WIZKID: A NUCLEAR REACTION?

For Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun, it hasn’t always been a “wizzy baby loke loke” thing as he has fought through defeat and now he’s living a better life.

Born on the 16^th day of June 1990, in Surulere  Lagos, Ayodeji better known by his stage moniker-Wizkid attended Ijebu-ode grammar school and launched a musical career from quite an early age of eleven albeit on the low( and I think the career was certainly amateurish). He was known then as lil Prinz and went ahead to form a musical group- Glorious Five that even dropped a seven-track album which was released in the church then. Yes you thought right..Wizkid had an album prior to his superstar album (PS: he made a then grand sum of #10000 from the album sale).

Our dear ‘baba nla’ after the dismembering of the glorious five, met a then seasoned record producer the late OJB Jezreel- who prevented him from recording any song for the first year he was with him. Although while visiting the studio, young wizkid saw 2face and Sound sultan record their albums “Grass 2 Grace” and “Jagbajantis” respectively. One year after his meeting of OJB, Wizkid recorded his first song which was met with great reception throughout surulere as it also featured OJB.

Wizkid claim to have had a great personal relationship with his would be record label boss Banky W and he even contribute his own quota to the writing of Banky W’s song “omoge you too much” and he didn’t relent. This surulere boy in 2006 went ahead and collaborated with two other big shots – Naeto c and Ikechukwu. But a break came when he was featured on MI’s “fast money, fast cars”in that same 2009 and trust me, he killed it, !

Mr Capable himself Banky W saw potential in this young boy and signed him to his record label Empire Mates Entertainment in 2009. But Wizkid only became a household name when he released his debut album’s single – Holla at your boy in 2010.

…wait for it…

BOOM!

I think and I daresay that was an action that spurred the spontaneity we’re seeing in Wizkid today(and I guess we’d be seeing for a while longer)

From “Holla at your boy”, to “don’t dull” to “tease me” and so on, the awesomeness of Wizkid refused to wane and he even moved to the international level to feature Akon on the remix of “don’t dull”. His debut album “Superstar” and the songs featured on it won so many award nominations and quite a number went on to bag some of these awards.

In 2013, Wizkid broke up from EME  and formed his own record label Starboy Records on which he has great artistes and producers right now.

Wizkid hasn’t been resting since then my dear people. He decided to take his career further into the international level by making friends with big shots like Chris Brown, Young Jeezy, Wale, Akon, Kendrick, Rihanna and the likes.

Work on his second album “Ayo” started in 2012 through 2014 and had guest appearances from prominent artistes and was produced by different seasoned producers

Just after the 2face’s Fortified celebration, Wizkid took to Instagram ti announce the postponement of his third studio album and a soon release of an EP instead. The EP is said to be titled “Sounds from the other side”. On April 5^th2016, Wizkid became the first Nigerian artiste to emerge on Billboard’s Twitter last 24 hour chart following his guest feature on Drake’s “one dance” single.(The song went on to peak at No. 1 on May 12^th 2016 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart)

Successful as he is , Wizkid has had his fair share of controversies ranging from his exit from EME to issues about his girlfriend and his baby boy to issues with other artistes like Davido, Skales, Dammy Krane amongst other even to his more recent rift with popular blogger Linda Ikeji. But  he has emerged strong amidst all this and is determined to do even better.

Now Wizkid isn’t just driving music all the way – not solely at least ; he’s bagged multi-million naira contracts with Globacom and Pepsi too in endorsements !! And for a while now, our “Baba Nla” has been talking of launching his own clothing line after the release of his EP…which I believe would be seismic.

After and amidst all these, I still don’t think he’s reached the zenith of his  career yet. I mean…I hear he still has some stuffs with drake and Chris Brown, his EP, and the coming album too, the launch of his clothing line, and so on. I know he’s on the road to legendary ..that’s if he’s not a legend yet sef..LOL. BTW I’m sure I’m not the only expectant one as his fans and probably some haters too are waiting to see what he has up his sleeve.

Adios my dear friends. Meanwhile, grab a chair, a bowl of popcorn, and a bottle of soft drink as we watch this “omo jaiye jaiye” the ‘final Baba Nla’ pour out his pot of Gold for us to marvel at.