In recent years, Nigerian music has gotten a lot of attention from international music audiences. Superstar acts like P-Square and D’Banj tour to sold out shows, and work alongside Nollywood to spread Nigeria’s cultural influence across the globe. At the same time, an interest in 1970’s era Afrobeat and Funk has taken root in the United States through Hip-Hop taste-makers reintroducing the music of Fela Kuti to a young hip American audience, eventually getting the Nigerian musical legend’s story a spot on a Broadway stage. It is in the context of this heightened international interest in Nigerian music that Uchenna Ikonne has entered the scene with a mission to fill in the gaps between the Naija Pop and Afrobeat boom, and represent lesser known sides of Nigeria’s musical legacy.
In the middle of the last decade, Uchenna started a blog called “With Comb and Razor” as a place to channel his creative impulses when the production of a film he was making got put on hold. Putting readers up on everything from Nigerian Country Music to Reggae, Rap, Disco, and Rock, as well as providing valuable social context, he brought a fresh and much needed perspective to the global music dialogue. After a few years of sharing his encyclopaedic knowledge of Nigerian music on the blog, Uchenna transitioned into other roles within the music industry. He recently expanded his realm of influence by starting a music label, Comb and Razor Sound, adding a new venue for personal expression.
His first release, Brand New Wayo: Funk, Fast Times & Nigerian Boogie Badness 1979-1983 is a collection of songs from a genre of music called Nigerian Boogie, made during Nigeria’s Second Republic and oil driven economic boom. Uchenna’s goal is to put music out that he enjoys, more as an archivist than as a DJ or a digger. He is motivated by trying to preserve cultural record and has grand goals to possibly remind Nigerians of the music from an optimistic time that they may have lived through but forgotten about. Uchenna fondly recalls the lyrics and melodies of popular tunes from his days growing up in Eastern Nigeria, which are sometimes only remembered and appreciated by a small group of people, mostly him and a few friends.
This is not Uchenna’s first work on a compilation. He previously collaborated with the Soundway record label on the compilation The World Ends: Afro Rock & Psychedelia in 1970s Nigeria. While he enjoyed working with Soundway, he found himself wanting to release music that they were not interested in. By starting his own record label he says he is able to do something different. The reissue industry is strongly oriented towards the European and American markets, and Uchenna recognises that the tastes of an American or European digger may not necessarily be the same as an African listener. Collectors’ emphasis on individual tastes doesn’t necessarily showcase how an African audience, or even the artist themselves would want to be represented. When licensing for another project, Uchenna remembers asking for certain tracks and the artists responding by asking, “why are you going to choose this obscure instrumental from early in my career when I have so many others that are hits?” For his own releases, Uchenna keeps with some of the naming and packaging conventions that speak to a targeted audience, of diggers and collectors, but he adds an important element of political, social, and economic context to the presentation. In a sense, he is continuing with the work that he started on the blog, and through his song selection is able to bring awareness to genres of music that may not be as valued by cultural outsiders.
To understand that this music was made at a time that was prosperous and celebratory is perhaps important. The promises of modernity and industrial expansion seemed to be delivering, and the music reflects this optimism. New studios flush with oil money created a slick and polished sound that allowed for insertion into a global pop dialogue. That dialogue is perhaps the same one that birthed Hip-Hop in marginalised communities of New York. The music certainly references America who at that time had, and in many ways continues to have, a hegemonic hold on the global definition of “cool.” As Uchenna explains it, Boogie was originally a Black American reclamation of Soul music from the international phenomenon of Disco. Although no longer overtly political, Boogie, like Hip-Hop, had embedded within it a subversive contestation to the mainstream. By adapting Boogie and adding their own flavour into the discourse, Nigerians were having a conversation about modernity not only with Americans, but with the world at large. Perhaps, then, Nigerian Boogie is an integral link in contemporary Naija Pop’s genealogy.
http://content.omroep.nl/ghettoradio/musicblog/chris_mba_funky_situation.mp3 Chris Mba - Funky Situation
Ultimately, with Comb and Razor Sound, Uchenna hopes to counter essentialist notions of African Pop and particularly notions of African Music as drum-heavy Funk. Representations of Africa still have a ways to go in many realms of Western media production, but Uchenna sees the surging interest in Africa in as positive. His future endeavours should only go further to open up all of our eyes to a wide scope of possibilities for African music, and perhaps even contribute to the constantly shifting ideas of African identity. What’s certain is that, Brand New Wayo is a promising start for the Comb and Razor Sound.
BRAND NEW WAYO is out now on LP, on CD from May 17th, and available at every major online retailer you can think of, and also at whatever remaining brick-and-mortar outlets! Nonetheless, below are some where-to-buy links.
Written by Boima Tucker, aka DJ Chief Boima (Also check Boima Tucker at Africa Is A Country)
RELEASE PARTY, NEW YORK - Brand New Wayo record release party at Zebulon Cafe, New York on May 21st
Tracklisting
A1. Mixed Grill - A Brand New Wayo
A2. Kris Okotie - Show Me Your Backside
A3. Murphy Williams - Get On Up
A4. Joe Moks - Boys and Girls
B1. Amas - Slow Down
B2. Oby Onyioha - I Want To Feel Your Love
B3. Dizzy K. Falola - Excuse Me Baby
B4. Chris Mba - Funky Situation
C1. Bayo Damazio - Listen to the Music
C2. Martha Ulaeto - Music Alone
C3. Segun Robert - Big Race
C4. Amel Addmore - Jane
D1. Honey Machine - Pleasure
D2. The Stormmers - Love or Money
D3. Emma Baloka - Let's Love Each Other
SOME WHERE TO BUY LINKS
Juno Records (mp3)
Light In The Attic Records (LP or CD)
Turntable Lab (LP)
Dusty Grooove (LP)
Amazon (LP)
HHV.de (LP)
