rap circles. 

His latest single, “Forreduci,” continues that signature approach, pairing a stripped-back, hard-hitting instrumental with a direct, high-energy performance. The track stays grounded in themes of pressure, survival, and ambition, delivered with his usual urgency and street perspective. 

The music video elevates the release through a striking visual concept in collaboration with Lauzza, blending bold animated sequences with a 3D-printed set design. The whole aesthetic leans into a cold, glitchy, dystopian London style. This mix of physical craftsmanship and digital animation creates a unique, almost experimental aesthetic, amplifying the raw tone of the record while giving it a cinematic edge. 

Overall, “Forreduci” reinforces TR GOBRAZY’s position within the UK underground scene, showcasing both consistency in his sound and a growing creative ambition in how he presents his music. Visually, he is one of the dopest new artists emerging right now, with incredible storytelling visuals. 

NATANYA 

NATANYA is a British singer, songwriter, and producer from North London whose sound blends alternative R&B, soul, and experimental pop influences into a style that feels both nostalgic and forward-thinking. She first emerged in 2019 with her debut single, “Sunset Melody,” released while still in school, followed shortly after by “Blue Jay” in 2021. She later returned with “Like U,” continuing to develop her distinctive sonic identity. 

Her fusion track, “Foolish,” surpassed one million streams, marking a major breakthrough moment and leading to a support slot for R&B group FLO. Since then, NATANYA has continued building a reputation for her genre-blending sound, emotionally rich songwriting, and creative unpredictability. NATANYA’s most recent project, “Felines Return,” marks one of her most defining artistic statements to date, expanding her world further into a space where alternative R&B, experimental pop, and soul-infused production collide.

Her latest single, “Don’t Ask!,” represents a bold step forward in her artistry. The track leans into a more theatrical and confident sound. It explores themes of ambition, independence, and refusing to seek permission or validation, presenting a more direct and assertive version of NATANYA. 

Overall, NATANYA continues to stand out as one of the most distinctive emerging voices in the UK alternative R&B space, consistently pushing her sound forward while building anticipation for what she does next. She balances experimentation with emotional clarity, shifting between stripped-back vulnerability and bold, genre-blending production that draws from alt-pop, soul, and experimental R&B. 

 FINESSEKID 

FINESSEKID is a South London-born rapper and emerging voice in the UK underground scene, active since 2024. His music blends elements of drill, trap, and club-influenced percussion, defined by swagger-heavy wordplay and an energetic, confident delivery. He first gained attention through viral freestyles, quickly becoming one of the most closely watched newcomers in British rap.

He represents a newer wave of UK underground artists building momentum through gritty, internet-driven releases and a raw, minimalist sound. His style focuses on tight flows over hard-hitting, bass-heavy production.

He has continued to build momentum through both solo releases and high-profile collaborations. Among his most notable link-ups are associations with Skepta and Lancey Foux, placing him within a wider network of influential and forward-thinking UK artists. His breakout moment came with the 2025 single “Sirens (From Ireland)”, a track that significantly amplified his visibility across streaming platforms and social media.

His new track “Boyega” builds on that momentum. “Boyega” stays rooted in his core themes: ambition, confidence and progression, and is focused on its delivery and intent. Overall, “Boyega” reinforces why Finessekid is being closely watched in the UK underground, steadily developing a recognisable sound and presence with each drop.

Overall, “Boyega” reinforces why FINESSEKID is being closely watched within the UK underground scene: he is not just releasing consistent music, but steadily developing a recognisable sound and presence with every drop.

LXO

LXO is a North London contemporary R&B singer-songwriter and producer whose sound blends nostalgic influences with a modern, self-defined edge. Her smooth melodies, cadences and narrative-driven storytelling, alongside fusing genres like sexy drill and other alternative influences, position her to carve out her own space within the evolving UK R&B scene.

Her single “I’m Sorry”, her second release, resonated strongly because listeners connected with the feeling of reclaiming themselves after being undervalued in a toxic relationship or situation, turning the song into an emotional release and an anthem of reassurance. Instead of centering heartbreak, the song flips the narrative into one of confidence, self-worth, and emotional power, which pushed the track viral across TikTok and social media and marked a turning point in her early career.

She’s continued to build momentum with singles “Hold Up” and “Lockscreen”. Her latest single, “Lockscreen”, sits in the space between desire and discipline; a record about yearning for the right partner while never losing sight of self-worth. It frames love as intentional—open to connection, but always on her own terms.

Her visuals for “Lockscreen” deepen that duality: 90s R&B girly nostalgia reflecting vulnerability and romantic imagination, while also being authoritative, where LXO appears in office wear reviewing CVs of potential partners, with the CV motif symbolising standards, discernment and emotional leadership. Her music explores love, heartbreak, relationships and emotional growth while giving listeners a sense of confidence, reassurance and comfort, where visuals are not decoration but an extension.

Her music explores themes of love, heartbreak, relationships, and emotional growth, while giving listeners a sense of confidence, reassurance, and comfort through both her sound and storytelling. For LXO, visuals are not decoration but an extension. She continues to shape a distinct sonic and visual identity, expanding a cohesive world where emotion, empowerment, and individuality all coexist.

BXKS

BXKS is a UK rapper from Luton known for her sharp delivery, laid-back confidence, and distinctive melodic flow that blends drill, rap, and R&B influences. Her music balances hard-hitting rap energy with smoother, more melodic moments, giving her a sound that stands out within the new wave of UK artists. BXKS has become recognised for her effortless cadence and ability to move between gritty lyricism and catchy, understated hooks without losing her identity.

Her latest project, “Fear of Eclipses” (EP), showcases that artistic growth in full. Across the project, she leans further into atmospheric and melodic production while maintaining the cool, controlled delivery that has become central to her sound. The EP explores self-awareness, pressure, independence, and navigating success on her own terms, with BXKS relying on tone, cadence, and subtle lyricism to carry emotion.

BXKS allows mood, flow and atmosphere to carry the weight of each track, creating a sound that feels effortless but intentional. While still rooted in UK rap and drill influences, “Fear of Eclipses” expands beyond those foundations, incorporating more melodic textures and experimental moments that help separate her from her peers.

Overall, “Fear of Eclipses” reinforces BXKS as one of the most distinctive and forward-thinking voices in UK rap, continuing to evolve her sound while staying true to the style that made her stand out. With each release, she continues to prove her versatility and artistic range, leaving growing anticipation for what is still to come.

RICO ACE

Rico Ace is an emerging UK artist shaping a sound that sits between melodic rap, R&B emotion, and trap-led production. His music is defined by contrast: smooth, almost vulnerable melodic moments layered over darker, more aggressive rap sections. That balance gives his catalogue a fluid identity, where mood often leads the direction as much as lyrics or structure, balancing emotion and momentum in equal measure.

Across his early run, Rico Ace has built strong momentum through consistent output and key collaborations with EsDeeKid. Their joint releases — including “Bally,” “Phantom,” “LV Sandals,” “Dope Boyz,” and “Treason” — became defining entries in his rise, circulating heavily within the UK underground. These tracks highlight his adaptability, as he switches between melodic hooks and sharp, rhythmic flows while still maintaining a recognisable and consistent sonic identity.

What separates Rico Ace from many emerging artists is the emotional duality within his music. On one hand, there is a cold, confident street presence driven by punchy delivery and hard-hitting beats; on the other, there is a more melodic, introspective side that leans into emotional honesty and personal experience. This gives his music a lived-in quality, where even high-energy tracks feel personal, while more reflective songs still hold a certain edge and tension.

That duality is expanded further on his 10-track project, “Black Jack,” which serves as a more complete statement of his artistic direction. The project explores different pockets of his sound — from atmospheric, late-night cuts to more structured, hook-driven tracks built for replay value — while showcasing a wider emotional range. Blending moody, atmospheric production with catchy melodic structures and more experimental rap flows, the project also demonstrates a clearer sense of artistic identity, with cohesive production choices that lean into both mood and momentum.

With “Black Jack,” Rico Ace continues to position himself as a rising voice within the UK scene, steadily building a catalogue that feels intentional. His growth is rooted in consistency, collaboration, and an evolving sonic identity that bridges underground rap energy with melodic accessibility. His ability to balance emotion, atmosphere, and hard-hitting rap elements positions him as an artist with strong growth potential, continuing to refine a style that feels both current and distinct within the evolving UK rap landscape.

MYSIE

Mysie (pronounced “My-Zee”) is a British singer-songwriter, producer, and pianist from South London with Ugandan heritage, known for her genre-blurring blend of electronic, soul, alt-pop, indie electronica, and alternative R&B. Her music is rooted in emotional storytelling and immersive production, combining warm vocals with experimental textures to create records that feel intimate, cinematic, and deeply expressive.

From an early age, Mysie was immersed in a wide range of influences spanning electronic, dance, pop, rap, hip hop, and indie music, drawing inspiration from artists such as Flying Lotus and Thundercat. That early exposure to boundary-pushing music helped shape her artistic direction, inspiring her to create music that feels fluid, emotionally rich, and unrestricted by genre.

Mysie’s artistry moves effortlessly between vulnerability and experimentation. Her songwriting often explores themes of identity, emotion, freedom, and self-reflection, delivered through layered melodies, atmospheric arrangements, and unconventional sonic choices that continue to separate her from her peers.

Her latest single, “Don’t Like You Anymore,” leans further into electronic textures and emotionally detached lyricism, blending alternative R&B with club-inspired production to create a record that feels both confrontational and emotionally vulnerable. The track explores emotional distance and disconnection through immersive production and expressive vocal delivery, reinforcing the introspective and genre-defying qualities that define her sound.

As both a musician and visual creative, Mysie places strong emphasis on world-building through styling, imagery, and sonic cohesion. Her artistry feels intentional yet emotionally raw, positioning her as one of the most forward-thinking and distinctive artists emerging from the UK alternative music scene.

SKAIWATER

Skaiwater is a Nottingham-born rapper, producer and creative artist known for pushing the boundaries of alternative rap through a blend of rage, hyperpop, emo rap, trap and electronic influences. Skaiwater has built a cult-like following through genre-defying music, emotionally unpredictable songwriting and an unapologetically experimental aesthetic.

Their sound moves fluidly between distorted production, vulnerable melodies, high-energy rap performances and glitch-heavy electronic textures, often rejecting traditional song structures altogether. Drawing influence from internet culture, underground rap communities, gaming aesthetics and alternative fashion, Skaiwater’s music feels intentionally unfiltered, capturing the emotional intensity of a digitally raised generation.

Skaiwater continues to expand that sound further with the recent single “Guess What”, a high-energy collaboration with Tezzus that leans heavily into chaotic rage production, distorted bass and hyperactive delivery.

Following projects like #Gigi, #Mia and Wonderful, the release further reinforces Skaiwater’s reputation as one of the most forward-thinking artists emerging from the UK underground. By combining rage, hyperpop, Jersey club, trap and alternative rap into a constantly evolving sound, Skaiwater continues to reshape what modern underground rap can look and feel like.

DC3

DC3 is a fast-rising UK rapper from Northampton known for blending Christian themes with UK rap, jazz, gospel, and alternative hip-hop influences. He has gained attention for intense freestyle-style performances, emotionally charged delivery, and faith-focused lyrics. In 2026, he broke into the mainstream after winning both Best Newcomer and Best Gospel Act at the MOBO Awards, which pushed him into wider UK rap conversations and gospel-influenced music circles.

Songs like “I Know!” and “Upstairs” helped him build a huge online audience, particularly on TikTok and YouTube, where clips of his performances spread quickly due to his unpredictable flow switches, raw emotion, and spiritual intensity. His music often feels less like traditional rap and more like a hybrid of testimony, spoken word, and performance, which has helped him connect deeply with listeners seeking honesty and emotional depth.

His rise also reflects a wider shift happening in UK rap, where artists are increasingly blending genre boundaries and openly exploring themes like religion, mental health, and personal struggle. DC3 sits at the centre of this movement, bringing together gospel-inspired expression with alternative production and contemporary UK rap energy, creating a sound that feels both modern and spiritually grounded.

DC3 stands out within the new generation of UK artists because of the intensity and unpredictability of his delivery. His music moves between melodic preaching tones, rapid-fire flows, and emotionally charged spoken-word passages, creating tracks that often feel more like personal testimonies than traditional rap songs. Rather than relying on conventional structure, DC3 builds emotion through vulnerability, pacing, and raw expression, allowing listeners to connect deeply with the message behind his music. Whether speaking on faith, pressure, purpose, or personal struggle, his honesty and emotional depth have helped him resonate strongly with younger audiences searching for authenticity and reassurance.

As his audience continues to grow, DC3 is increasingly being recognised as one of the most original emerging voices in British music. His rise reflects a wider shift happening within UK rap, where artists are becoming more open about vulnerability, spirituality, and emotional honesty while pushing beyond traditional genre boundaries. Blending gospel-inspired emotion, alternative production, and modern UK rap influences, DC3 has created a sound that feels both deeply personal and culturally impactful. With each release, he continues to challenge expectations of what UK rap can sound like, positioning himself as an artist with a strong creative identity and long-term potential.

DEXTER IN THE NEWSAGENT

Dexter In The Newsagent is a South London artist known for her introspective songwriting, lo-fi production, and emotionally honest approach to alternative music. She first gained attention through self-recorded songs made on her iPhone, building a cult following through soft, conversational vocals and deeply personal storytelling that blends indie, R&B, UK garage, and bedroom pop influences into a sound that feels nostalgic. Over time, she has continued to evolve creatively while maintaining the DIY vulnerability that made her stand out.

Alongside her solo work, Dexter has collaborated with artists including Niko B on “Trespass Coat” and Jim Legxacy on “Dexter's Phone Call,” further cementing her place within the UK alternative underground scene. These collaborations have highlighted her versatility and ability to naturally fit within the wider world of experimental UK music while still maintaining softness and emotional intimacy.

Her latest mixtape, “Time Flies,” feels warmly nostalgic, capturing the same emotional comfort as flipping through an old photo album. Across the 12-track project, Dexter reflects on memories, growing up, love, family, identity, and loneliness with a softness that feels both personal and universally familiar. Tracks like “Special” and “Eighteen” blend hushed dance production with early-2000s-inspired textures, creating music that feels timeless and comforting. The project carries a dreamy atmosphere throughout, balancing melancholy and warmth in a way that mirrors the blurred feeling of looking back on formative moments and relationships.

Dexter creates intimacy through understatement, allowing small details, quiet melodies, and conversational lyrics to carry emotional weight. Her songwriting often feels observational and diary-like, capturing moments that might seem ordinary on the surface but become deeply affecting through her honesty and perspective. That same feeling carries into her latest release, “Special (A COLORS SHOW),” where her emotionally raw songwriting is stripped back even further. The performance places her soft vocal delivery and reflective lyrics at the centre, allowing themes of love, validation, vulnerability, and self-worth to resonate more deeply. The minimal presentation highlights the emotional clarity of her writing and reinforces her ability to create impact.

Dexter In The Newsagent continues to carve out a unique and deeply personal space within the UK alternative scene through honesty, intimacy, and storytelling. Her ability to transform everyday emotions, memories, and insecurities into music that feels universally comforting has made her one of the most emotionally resonant emerging artists in the UK right now. As her artistic world continues to grow, she represents a new generation of artists proving that vulnerability, softness, and authenticity can be just as powerful as volume or spectacle, leaving growing anticipation around where her sound and storytelling will evolve.

CARI

Cari is one of the most compelling new voices in alternative R&B. Best described as a quiet storm, the Black-British singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, shaped by her Caribbean roots and raised in London, creates music that moves fluidly between alternative R&B, indie soul and experimental textures while remaining emotionally grounded and instinctive. Guitar sits at the centre of her artistry, acting as both a sonic and emotional anchor throughout her music, threading vulnerability and intimacy into each record she creates.

Her artistry is rooted in patience, growth and emotional honesty. Cari released her debut single “Colder in June” in 2023. The release marked a defining turning point in her career, opening the door to new creative opportunities while establishing the emotional depth and atmospheric storytelling that would quickly become synonymous with her sound.

She followed the release with tracks such as the indie-leaning “Over & Over” and the melancholic “Bleeding”, both of which further showcased her ability to translate vulnerability into immersive sonic experiences. Cari’s music thrives in its honesty and restraint, allowing space for emotion, texture and subtlety to take centre stage.

That growing momentum has already led to a number of standout opportunities early in her career. Cari performed as part of a special NPR Radio collaboration with Marni, opened for Sasha Keable in Paris, and contributed the dreamy interlude “Cari’s Honeymoon” to Destin Conrad’s debut album “Love on Digital”.

Cari recently returned with “Laugh Later Cry Now”, a deeply reflective single featuring AMBRE that further showcases her ability to turn vulnerability into atmosphere. Blending alternative R&B, indie soul and stripped-back instrumentation, the track explores the emotional tension between avoidance and honesty.

The collaboration between Cari and AMBRE feels naturally intimate, with both artists bringing softness, emotional depth and vulnerability to the record. Their voices move seamlessly across the production, creating a conversational dynamic that strengthens the song’s themes of emotional conflict, heartbreak and internal reflection. Driven by subtle guitar work, warm melodies and emotionally detailed songwriting, “Laugh Later Cry Now” leans into the restraint and honesty that continue to define Cari’s artistry. Cari continues expanding the deeply personal and atmospheric world she has been building across her catalogue.

TEEBO FG

Teebo FG is a British rapper and producer emerging from the UK underground scene, known for his delivery, dark experimental production and raw approach to contemporary British rap. His music blends street-rooted lyricism with industrial, bass-heavy beats, creating a sound that feels intense, immersive and unapologetically underground.

Teebo FG first drew major attention with “Shop Floor (B22’s)” in 2024, an underground anthem that quickly circulated across the UK scene before later receiving a remix featuring fellow artists Len, Hako, and Coults. The track established Teebo as a distinctive new voice, showcasing the cold delivery, dark production choices and gritty energy that would become central to his sound.

Since then, he has continued building momentum through consistent releases and a sonic identity shaped by mood-driven production and sharp vocal performance. While much of his music leans into darker textures and high-intensity delivery, there is also an atmospheric quality to his work that allows his cadence and storytelling to remain at the forefront. His 2025 mixtape RIDDLR further cemented his position within the UK underground landscape.

His latest release, “COD 45”, expands on that identity through a cold, bass-heavy instrumental and tightly controlled delivery. The track captures Teebo G at his most focused, balancing aggression with precision while exploring themes of ambition, survival and street mentality. Driven by distorted textures, heavy percussion and an intense atmosphere, “COD 45” reinforces the stripped-back rawness that continues to define his music.

What makes Teebo FG stand out is his ability to maintain intensity without losing clarity or control. Rather than overcomplicating his approach, he relies on mood, cadence and presence to carry his records — a quality that continues to position him as one of the UK underground’s most distinctive and fast-rising new artists.

SADE OLUTOLA

Sade Olutola is a British-Nigerian singer-songwriter crafting a distinctive space within the UK’s alternative soul and R&B landscape. Her artistry is rooted in emotional storytelling, introspection and atmosphere. Through warm, expressive vocals and poetic lyricism, Sade creates music that feels deeply personal while still carrying a cinematic, nostalgic and immersive quality.

Earlier this month, Sade Olutola told Deeds Magazine that her work is driven entirely by self-direction, with both her music and visuals coming directly from her own ideas and perspective. She described herself as the core “source” of everything she creates, ensuring her artistry stays authentic and aligned with who she is rather than outside influence. She also pointed to three key pillars—nostalgia, community and authenticity—that shape her creative world. These values keep her work cohesive while allowing her to evolve naturally, with every project grounded in honesty and personal expression.

She further introduced her artistic world through her 5-track debut EP Arrow Heart, a concise but emotionally layered body of work that showcases the full range of her artistry. Blending alternative R&B, indie pop, electronic textures and soulful songwriting, the project creates a dreamlike listening experience built around intimacy, vulnerability and emotional reflection.

She went on to share that her EP Arrow Heart is being developed as a visual album, with plans to create a music video for each track. She described the project as an extension of her artistic vision rather than a separate idea. Inspired by Beyoncé’s self-titled visual album, she explained how its full visual rollout influenced her approach and reinforced her desire to treat music and visuals as one cohesive body of work.

Across Arrow Heart, tracks such as “Grey Matter”, “Ready 4 It” and “Game for Two” continue exploring themes of connection, uncertainty, longing and emotional push-and-pull. Rather than relying on overly polished mainstream structures, the project leans into mood, texture and feeling, allowing each song to unfold with patience and emotional weight. There’s a quiet confidence in the way Sade approaches songwriting, trusting subtlety and atmosphere to carry the emotional impact.

What makes Arrow Heart particularly compelling is its strong sense of identity and world-building. The EP feels less like a collection of songs and more like an emotional universe, where visuals, sound and storytelling all work together. Through immersive production, intimate writing and carefully curated aesthetics, Sade Olutola continues to establish herself as one of the UK’s most promising emerging alternative voices.

SAMRECKS

Samrecks is a Nigerian-born, South East London-raised rapper, singer and producer known for his melodic, fashion-forward approach to contemporary UK hip hop. Emerging from London’s music scene, he has quickly become one of the most talked-about new artists in British rap, recognised for his self-directed creativity, genre-blending sound and introspective lyricism.

His music sits between rap, melody-led performance and alternative production, often carrying a reflective tone that explores ambition, identity, loyalty and emotional pressure. Samrecks stands out for his ability to balance vulnerability with confidence, pairing thoughtful writing with an off-kilter, expressive delivery that feels both modern and unpredictable.

His track “Amazing Grace” from the REKKI I mixtape is one of his most introspective releases to date. The song focuses on perseverance, loyalty and self-belief, capturing the emotional weight of chasing his goals while navigating fake relationships, pressure and everyday struggle. Throughout the track, he reflects on survival and ambition, using “Amazing Grace” as a metaphor for hope and deliverance through difficult times.

Built on minimal, atmospheric production, the song allows his cadence and storytelling to take centre stage. He shifts between melodic phrasing and rap delivery, creating a raw but controlled performance that feels personal and reflective.

Overall, “Amazing Grace” reinforces Samrecks as a distinctive voice in the new wave of UK talent, an artist pushing creative boundaries while grounding his music in honest, lived experience.

NIA SMITH

Nia Smith is a British soul and R&B singer-songwriter from Brixton, South London, celebrated for her rich vocals, honest songwriting and emotionally driven sound. Combining elements of classic soul, contemporary R&B, jazz and alternative music, she has quickly emerged as one of the most exciting new voices in the UK scene.

Through intimate storytelling and warm, layered melodies, Nia’s music explores love, vulnerability, healing and self-growth with striking sincerity. Her ability to balance softness with emotional depth has helped her build a sound that feels both timeless and refreshingly modern, drawing listeners in through production and deeply personal lyricism.

Her debut EP Give Up the Fear introduced listeners to her emotionally candid approach to songwriting, earning praise for its soulful production, vulnerability and honesty. The project positioned Nia as a standout artist within the UK’s growing alternative soul and R&B landscape, showcasing not only the strength of her voice but also her ability to create music that feels intimate and universally relatable at the same time.

Since then, Nia has continued to build momentum through a series of reflective and heartfelt releases, further cementing her place as an artist to watch. She recently collaborated with Destin Conrad on the tender single “Tough”, a soulful and emotionally rich record centred around openness, connection and vulnerability.

The track pairs Nia’s warm, soulful delivery with Destin’s airy, melodic vocals, creating a soft but emotionally charged blend that feels reflective and deeply human. The collaboration highlighted her ability to seamlessly blend with other artists while still maintaining the warmth and individuality that defines her sound.

Alongside her recorded music, Nia’s live performances have also become a key part of her growing reputation, with her calming stage presence and expressive vocals allowing audiences to connect deeply with her music in real time.

As her artistry continues to evolve, Nia Smith is carving out a distinct space within contemporary soul and R&B, creating music that resonates through honesty, emotion and quiet strength.

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On his latest seven-track project, the Nigerian-born artist bypasses contemporary romance clichés to craft a deeply spiritual, un-skippable love story.

Mannywellz has delivered a project that feels profoundly honest, structurally intentional, and fiercely strong. Small Chops is a beautifully curated, seven-song love story that elevates modern romance into something deeply spiritual. Grounded firmly in classic R&B and pure soul, Mannywellz subtly colours his arrangements with rich jazz inflections and West African rhythmic textures, creating an elevated sonic palette that is both effortlessly sexy and masterfully sophisticated.

The journey begins with "Do You," an opening track with production so buttery and fluid it feels like silk to the ears, immediately setting a luxurious tone for the rest of the project. From there, the album flows seamlessly into "How It Feels," a brilliant display of musical contrast and an absolute standout. I still remember first hearing a snippet of this track on TikTok and instantly thinking, “this song is absolutely everything”. I knew right then I needed to hear the rest of it, and the full version does not disappoint. What makes the track so captivating is how beautifully Mannywellz’s rich Nigerian heritage naturally shines through his vocals; you can clearly hear the elegant cadence of his native accent, adding an organic warmth and authenticity to the music. He weaves a gorgeous tapestry of jazz, rhythm and blues, and deep soul, creating an undeniable foundation for Wale to step into. Wale’s signature flow wraps around the rhythm beautifully, cementing the fact that this track is a definitive hit. Along with "Holy Father," it is easily one of my two favorite tracks on the entire project.

The emotional and lyrical center piece of the album arrives with "Holy Father." Rather than relying on standard, surface-level tropes of romance, Mannywellz bypasses contemporary clichés to dive straight into the soul. He uses the track to thank God for the very creation of his muse. It is, without question, one of the highest compliments penned in modern music. By praising the Creator for the perfection, complexity, and beauty of the woman he loves, he elevates her far beyond mere physical attraction. This approach strips away insecurity. It declares that she is superb, exceptional, and divinely designed. To thank God for a partner's existence is a profound act of devotion that carries far more weight than a simple "I love you."

The album reaches its climax and conclusion with "Wow," a track that bravely subverts expectations of how men express desire. While media often reserves "movie-like," sweeping cinematic romances for the female gaze, Mannywellz steps into the light to voice his own deepest longings. He openly asks for a love so breathtaking it leaves him speechless, offering a rare, vulnerable glimpse into the male psyche. It serves as a beautiful reminder that men, too, crave that awe-inspiring, magical kind of intimacy.

With its rich melodic layers, impeccable mixing, and sensual storytelling, "Small Chops" is a flawless compilation of R&B and soul. At just seven songs, it leaves you entirely captivated and entirely greedy marveling at the sheer depth of Mannywellz's musical tool belt. This is an elevated, deeply felt experience that commands your undivided attention, begging to be left on an unbroken, un-skippable loop.

From Bouyon, Konpa to Zouk: sounds of the French Antilles are taking over this summer

On July 1st 2023, Yardland was set to launch its first festival at Parc de Choisy in Paris, two days of a trailblazing line-up, which I hoped would be my big breakthrough as a freelance journalist. Unfortunately, due to the tragic murder of 17-year-old Nahel Merzouk on June 27th, followed by an outbreak of riots, the festival was cancelled altogether. I found myself in the middle of a French-Martinique household in the outskirts of the city, wondering how else I was going to spend the remainder of my trip in the comfort and safety of their home.

It was during this particular summer that I was formally introduced to Zouk, a musical style originating in the French Antilles, namely Guadeloupe and Martinique. Its slow pace and low-dance hip rhythmic felt familiar; however, nothing I could previously translate into words. With the guidance of the accommodating family, I spent my days listening through some of the Zouk classics, braising with the smell of rum in the background, fully unaware of the sonic world I had just entered.

Growing up in a French-speaking house, the Francophone diaspora was always within reach, and it wasn’t so long that one was listening to Confidence by Kim, for example, a French-Martinique singer who rose to prominence at the Fête de la Musique in 2004. In my naivety, I had convinced myself that any diasporic movement charting in France was Congolese-influenced, and anything remotely afro-inspired in the UK was Nigerian. Surely Jamaican riddims, such as Dancehall and reggae, made it through our cross-cultural environment back when I was still living in South East London. Legends like Bob Marley and Vybz Kartel were a staple in everybody’s diet, regardless of whether our background was Caribbean or African. Yet, I rarely remember Francophone Caribbeans receiving their flowers for the role they played in also reshaping modern Afropop.

Today, their musical resonance is everywhere in the work of the Queen of France, Aya Nakamura, who is of Malian descent, her French-Congolese protégé Theodora, underground rap act 63OG, of Cameroonian origins, French-Cameroon Tayc and his musical universe of Afro-love, and French-Congolese ‘Jaloux’ singer Dadju. Even all the way in Kenya, singer-songwriter Bien had become a recent participant. Not only are Caribbean music styles, like Dominican Bouyon, Haitian Konpa and Martinique Zouk, having a resurgence, but they have been quietly influencing some of the most popular Francophone Afropop music for decades. Deeds Magazine selected their top 3 picks that you may not have known were infused with the West Indies’ most popular dance music.

Aya Nakamura - Copines

Arguably, French-Malian Afropop singer Aya Nakamura’s 2018 breakout hit ‘Copines’ is the biggest song in her career thus far. However, did you know that the drums' soothing groove on the track can be traced to Zouk music? As one of the lead figures of modern Francophone Afropop, Aya has always made use of elements from both Zouk and Konpa to unveil her musical soundscape. Produced by powerhouse French-Congolese Julio Masidi, the multiple award-winning, breaking-hit track sits between Afropop, R&B, and Zouk. Some of the influences we could imagine a young Aya raised in Saint-Denis (also known as “93”) absorbed throughout its multi-cultural pot, where Caribbean and African influences due to its diaspora all intertwine.

Theodora - KONGOLESE SOUS BBL

One of French-Congolese Aforfusion singer Theodora's biggest 2024 hit songs to date, ‘KONGOLESE SOUS BBL’, has catapulted her ever since to major stardom. What many listeners may ignore, however, is that the track is deeply rooted in Bouyon music. Originating in Dominica in the late 80s, its distinctive, rapid drum pattern is almost always recognisable, sparking the interest of fellow collaborator 63OG in ‘ruiné (comme un dj),’ who revealed to have been his main inspiration. Despite its lyrical content clearly nudging Theodora’s Congolese roots, produced by her own brother Jeez Suave, the song fuses Dominica’s popular music to boost this cross-continental dance anthem.

Joé Dwèt Filé - 4 Kampé

Perhaps the song of last summer, ‘4 Kampé’ by French-Haitian Konpa singer Joé Dwèt Filé, shouldn’t come as a surprise that he is undoubtedly woven to his roots. Konpa, a dance genre that originated from Haiti in the late 50s, is Joé’s makeup through and through. With the mélange of R&B and Afropop, he is able to retouch the signature sound with a modern approach, making the genre’s rise to watch closely in the coming years. Joé can be vastly credited for the popularization of Konpa in the diaspora and beyond.

Talks Behind the Noise

One of the main online discourses surrounding the recent surge of the French Antilles regional sounds is that a lot of foreign artists are accused of copying their arrangements, however, without fully crediting the original genres. This has sparked Caribbeans and members of the diaspora to flood the internet with tweets, Instagram comments and TikTok reels demanding their influence to be rightfully acknowledged and legitimately recognized. Not only as a source of inspiration in the modern arena, but also as the main influence to popularize Francophone Afropop and beyond.

Nothing is new under the sun. I think what we’re seeing is different regions battling for international dominance. After the rise of Afrobeats in the early 2020s, it felt as though the skies were the limit. Any member of a niche community now has the opportunity to place their culture on the world map. Little do we need to be reminded that not too long ago, Dancehall was under a similar trajectory in the early 2000s. The answer lies not in our differences, but in coming together to amplify our communities.

Take Fally Ipupa’s feature ‘Doucement’ with Joé Dwèt Filé, for example; they have managed to garner more attention and make more noise together than they would have ever done separately. The collaboration doesn’t feel forced or imbalanced; it is a genuine mashup of two sounds, a heartfelt connection between two regions, Haiti and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which have a long historical context and unbreakable synergy. The same can be said of Joé Dwèt Filé and Aya Nakamuru joining forces in ‘Baddies.’ It is almost like the world’s colliding from the back of decades of mingling and interacting with one another, both in the diaspora and each sonic landscape.

So are the sounds of French Antilles taking over? The truth is, they have had an imprint for decades, and it is only the rest of the world just catching up. One could say that they are finally getting the global recognition they deserve, and we are all here for it.

The duo, made up of April George and Matthew Thompson, brings a genre-defying album that features sounds familiar to fans of the duo, who came onto the music scene back in 2014. The album itself speaks to a sense of nostalgia, addressing growth and navigation, how the two have transformed as artists, their current state, how global events have impacted them, and how things have shifted post-pandemic. It also includes personal explorations of letting go of trauma and embracing a chapter in their personal and professional journeys. 

This is set against the backdrop of their sounds, which can't really be confined to a single sound but rather a fusion of various influences they carry and have infused into their music, specifically on this album. The melodies that flow across the eleven tracks really showcase this variety, not only sonically but also lyrically, as they tell the stories that have brought them to this point in their career.

April & Matt took us through the album, breaking down each track and explaining how the album came to be.

‍“HELLO”

APRIL GEORGE: We wanted to treat the opening track like a score to set the scene and tone for the album. The sweet, sweeping strings gently place you in the middle of our chaotic world and give you a brief moment to breathe before “Very Bad News” detonates in your face.

MATT THOMPSON: The “hello” samples come from our friends and family. We started using these to open our live sets and to ground ourselves before we began playing. After tour, we knew we needed it to open our album. 

‍“VERY BAD NEWS”

APRIL GEORGE: This song is a sonic explosion, meant to catch you off guard and throw you into the fiery energy of our pure rage. It opens up with a computer voice that sounds almost like one of those esoteric self-help tapes from the 80s. The lyrics were born from my frustration with feeling trapped in the capitalist rat race. I’ve worked a 9-to-5 job while simultaneously pursuing music ever since we started, and needing to do so has bred a lot of frustration for me. When I commute to work, I have a lot of time to think about how cornered I feel, how cornered many of the 99% truly are, some unknowingly. One day, I found myself meditating on the idiom “a fish rots from the head down” and how it reflects the times we’re living in. Very Bad News is a middle finger to the corrupt people and systems that have us all in their tight grip.

“DO WHAT YOU KNOW”

APRIL GEORGE: Do What You Know is an ode to my childhood self; I wanted her to know that life gets better and that we eventually muster up the courage to pursue our dreams. It’s also a reminder that sticking to the virtues that you’re raised on, staying in lockstep with your moral compass, will take you far. It’s funny how all of the cliché bits you might brush off when you’re younger turn out to be pillars that you cling to in your adult life.

MATT THOMPSON: It’s a simple alt-pop tune with a ton of nuance and subtle complexity. It’s our attempt at making a traditional pop record which, funny enough, just so happens to be full of noise. 

‍“TWO EVERGREENS”

APRIL GEORGE: This song is very close to my heart; it’s about my grandmother, Elsie Wilson, who passed away. She encouraged me to be a musician and bought me my first violin; I still play it to this day and named it after her in her honour. I grew up in her home in Portsmouth, VA; she lived in a small ranch-style house bookended by two evergreen trees. I’d climb them as a child in the summer months and get sap all on my hands. Her home meant safety to me, and that warm, all-encompassing feeling inspired the lyrics.

MATT THOMPSON: We initially wrote this song to a different arrangement years prior, and it didn’t quite stick. When I found it in our scrapped drafts, I knew it needed to be heard, so I spruced up the composition, broke out my $50 second-hand acoustic guitar and even sang a little background vocals. Ultimately, I needed to give April all the space she needed to tell her story. 

‍“STANDING IN PLACE”

APRIL GEORGE: Disorder is as beautiful as it is terrifying. It’s a lesson every artist learns when journeying through the not-so-glamorous parts of their career: you have to get comfortable with walking confidently through the dark; doing it scared is the only way you will get to where you belong. We see this song as a sort of final goodbye to our past selves as we evolve and transition into a new form. 

MATT THOMPSON: This one has a maddening time signature that probably drove our drummer, Foots, insane when we recorded it. We threw everything into this record, including 4 of our talented friends who became our choir. 

‍“ROT”

‍APRIL GEORGE: This interlude serves as a palette cleanser right before you dive into the rest of the album; it’s a short experimental motif that we treated like a micro-score. At the time, we were reading a beautiful graphic novel called Stages Of Rot by Linnea Sterte. It takes you thousands of years into the future and chronicles how alien organisms and humanoids on another planet live within their extraterrestrial ecosystem. It centres around a whale-like alien that died and shows how its carcass feeds the ecosystem and organisms that need sustenance. It got me thinking about dilapidation and preservation, about how time is the devourer of things, and about how this album is a fossilisation of our essence and identities as artists.

MATT THOMPSON: We have a bunch of these ambient pieces that we planned to include on the album, and this is one of the interludes that stuck. I love the scratchy melody and the textures that bounce around. It makes me feel like I’m in an old pinball machine.

‍“BLESS MY HEART”

APRIL GEORGE: This song features our good friend Tony Kill, who we worked with on our EP You Are Here in 2018. It’s an ode to our favourite bands growing up like Gorillaz, Stereolab, and At The Drive In. We admire how they can wrap heavy subject matter in layers of surrealism, shielding it from sounding preachy or forced. Living in the D.C. area - so close to the heart of American politics - makes it hard not to doomscroll your way into despair. This song is our way of reckoning with what it feels like to spin beneath the heavy hand of capitalism.

“LOVE UNSPENT”

APRIL GEORGE: This song is another one that’s dear to me; during the pandemic, two of my friends passed away, and I found myself thinking about my relationship with grief. I stumbled upon the ball-in-a-box analogy, which states that we grow around the grief we hold. It never disappears; rather, it becomes a part of you, evolving with you. The lyrics spilt out from there. 

‍MATT THOMPSON: Very heavy Curtis Mayfield influence here. Specifically his live rendition of “The Makings of You” performed at the Bitter End. We were inspired by 70s soul quite a bit throughout the writing of this album, and I think it’s most apparent here. 

‍“GROTTO”

APRIL GEORGE: After finishing our EP Pit of My Dreams, we found ourselves at a crossroads. The pandemic forced us to be still after years of pushing, and we found ourselves looking for comfort and reassurance that we were on the right track. Rejecting projections of doubt from others and standing firm in the belief that you’re enough on your own brings you closer to that kind of reassurance. This song bloomed from that realisation.

‍MATT THOMPSON: It’s the first song that we wrote for Traditional Noise, and it reignited our will to keep going. We were directionless after Pit of My Dreams. After I stumbled upon the guitar melody, and April sang that first bar, everything became clear.

‍“MODIFY YOUR TRADITION”

‍APRIL GEORGE: This is another micro-score, a final vignette before we close the album. Matt wrote a passage about tradition that illuminates the album's core theme. It says “The thing about tradition, it’s all around you… it silences, it pierces, it compels, it restricts.. it’s safe.” 

MATT THOMPSON: This interlude is a reflection of the album’s core theme. We’re fascinated by the idea of tradition and how it informs our faith, our fears, our perception of the world, and how the world perceives us. It can be a safe harbour or a cage.

“MORNING STAR”

APRIL GEORGE: Morning Star is about ancestry; I found myself meditating on what kinds of words, songs, ideas I wanted to leave behind for generations after us. I thought deeply about my heritage as a Black American growing up in the American South, about all of the suffering that my people went through and how we overcame incredible odds. This song is a requiem for those who died before us; when you think of a morning star, you can either think of the weapon of war or the North Star, a signal of hope and freedom for the enslaved. My sister is a clinical psychologist, and she taught me a lot about epigenetics around the time we were writing this record. I learned that the trauma that we face in our ancestry gets passed down through our DNA. While I wrote, I thought about how not only has generational trauma made its way through my lineage, but also how incredible resilience and strength have been passed down through our DNA as well.

MATT THOMPSON: The first version of this song has a beat on it, and it goes crazy, but, like “Two Evergreens”, additional production would only distract from the core theme of this record. The beat is really crazy though…

History-making British-Nigerian rapper, producer, and songwriter Dave, also known as Santan Dave, will headline his first-ever shows in Nigeria on October 16 and 17 at Lagos' Wole Soyinka Centre for Culture and Creative Arts (formerly the National Theatre), bringing his acclaimed The Boy Who Played the Harp tour to a close.

Presented by Live Nation and MASSIVE, the highly anticipated performances represent a significant moment for both Dave and Nigerian audiences. Long celebrated for its unmatched energy, creativity, and influence across music, fashion, nightlife, and art, Lagos continues to shape global culture through the worldwide impact of Afrobeats and a new generation of African creatives redefining entertainment on a global stage. The shows bring one of the most important voices in contemporary British music to one of Africa's most culturally influential cities.

The announcement also comes during a significant cultural moment for the city, following the reopening and renewed spotlight on the iconic Wole Soyinka Center for Culture and Creative Arts (formerly and commonly known as the National Theatre) in Lagos, a historic symbol of Nigeria’s artistic heritage and an important marker of the city’s evolving live entertainment landscape. The performances further reinforce Lagos’ growing position as a global destination for music, entertainment, and large-scale cultural experiences.

The Lagos dates will serve as the closing shows of his global The Boy Who Played the Harp tour, which has included major stops across Europe and North America, as well as previously announced dates in South Africa, including a sold-out show at Grand Arena in Cape Town on October 6. For the British-Nigerian artist, whose parents are Nigerian, the performances also carry a deeper cultural significance. At just 27 years old, Dave has become one of the most influential artists of his generation and recently made history as the first and only UK rap artist to debut three consecutive studio albums at No. 1 on the UK Albums Chart. With multiple BRIT Awards, an Ivor Novello Award, critically acclaimed projects, and sold-out shows around the world, he continues to connect with audiences across continents.

TICKETS: Tickets will be available starting with the Artist Presale beginning on Monday, 8th June at 10 am local time. The general onsale will begin on Tuesday, 9th June at 10 am local time exclusively via SANTANDAVE.COM.

PRESALE: To participate in the artist presale on Monday, June 8 at 10am local time you must sign up at  https://santandave.lnk.to/Lagos 

THE BOY WHO PLAYED THE HARP TOUR DATES: 

Wed Jun 18 – Brisbane, AU – Brisbane Entertainment Centre
Fri Jun 20 – Sydney, AU – Qudos Bank Arena
Mon Jun 23 – Melbourne, AU – Rod Laver Arena
Fri Jun 27 – Perth, AU – RAC Arena
Thu Aug 07 – Skanderborg, DK – Smukfest
Fri Aug 29 – Reading, UK – Reading Festival
Sat Aug 30 – Leeds, UK – Leeds Festival
Fri Oct 03 – Pretoria, ZA – SunBet Arena
Mon Oct 06 – Cape Town, ZA – Grand Arena
Fri Oct 16 – Lagos, Nigeria – Wole Soyinka Center for Culture and Creative Arts  NEW DATE 
Sat Oct 17 – Lagos, Nigeria – Wole Soyinka Center for Culture and Creative Arts NEW DATE 

For years, Starsamm has been building in plain sight. Long before the Nigerian singer-songwriter emerged as one of Afropop's most promising new voices, he was quietly refining his craft behind the scenes–writing songs, developing his sound, and earning the respect of industry insiders who recognized his potential early.

Born Samuel Iseoluwa Awelewa in Osun State, Nigeria, the budding artist’s journey eventually led to a songwriting credit on a Grammy-nominated record, ‘Tomorrow’ by Yemi Alade. This milestone reaffirmed his belief that the years of sacrifice were beginning to pay off. It also helped pave the way for his signing to KeyQaad, the influential Nigerian label known for nurturing distinctive voices such as Omah Lay and Kaestyle.

Since then, Starsamm has steadily carved out a lane of his own. His 2025 debut EP, ‘Love Is War,’ introduced listeners to a young artist documenting romance, longing, and self-discovery in real time. But on ‘Dawn’, his latest project, the perspective shifts. Written during a period marked by personal change, mounting expectations, heartbreak, and sobriety, the EP captures an artist learning how to navigate a new phase of life while remaining emotionally transparent.

In conversation with Deeds, Starsamm reflects on growing up in Osun State, moving to Lagos in pursuit of music, finding his voice through vulnerability, and why ‘Dawn’ represents far more than a new release–it marks the beginning of a new chapter.

Stanley for Deeds Magazine: Right now, in this exact season of your life, who is Samuel when the music is off, and nobody’s watching?

I've always been a family man. A lot of what fuels my hustle is wanting to take care of the people around me. When I'm not making music or out on the road, I'm usually at home trying to build real connections with the people I love. Life on the road ends on the road. Eventually, you have to come back home and connect with your people. I never want my family to feel like Sam only shows up when things aren't going well. I want to be present all the time. That's important to me.

Before there was Starsamm, there was Samuel. What kind of kid were you growing up?

I grew up in Osun State before moving to Lagos when I was around 14 or 15. I've always been a quiet person. Looking back, I spent a lot of time observing people and paying attention to my surroundings. Now that I'm older, I realise some of that was probably ADHD. I was constantly taking mental notes about what was happening around me. Whenever I wanted to express myself, I tended to do it intensely, and sometimes that made me retreat into my shell. So I became the kid who watched everything.

What first made music feel personal to you?

Church was where music became personal. I joined a dance-drama group where people would act on stage while others sang alongside the performance. Watching storytelling and music come together fascinated me. I wanted to be part of it. What's funny is that I wasn't actively listening to a lot of mainstream artists at the time. Most of my friends sounded like the artists they loved. They sounded like Wizkid, Kizz Daniel or Patoranking. I didn't really know those artists well enough to imitate them, so whatever I wrote came directly from me. Looking back, I think that's one of the reasons my music developed its own identity early.

When did music stop being something you loved and start becoming something you needed to pursue?

It happened naturally. I didn't wake up one day and decide I was going to be an artist. I just realised that whenever there were rhythms, melodies, or opportunities to create, I wanted to be involved. When I recorded my first song, I actually hid it from my dad for years because I didn't want to get in trouble. Later, I moved from Osun to Lagos to pursue the dream more seriously. For a teenager, that was a huge decision.

At first, my family worried about stability. They encouraged me to find a job alongside

You spent years building before wider recognition came. What did those years teach you?

It felt like I was writing a story. Leaving my state, moving to Lagos, attending music school, hustling and trying to survive–it all felt like chapters in something bigger. There were moments when I was exhausted. I wasn't going to quit, but I was definitely getting tired. Working with Yemi Alade changed everything for me. When a song I contributed to received Grammy recognition, it shifted something in my mind. I remember thinking: if something I actively worked on can reach that level, then this is only the tip of the iceberg. It reminded me that I was doing something right and that I needed to keep going.

Was there ever a moment when you questioned whether all of this would work out?

Of course. Unless you're completely delusional, everybody has those moments. There are nights when you're staring at the ceiling at 3 a.m., wondering whether you're on the right path. I've had those moments too. But eventually I stopped thinking only about results. Music became my way of life. I started viewing my career as a story that was still being written. Years from now, I won't just look back at songs. I'll look back at memories, sacrifices, lessons, and experiences. That perspective helps me push through uncertainty. Even today, I sometimes look back and think, "I can't believe I've made it this far."

A lot of people describe your music as incredibly vulnerable and emotionally honest. Was that always natural for you, or has music helped you become more open?

Not really. Earlier in my career, I spent a lot of time writing from other people's perspectives. I would take their stories and personalise them. But eventually I started losing myself in that process. The only way out was to become more honest about my own reality. I realised creativity is strongest when it comes from your own point of view. Once I stopped hiding behind other people's stories and started writing about what I was actually experiencing, everything changed.

Why is vulnerability so important to your music?

I think honesty is how you build community. A lot of people want escapism, especially in a place like Nigeria, where life can be difficult. But if you want longevity, you have to give people something deeper than entertainment. When I started meeting fans, I noticed they would open up to me emotionally. Strangers would tell me things they were going through because they felt safe. I think that's because I've opened up in my music first. When people feel like you're being honest, they trust you. That's how real communities are built.

Which artists, whether Nigerian or global, have helped shape the way you think about songwriting and storytelling?

Ed Sheeran was a huge influence on me. He's one of the greatest songwriters I've ever listened to. Beyond the melodies, he tells stories that make people feel something. The Lumineers also had a big impact on me because of their songwriting. Then there was Omah Lay. Listening to him changed something for me creatively. He showed me that storytelling could be deeply Nigerian and still connect universally. Before that, I felt like my songwriting leaned very Western. Omah Lay helped me realise I could embrace my identity, my experiences, and my culture without sacrificing quality. That was a major turning point.

What made KeyQaad feel like the right home for you?

The funny thing is that it happened very naturally. My manager was at the KeyQaad office and played some of my music. One of the CEOs heard it from another room and asked who the artist was. They played more songs, and apparently, both CEOs immediately felt they needed to sign me. What attracted me to KeyQaad was how much they allow artists to remain themselves. There wasn't pressure to become someone else or chase a particular trend. They believed in who I already was, and that meant a lot to me. 

Your debut EP, Love Is War, and your latest project, Dawn, feel like two very different chapters. How do you view them now?

‘Love Is War’ came from a very different place in my life. At the time, I wasn't trying to make a project. I was simply documenting my experiences. I was in love, I was making music, and I was enjoying life. The songs reflected that. They were about relationships, emotions, arguments, happiness, and everything that came with it. After the project came out, life changed. Suddenly, there were expectations. There was pressure from the label, pressure from management, and pressure from myself. The same relationship that had inspired so much of the music became harder to sustain because my life was changing so quickly.

That's where ‘Dawn’ begins. It’s me deciding that I want to restart my life. I had achieved things I once thought were impossible, but I realised success also brings new challenges. I needed to learn how to live this new life and how to manage everything that came with it. Unlike ‘Love Is War,’ which happened naturally, ‘Dawn’ was a very conscious project. These songs came from late-night thoughts, difficult conversations, anxiety, heartbreak, and self-reflection.

I used to smoke heavily, and while working on the EP, I decided to get sober. That decision forced me to sit with my thoughts instead of escaping them. There were emotions I couldn't run from anymore. There were memories I had to confront. Songs like ‘Sober’ came directly from those moments. ‘Dawn’ became a record about clarity, acceptance, and learning how to move forward. For me, it's more than just another project. It's the beginning of a new version of myself.

What do you hope people take away from Dawn?

I want people to listen to my music from a first-person perspective. I want them to imagine that they're the ones speaking the words and feeling the emotions. If they do that, they'll understand what I was going through when I made these songs. More than anything, I want people to feel safe, to feel understood, and like they're listening to someone who understands what they're going through because he's lived through similar things himself. And moving forward, I want to keep exploring that through Afri-pop. I want to continue blending strong songwriting with African rhythms and sounds while telling stories that feel honest and personal. That's always been the goal!

IG:@_stanleykilonzo