BROWN: THE COLOURFUL REVIEW

The success of soul music in Nigeria has been a very tricky one, mainly because there are only two genres of music in Nigeria as of late: Afro-pop and everything else. Lindsey’s debut Brown falls into the latter. Despite the success of international stars like Nneka and Asa, the cross-over appeal of Darey and the artistically refined Bez, soul music in Nigeria hasn’t really found its footing. Its biggest home-based star is Darey, who for years flew the genre’s flag only to be met with disappointment on his debut album despite being a runner-up on Project Fame and making many lists of stars to look out for at the time. He crossed-over for his sophomore album and finally found some commercial success.

          

However it was Asa who produced the genre’s most successful album, her self-titled debut won over critics and fans alike in a year pop acts P-Square dropped their third and arguably most successful album and the then recently formed Mo-hits dropped their compilation CD. The genre struggled shortly after with Asa and Nneka being courted by the international markets and Darey releasing a mish-mash double CD (a rarity in Nigeria) of pop and soul hits. Then came Bez, the genre’s new prince. Bez’s problem was from the beginning he seemed to play only to a niche market, add to that his people seemed to have no idea how to promote him. His first single was the confusingly slow, “More” (Nigerian listeners tend to have a phobia to slow strumming guitars and piano playing that might lead to a poetry recital), add to that for some reason, someone thought it would be a great idea for Bez to die in his first video. Really?! Who was in charge of this?

           

That brings us to the genre’s newest star Lindsey or Miss Lindsey or whatever Puff Daddy-inspired name change she might go through in future. Lindsey is one of those behind-the-scenes artists who is finally getting her shine on. After singing back-up hooks for stars like M.I and Jesse Jagz (she was on the best two songs on Jesse’s debut if you ask me) she’s released her debut EP titled Brown. I don’t know why it’s called that, when for the most part it’s quite colourful. The EP has one major fault, but let’s start with the good.

           

The EP was largely produced by Atta Lennel who seems to have a knack for producing songs of this genre. The album actually picks up from the third track, tracks one and two serve as a re-introduction as to who Lindsey is, you know kind of like how the Avengers starts with that scene with Loki just to remind you what’s been happening from the previous films, those tracks are just to remind you she can sing and she brings a friend on track two (Eve). Atta’s production hits you like the snare drums which sneak in on the back of Don’t Look At Me That Way. I applaud him.

Lyrically the EP is straight-forward, that’s a technical way of saying simple. Some of the concepts however are higher on tracks like Man To Woman and to a lesser extent Taxi. The main fault with the album for me is the sequencing. People generally take sequencing for granted and it’s been a major problem with many a Nigerian albums. For those who are clueless, sequencing refers to the order in which the tracks are presented (rappers are supposed to be good at this, because they often have an intro, outro and possibly skits. I say supposed to, because M.I 2 had one of the worst sequencing, on the other hand S.D.C’s The Dreamer Project had the best sequencing on any album I’ve heard this side of the Atlantic. I’m not being dramatic, it’s true!).

I never would’ve opened Brown with Taxi, unless the idea was for her to meet her lover on the last track of the album. She doesn’t. Personally I would’ve opened with the more fitting The Letter, the track is backed by nothing save for vocals and finger snaps; a befitting intro featuring a striped down sound, opposite to the drum-heavy songs that populate the airwaves. Taxi really should’ve been the last song, a befitting outro as we hear her sing about leaving in a taxi to go meet her lover, don’t you think? Also while her cover of Fela’s Trouble Dey Sleep Yanga Go Wake Am is quite admirable, I can’t feel the same about her cover of Asa’s Jailer, it’s become one of those records that’s really hard to cover without people wishing for the original. It’s like trying to cover early Whitney Houston, you don’t do that, Whitney covered you and did it better.

Personally I’m in awe of Lindsey and the fact that she even did this to begin with. Waiting to get signed is not the way to go these days, especially when your music falls into Nigeria’s “everything else”. I applaud her.

RATING: 7/10.

             

Suggested singles/videos:

The Letter

When You Don’t Drive Me Mad

And just for nostalgia sake, maybe The 90s Song.


Download Brown here: http://iblend.net/music2/download-lindsey-brown-the-ep/