December 2018 marks 10
years since the release of M.I’s debut album and by far, his best and most
important piece of work, Talk About It.
They say you should give people flowers while they can still smell it. So
despite how I may have felt about his successive work, for a moment in time M.I
was where he was suppose to be: at the top. This isn’t a famzing letter,
although I am a fan… but as a fan, it also affords me the right to be a critic
and I have been a down right critic of the man over time. This (dedication)
letter will not cover his recent album, Yung
Denzel.
Anyway like I said, for
a moment in time M.I held the torch, took it higher than you never thought it
could get. There’d never been a rapper who dropped an album that seemed so
uncompromising as his debut, till he showed up. Prior to his entrance, most
rappers in Nigeria tended to bend towards a certain part of the market to gain
more followership and airplay. M.I seemed to play it straight (and oh yes,
let’s not kid ourselves, there were comprises on his debut, just not enough to
drown out the man’s authenticity).
His first single, Crowd Mentality got him his first batch
of fans. I was one of them. Critically, it was a success. Commercially? Not so
much. Everyone knew he could rap, but so could so many people in Nigeria. The
question was could he appeal? That answer came with the second single, Safe, a song where he basically built
lyrics around the cadences and lyrics of popular Nigerian musicians at the
time. It was a tried and tested music troupe. Take something well-known and
flip it. It was akin to 50 Cent robbing all your favourite artists while using
their lyrics to do so on How To Rob.
The album was a first
of many (I’m not going to discuss how many copies it purportedly sold in its
first week, since we don’t have a Sound Scan like chart and we all know the purported
amount is hearsay; more likely from the label as a form of packaging. I can’t
filter myself, despite knowing a few Chocolate
City people and associates). It was the first formal album to introduce us
to Wizkid (Wizkid that is now flexing on us with his new acquired accent, lol.
Joke!). It was really the first album to put Chocolate City on the national map. Yes, we up North were aware of
their early successes with Jeremiah Gyang as well as a stint working with Asa,
but the industry in Lagos was not exactly looking up North to Chocolate City till this dropped (much
respect to Jeremiah Gyang and D’jinee, that MUST be mentioned. We still respect
the forerunners!).
It was the first album
to feature the then whole roster of the label or just the people heavily
associated with it (D’jinee, Jesse Jagz, Ice Prince), because not everyone was
technically signed then (and that’s how much I know about this label). The
exclusion of Jeremiah Gyang, possibly had to do with his issues concerning the
label, but I’m not here to pour sand in anyone’s garri. It’s a celebration!
So here’s to M.I. Don’t
ever say we never gave you your flowers, before we get another rant about how
people can’t tell you what they feel about your music, lol.
P.S. We’re going to talk about what happened after this album one day, but for now, here’s a toast to Mister Incredible.
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