The Urban Retro Playlist

One of my favorite tapes this year so far has been Leap of Faith by Juls, which is a wonderful blend of laid back but still very progressive and considerably upbeat music ironic right ? Anyway the song of the day is actually not from that tape but it wouldn't be hard to believe if it was just one of those songs you recorded for an album but eventually didn't make it to the album for one reason or the other. Definitely not because it wasn't it wasn't good enough though.
The song posses sounds that embody Banky style of music, said to be pioneered by Mr Eazi but another salient individual in the development of this sound is Juls who has prominent in a good amount of his songs. I hope at some point they (Juls & Mr Eazi) work on a project together.
Any Rock your body is heavily influenced by the banku sound and Burna Boy maintains a laid back demeanor and is able to impose his style and personality properly although the song.
Also present are some dancehall elements in the song but they are so subtle, well blended and entirely smooth to listen to. I especially love the array of the various drums on the instrumental. This in my opinion is the closest anyone has shown they posses as much chemistry as the Burna Boy LeriQ duo, I hope to see more collaborative efforts with them in the future.

So it's sometime in December 2016 and its mind blowing news to me that two relatively unknown upcoming nigerian artists have songs on the billboard charts. I mean I was already acquinted with previous bodies of work they had put out and I just wondered "what if these guys actually realize the platform they've been able too get to and decide to work on something together?" To my surprise they actually put out a body of work in April 2017. I mean I was surprised because there wasn't any prior collaboration or affiliation between the two artists. That not withstanding they produced a brief but very solid body of work. Words that instantly come to my mind when you mention this tape are Love, Soul, Smooth, Harmony,  Progressive and Transitions.
The tape starts off slowly with "Ocean" which is filled with numerous vocal harmonies and in verse transitions. It is very expressive and sets the general tone of the tape altogether. Then comes "Don't" which from my point of view describes a complex relationship where there have been intentionally undefined feelings. The begining of Odunsi's verse is redolent of Kevin Lyttles 2004 smash hit "Let Me Hold You". The nostalgia gives a certain appeal, so does the part where the brass instruments are given the spotlight. Right after that part is where I think the tape goes from very good to great, there's an effortless transition from "Don't" to "Stay" which if you're not paying attention to you wouldn't even realize the song has changed. "Stay" is also very progressive, maybe a little more than "Don't". It posseses some subtle and well blended Caribbean elements. The prime focus in my opinion is telling the other party in the complex relationship not to leave. At the end of Stay is yet another smooth transition into the concluding song of the project "War". The tempo of this song is slowed compared to the preceeding song. It ends up telling the partner they should resolve things and avoid getting into a feud. There are some very soft drums which really do it for me at several points in the song, especially the ones that become prominent close to the end of the song.
I've lost count of the amount of times I've listened to this body of work and I feel like it's going to be one of the best I'll hear all year.

In the time I stopped writing (for reasons unknown to me as well) I haven't stopped listening to music, in fact I've discovered so much more music and I've opened my mind  so many new thing I didn't know and my not ordinarily accept. I also decided screw my data constraints, Seun be like: " I will open my SoundCloud more often."  I've in the process opened myself to the many people making mind blowing music especially from Nigeria.
Today I'll be focusing on Odunsi who's music is spreading like wild fire, considering his song "Situationship" made it to the Billboard charts late last year. I'm excited by a lot of things he makes keeping in mind he's a producer as well, there's something about being able to create your own sound.
It's a different experience, it's one of those things where no matter how you explain it can never come close to what you feel. Another thing is how he's effortlessly able to switch and mix up his sounds as clearly apparent in his Time of Our Lives Extended Play.
As a producer it's expected that you'll collaborate with a good number of artists, his collaborations also involve him as a vocalist and I find his performances on features very exhilarating. There's also this calm, not too laid back and still exciting vibe he has I don't know if that makes any sense at all. I'm really excited because I'm going to watch him perform live tomorrow at Young Kulture.

So I decided to make a playlist off songs I've heard which  he's been featured on.

2016 was a year with a lot of music and the nigerian music scene wasn't left out, there was a decent amount of full length projects out from different genres. It came to my notice that there were a lot more extended plays as opposed to the orthodox long plays. I was actually cool with that and I experienced a lot more nigerian music off soundcloud this year (closer to the end though) including the likes of Odunsi, D-Truce, Aylo, Nonso Amadi, Bella, 3rty, Muyiwa and many more (yes Soundcloud is a bottomless pit of music and there is an appealing nigerian urban underground scene).
I like to briefly review the projects that I've really enjoyed through the year(you know albums that I've honestly listened to and the ones I felt in my brim the most, I did that previously here).
These are the projects from 2016 I enjoyed the most in no particular order:





I was very excited when I heard the announcement of a new addition to the Illegal Music series by M.I early in the year 2016. My excitement was rewarded with very good hip hop music as M.I gave a mixtape that every core hip hop fan would love to hear (I talked about it at some point here). On this tape he really sounded like the "prime rapping" M.I and cleared doubts about him losing ability. On the tape samples were a focal point on the production. Though I thought it could have been more experimental production wise, but it was still very good irrespective. Lyrically it focused a lot on breaking out of "boxes", shunning people's opinions of what hip hop should and doing it how it comes to you.






My mind was all over the place when I was about to start listening to this body of work. Tay had already set the bar high with his first body of work "Passport" (which I've written about previously here). I actually did not know what type of sound I was going to hear but I just expected it was going to be good. I genuinely had goose bumps when I bumped it for the first time. I was blown away by the direction and production of the tape. The sound entirely was very quirky and a breath of fresh air to be honest. It was very well paced, soulful and sensual sound. Till today I find it difficult to believe Tay isn't a veteran artist and it's saddening that he's still not getting the kind of attention I think he deserves.






The first single of the this Tape "Pree Me" (which I wrote about here) took me to a different dimension. As I was unhappy when he announced his split from Aristocrat Records a while back mostly because I knew it would at some point affect the LeriQ & Burna Boy combination. The absence of LeriQ was evident on his body of work "On A Spaceship", In my opinion it was underwhelming juxtaposing with all his bodies of work.
 The Joy that filled my heart when I heard there was going to be a tape with both of them and I was in no way disappointed. I think it got even better with every listen, the project is one you can just easily vibe with and it seemed in no way forced. There was a lot of experimentation with themes on the project and I know for sure a number of the tracks were freestyled and I
can only imagine the type of atmosphere and the vibes in the studio when it was created. This tape was really a Redemption for Burna Boy as he had been through a lot of unpleasant things with his family, label and the media generally.






I heard a single off this tape the year before and that put Ozzy B back on my radar after he took some music scene for a bit. I was actually expecting a transition as I was aware his sound was evolving. But this body of work put me on a different "cruise" entirely, I did not see it coming at all(I talked about one of the songs here).
There was an aesthetic he was going for and I think he executed it wonderfully and he was entirely consistent with the direction which is something that is very difficult to pull off having in mind it'll cause you're sound to appeal to a particular audience. The production was also on another level entirely, it was a diverse amount of vibes from giving very dark grimy impressions at some points to softer and more progressive sounds at other points. What I love the most about the tape is I think there was an idea in his mind and he executed it so care-freely without considering general opinions.






I am an unrepentant fan of Brymo, I became that way because he's been consistently churning out amazing albums (I've written about him numerously you can check out some of it here). He's had three in the last four years. So when he announced he was releasing an album this year I knew I had to get it even with the controversy surrounding the title and album art (I think it was for publicity to be honest). I think I enjoyed his last album more, maybe because I had more time to listen to it but this one is certainly on the same level.
On this project he drifted to a more urban sound but the rudiments were pretty much the same. Then he still maintained the traditional vibes on a number of track notably "Ko-Ṣaya-Mi", "Something Good is Happening" and one of my absolute favorites off the album "Alajọ-Ṣomolu".








From their first collaborations you could tell Falz and Simi possessed a different kind of understanding. The realized it and decided to leverage it by working on a project together (which I've written about here).
It worked out so well for them in my opinion, they're properly executing the whole comical thing and it something that really gains the whole commercial appeal.
The comical and commercial appeal aside they really put out good music as  harmony was consistent throughout the project. As well as the harmony the songs were witty, conscious and very well produced. To be honest when I initially heard about the tape there was some skepticism but after my first listen I was in tune with the sound. I especially loved the fact that a number songs consisted of live instruments, I can only imagine how a concert would sound.

When some photos began to surface of Falz and Simi about a month ago I
wondered what the publicity was for, because I was pretty certain something
was coming afterwards(I mean you can't just come and go and just do
photoshoot for nothing, though you can but that's not the point).
Shortly after the announced that they were releasing a joint project, I was
absolutely certain I was going to listen to it. For some reason I thought it
would just be good but not great, was I wrong.
The album was properly titled as the duo posses the type of chemistry that
Timbaland and Timberlake posses in my opinion. At no point did I spot signs
of struggle with their transitions between verses. Also, the album was very
comical, filled witty lines and there were constant variations in tempo and
the genre.
Simi's performance and vocals were very commendable as she showed versatility
approaching her verses differently from doing a little rap verse like in the
song "Want To" to exhibiting her vocal prowess in the song "Chemistry".
Versatility wasn't limited to just her performance but to the entire project
as the themes differed in most of the songs while trying to maintain elements
of the general vibe. Like the song "Shake Body" which particularly targets a
(Yoruba) marriage audience, which is a topic which Falz talks about which I
established in this post here.

I think it's safe to say Brymo is one of my favorite Nigerian artist. I remember when I was asked to mention artists I would like to see perform live he was one of them.
Earlier this year he released another album Klitoris (which i've written about here) and i've actually really enjoyed the album even more as time passed. I already made a Brymo playlist here, which i briefly talked about his evolution and I'll love to just update it with some of the new (potential) classics he's just dropped.
The new music is still along the lines of his last albums just a little more refined I guess.
Plus it's been the soundtrack to a lot of my outings and hangouts of recent.
So here's the updated version of the playlist, enjoy!

The song of the day is Rundown by Damayo ( who I've written about here), which was created of fragments of D'Banj's 2006 mega hit Rundown(Funk u up). I actually remember listening to the unfinished version of the beat and I was like this has so much potential, then Damayo finally released the song and I must say it bangs.

 

I'm going to start by saying this is one of the best freestyles to come out of Nigeria.

There are actually few groups/ boy band artists in Nigeria or maybe that I know of. 

Today I was at a ceremony and of course its inevitable there has to be music available at any ceremony irrespective of the reason. This particular one was a celebration of life and the choice of music was a band. 

I was listening to the radio earlier and they were talking about the whole P-Square situation, prior to that I actually heard about it and didn't really pay attention to it. But as I listened to them talk I realized that they have been around for a really long time and were pretty instrumental in making the Nigerian music industry what it is now.