The Amazing Story Of Wizkid From The Rough Streets Of Lagos To Global Stardom

Wizkid's Early Hustle
Wizkid’s story is the ultimate rags to riches trajectory, born Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun in Ojuelegba a vibrant Surulere district of Lagos, Nigeria, he went from singing in his local church choir to becoming one of the most streamed artistes in global music history.

At just 11 years old a young Ayodeji formed a gospel group called the Glorious Five with a few friends. He was a constant presence in the Lagos studio scene, where he slowly gained a reputation for his hard work and tireless dedication eventually catching the eye of established Nigerian Music artist and actor Banky W, who signed him to his record label Empire Mates Entertainment in 2009.

Wizkid’s  first major breakthrough came a year later in 2010 when he released the song "Holla at Your Boy". which instantly became a smash hit on the Nigerian Music scene.   His debut Album 'Superstar' which he dropped the following year in 2011 catapulted him to superstar status and recognition across  Africa as a leading exponent of  Afrobeats music which was gaining rapid popularity around the world. 

Global Recognition
Always hungry for a broader audience, Wizkid began focusing on transnational collaborations, this strategy paid off in 2016 when he co-wrote and featured on Drake's massive hit "One Dance." The track topped the charts worldwide in 15 countries and earned Wizkid a place in the Guinness World Records as the first Afrobeats artiste to reach number one on the Billboard Hot 100. exposing Wizkid and Afrobeats music to audiences in the United States and global entertainment markets around the world.

The Reign Of Big Wizzy  
Since then Wizkid has gone from strength to strength, he set up his label Starboy Entertainment and dropped his critically acclaimed 2020 album "Made in Lagos" which  included the mega hit single 'Essence' featuring  Afrobeats Diva Tems.   The single gained international attention and recognition to become thefirst Nigerian hit single to chart on the Billboard Hot 100.    A  further hugely successful remix of 'Essence' this time in collaboration with Canadian R&B star Justin Bieber  solidified his status as an international icon.

Sold Out Concerts
In 2021 Wizkid became the first Afrobeat artiste to sell out the 02 Arena in London UK with his concerts attracting an audience of 5.2 million fans over 5 nights. He has continued to perform to massive crowds around the world from the O2 Arena, to Glastonbury and Madison Square Garden in the U.S.

Today, Big Wizzy has multiple BET, MOBO and Grammy Awards to his name, he has collaborated and released tracks with some of the biggest international artistes in the in the world such as Beyonce, Chris Brown, Drake & Skepta,  As well as global Afrobeat Artistes such as Olamide, Tiwa Savage, Gunna and Tyler.    He is recognised as one of the first Nigerian artiste's to usher Yoruba -infused Afrobeats music to the global stage alongside the likes of other afrobeats stars such as Tiwa Savage, Davido, Burna Boy and Asake.

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Wizkid Announces New Album On The Way

 

Afro beats Megastar your boy Wizzy Star Boy WizKid recently sparked excitement with a message on social media hinting that new project is underway with a new Album to be released soon although no title or release date has been confirmed yet.

This is welcome news to his millions of fans worldwide and fresh off his nomination for the 2026 BET Awards alongside fellow Nigerian Stars Tems, Burna Boy, and Asake, continuing his strong international recognition streak, we look forward to seeing who comes out on top in this clash of Afrobeat titans.  By the way why has my boy Davido not been nominated😏

Wizkid was also nominated for the Best Artist at the recent 2026 American Music Awards although he was edged out by South African Singer Tyla who won that category - Big shout out to Tyla on that one, please lead the way beautiful Sis for your South African brothers by showing love to all Africans.😊  

Watch this space for more info, album release and tour dates on Wizzy.

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How Burna Boy Fell From Grace in The U.S

On the 12th of November 2025, Burna Boy kicked off his latest tour of the U.S.A riding high on a wave of accolades and achievements, the first African Artist to accumulate five Grammy album award nominations, the first African Artist to sellout a U.S venue, solidifying his reputation as one of the most recognised Afrobeats mega stars on the planet at the moment. 

 

His 8th studio album “No Sign Of Weakness” released on the 25th July featured collaborations with big name artists such as Travis Scott, Stromae, Shaboozey and even Mick Jagger.

 

Controversy

So as they say what could go wrong? for a man obviously at the peak of his career.

Unfortunately, where there is fame and fortune, pride and self-destruction are often not far behind.     The controversy for Burna Boy started after he ejected a female fan from his concert in Colorado for the alleged sin of daring to fall asleep during the show. This led to a backlash on Social Media with tickets sales plummeting after widespread calls for fans especially females to boycott his shows.   Burna Boy seemed to have made the matter worse by issuing a late half-hearted apology to the lady probably after realising that his ticket sales were falling.

 

Since then there have been videos circulating online showing Burna Boy performing to a half empty concert venue in Houston Texas, which must have been a disaster for him, considering the fact that Houston Texas is known to have a high population of his fellow Nigerians as well as other Africans.  There has also been news that he had to cancel his concert scheduled for the 28th of November in Minneapolis due to low ticket sales. 

 

So what are the takeaways from this – My view would be that Burna  Boy obviously needs to improve on his customer care and  public relation skills, I for one believe that Burna should have immediately issued an apology and a full refund to the lady in question.   There is no doubt that he is a hugely talented Artiste, but no matter how big or famous an Artiste might be, he is still nothing without his fans. Especially females if you are a young male artist.   We all know that the U.S market has always been a hard nut to crack, and it can also quite unforgiving and very quick to consign Artists to oblivion if they stumble and make too many mistakes.   Just ask Janet Jackson who never seemed to have never recovered from that Super Bowl fiasco back in 2004 or Vanilla Ice who went from hero to zero faster than you could melt an ice cream cone in the Sahara.

Will Burna Boy weather the storm and recover from the dent in his popularity – I think he probably will mainly because he is one of the most talented Afrobeats artists on the planet at the moment and he has a huge followings in Africa, the UK -Europe etc so he is not solely reliant on the US market, however he needs to learn lessons from this incident and not take his audience for granted -Artistes rise and fall all the time – I would suggest he takes particular note of the experience of his fellow Nigerian star Naira Marley who seems to have permanently fallen from fame after undergoing his own controversy due to the death of his label artiste -Mohbad in 2023.

 

Anyway folks thanks for visiting this blog,  Please feel free to leave your comments below.

 

 

Lagos Will Humble You

10 Keys To Success

 

Trump's Arrogance Towards Africa & Why It Matters

We all know that U.S president Donald Trump is not one to hold back when making statements about perceived friends or foes and I daresay he doesn't always seem to have much regard for the truth or actual facts.  

So his attitude towards African countries is probably not surprising given his past infamous description of countries from that continent as $***holes. More recently in 2025 he seems to have continued his  arrogant and dismissive behavior towards Africa: as illustrated in the examples below.

1. “Country nobody has ever heard of” — Lesotho (March 2025)

While addressing.S. Congress, Trump singled out Lesotho—one of Africa’s AGOA beneficiaries mocking its significance by calling it a country “nobody has ever heard of” as justification for cutting aid. The government called the remarks “shocking” and offensive.

2. White House “mini‑summit” of only five African leaders (July 9, 2025)

Trump hosted presidents from Liberia, Senegal, Mauritania, Gabon, and Guinea‑Bissau—excluding major economies like Nigeria, South Africa, and Kenya. He then opened the summit by framing them as representatives of the entire African continent, emphasizing their countries’ natural resources and treating them like transactional partners, not equals  .

At one point, he complimented Liberian President Boakai “beautiful English”—an apparent surprise given that English is Liberia’s official language since its founding. This remark was widely criticized as colonial, condescending, and ignorant.

3. Oval Office confrontation with South African President Ramaphosa (May 21, 2025)

• In a highly publicised bilateral meeting Trump dimmed the lights and showed manipulated imagery, claiming “white genocide” in South Africa. Many clips actually came from conflicts in the DRC.
• Accused Ramaphosa of endorsing violence against white farmers during a land reform debate, ignoring constitutional context and data showing equal violence rates across racial lines. Trump interrupted Ramaphosa and dismissed his rebuttal on facts.
• Followed up by cutting all U.S. aid to South Africa, offering fast‑track U.S. citizenship to white Afrikaners only, and imposing punitive tariffs on South African exports (31 %) while undermining the AGOA framework.

Critics described the meeting as a “diplomatic ambush,” noting it was orchestrated for dramatic effect rather than mutual understanding, and judged the rhetoric biased and disrespectful.

4. Africa policy pivot: from “aid to trade” with double standards

Starting summer 2025, Trump proclaimed a policy shift from humanitarian aid to “commercial diplomacy.” However, he simultaneously:

• Closed USAID and reduced aid to critical programs like HIV treatment.
• Imposed steep tariffs on South African goods and other African exports.
• Gave preferential refugee status to Afrikaners while de-prioritizing other vulnerable groups. These actions were widely viewed as transactional rather than transformative engagement  .

Analysts argue that this rhetoric cast Africa not as a continent of sovereign nations, but as a commodity pool to serve U.S geopolitical and economic needs.

↪ Why this matters

These examples highlight a consistent pattern in early 2025: a U.S. leader addressing African nations with disregard for their sovereignty, contextual nuance, or diplomatic parity. This culminates into controversial refugee policies, rhetorical confrontations, punitive trade actions, and optics clearly favouring U.S. interests over mutual respect.

 However some Africans are actually beginning to see Trump's behaviour as a possible blessing in disguise, due to the fact that Africa is a continent blessed with an abundance of resources, mineral wealth and manpower, his dismissive and arrogant behaviour could serve as a wake up call to the continent and encourage self development and self reliance and control of its own resources rather than an over reliance and dependence on the West.  

And of course there are other major players like China, Russia Turkey, India etc which means African now has other partnerships options, who so far have been more than willing to step into any gaps left by Western Powers.  

So while Trump continues to see  his sh***hole countries the others major players are seeing  goldmines boundless resources and endless opportunities. and above all maybe this is the time for the sleeping giant to wake up. 

Rema - Trouble Maker (Official Music Video)

 Rema Ravages  - Released 26 October 2023

Global Afrobeats superstar  Rema  drops his new EP titled Ravages  featuring 5 mid tempo tracks of those mellow dulcet tones which we all know so well .  I would say Rema aka Mr " Calm Down" does not disappoint with his new offerings, and there is definitely plenty of material to keep his army of fans happy.

My favourite stand out track would be  the debut album "Trouble maker" although the tracks "DND" and 'Don't Leave" were also close favourites 

Since hitting the music scene in 2019 under the auspices of Mavin Records Rema has gone from strength to strength releasing banger after banger culminating in his mega hit "Calm Down" which led to incredibly successful world tours and that massive collaboration with Global pop star Selena Gomez.  

As usual his album cover features some very interesting artwork and symbolisms indicating heightened creative awareness and spiritual awakenings such as third eye activation.  Needless to say Rema is a serious artiste deeply into to self development and inner introspections  

Rema has definitely earned his place as one of biggest afro beat stars on the planet and no doubt, will continue to go from strength to strength and challenge his Nigerian contemporaries, the likes of Burna Boy, Davido, WizKid and dare l say Asake for that coveted title King Of Afrobeats  

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