Issue 47 | December 2018
REMINISCE
Alaga ibile is more than just a local rapper
It
by IfeOluwa Nihinola
is difficult to determine what drove Reminisce to produce ‘Ponmile’ in 2017. But it can’t be mere coincidence that in the year of #metoo Remilekun Abdulkalid Safaru produced a song where he inches towards vulnerability, albeit reluctantly. Or is it? If we played a game of word associations and asked what comes to mind when the name Reminisce is called, the response should always be sex. The man hasn’t found a rap verse he can’t infuse with graphic descriptions of coitus, usually as a way to boast about his prowess. So, when the macho lothario was heard pleading and grovelling about love, the response of many was a mixture of shock and admiration. That the rapper who sang ‘Tesojue’ could sing ‘Ponmile’ was a sign that maybe there’s hope that the prototypical male Nigerian rapper with his veneer of hyper-aggressiveness will finally find value in vulnerability. “When things no pure / Would you be my umbrella / When rain dey fall / If you no go dey there o / Je te te so / Kin ma lo pa ra mi si e l’orun,” he sings, telling his woman a lack of assurance that she’ll be with him will lead to his death. Manipulative? Yes, but a crack of emotion from a man who had made a career out of verses that sound like the masculine id in its basest libidinous form is always welcome. Consider, however, that in the song ‘If Only’, released in his first album Book of Rap Stories, Reminisce sings, “You’re all I want, you’re all I have, if you hurt me I’m gon’ bleed.” That emotion in Ponmile did not come out of a void. Before he became Alaga Ibile, one of Nigeria’s most respected hip hop artists and a leading “local rapper”, Reminisce was an MC in the American mode of the word. His first single ‘Ever Since’ featuring 9ice was delivered in fluent English with smart punchlines and references to Americans Mick Jagger and 50 Cent. The aforementioned ‘If Only’ was delivered in the same linguistic mode. There was lyrical competence to Reminisce’s performance, which was already a requirement for stardom in late 2000s and early 2010s Nigerian hip hop. But that competence did not mask the irony of listening to a man shouting that he’s from the streets of Lagos in a language that is anything but local to his home. Thankfully, Reminisce had already met the men at Coded Tunes, as part of a clique of rappers called Yabtown Squad. The influence of working in a space where ID Cabasa was producing beats, Lord of Ajasa was rapping in Yoruba and 9ice was singing his unique Fuji-based sound was bound to produce something better than an American clone. By the time Reminisce released ‘Kako bii chicken’ in 2011, the late Dagrin had already proven that a brashtalking, Yoruba-speaking rapper can be loved and adored. And Olamide, another product of the Coded Tunes pipeline, had shown that formula replicable in his ‘Eni Duro’. So, it should surprise no one that slim, bleach-haired Reminisce found his audience. “Mo n’awo ya, o n dun bi woofer” he sang in the first verse of ‘Kako bii chicken’, and it was obvious to Yoruba speakers that he wasn’t just moving on to greater things like he claimed in the song’s introduction but, with a line that is essentially translates to a boast about hitting a vagina till it sounds like a broken woofer, he was also settling for raunchier things. Four studio albums, two-time appearance on the Billboard World Music Charts and a mention in Time magazine in 2014 as one of seven “world rappers you should meet”, among other things are a reflection of Reminisce’s immense success. But he, like other local rappers of his ilk, still raps like one who is an underdog. Maybe they need that status to fuel their ambition, but it’s dissonant to hear Reminisce, Olamide and Phyno, kings of the streets, embrace the moniker ‘local rapper’, while also reminding the world that it started as a term of derision. 8
