Grammy-winning Nigerian artist Burna Boy has claimed that the afrobeats genre lacks lyrical content and is “just a great time.”
He considers the genre to be “literally nothing.”
The self-proclaimed “African Giant” made the startling comment in a recent interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe in New York.
He said:
“90 per cent of them [Nigerian musicians] have no real-life experiences, which is why most of Nigerian music or African music or afrobeats, as people call it, is mostly about nothing, literally nothing.
“There is no substance to it — like, nobody is talking about anything in it. it is just a great time. It’s an amazing time. But at the end of the day, life is not an amazing time. No matter how nice of a time you are having now or you had at some point or you plan to have, you are still going to face life.
“So, for me, I feel like music should be the essence of the artiste. The artiste is a person who has a good day, bad day, his great days and worst days. So, I’m dropping a project that should be a window for the fans to see those experiences.”
Burna Boy has stated that his music is afrofusion, which he describes as a fusion of afrobeat, hip-hop, reggae, R&B, and dancehall.
