Celebrations in the air as Wizkid becomes the first Afrobeats artiste to win Grammy award

It was an emotional moment for Wizkid fans across the world as Wizkid became the first Nigerian artiste to win Grammy award since Sikiru Adepoju in 2008 as “Brown Skin Girl” wins “video of the year” at the 63rd Grammy award, people took to social media to celebrate the Grammy award winner as he hits a new milestone in his career. In every industry, there is a trophy used to mark outstanding performance. In music, awards are used to celebrate artistes with outstanding performance in a year and Grammy happens to be the most prestigious music award worldwide. Although there are questions and concerns raised about the credibility of the award but it still remains what it used to be.

Nigeria music industry has had a huge number of talented artistes for decades but the industry saw a whole different type of talent, a rare breed that made it out at a tender age when the industry was filled with grown men and women, that person happens to be no one else but Wizkid. People already know what he was capable of doing when he was featured on M.I song “Fast Money Fast Cars”, that was a hell of an entrance into the industry, he came in and breathed new life in to Afrobeats scene. In 2010, he dropped his debut single “Hola at your boy” and the whole country went crazy, everybody wanted to be Wizkid, everybody wanted to dress like him, every youth wanted to become an artiste, he has had so much influence on the youth. He went ahead to drop his debut album “Superstar” in 2011, this album took over the street, every track on this album was somebody’s favorite, you could organize a party with Superstar album alone and everybody will be satisfied, it is unarguably top 2 debut album Nigeria has ever had. However, few months later, Wizkid went ahead to win The Headies Next Rated award on October 2011, he also won The Headies Artiste of year award and MOBO Best African Act award in 2012. That was the beginning of a whole different level of greatness. One of the things that made Wizkid stand out amongst others was knowing what he wanted, he put in the work, spoke everything in to existence on his songs and let God take charge of his career. Everything Wizkid achieved today, he did it because he believes so much in himself and he knows what he is capable of. For someone that used to be a studio rat, he made sure he utilized every opportunity he got to showcase his talent back then in OJB studio.

There is no smooth path anywhere, they say there is a price to pay for greatness and Wizkid paid dearly, he has been heavily criticized, for someone with this quality of talent, one would think he would have a smooth ride, and the backings of music critics. When Wizkid dropped his sophomore album “Ayo” in 2014, the reception from critics was poor, there were mixed feelings due to the blogs rated the album as low as 2/10, an album that houses hit songs like Jaiye Jaiye, Caro, On top your Matter, Joy, One Question, and the African anthem “Ojuelegba”, it was a shocker in the eyes of die hard Wizkid fans, they expressed their disapproval. Some lamented about the bias, while some said critics wanted to put him down, they said the criticisms were so unfair and undeserving. For an artiste that just parted ways with his label and launched his own label, the criticism could have just ended every dream he ever had. However, Wizkid happens to be a kind of person that believes in himself so much that he does not believe anyone is capable of stopping him. It is quite unbelievable that an album that was heavily criticized by music critics took Wizkid to a level that looked like just a dream to Nigerian artistes, big international celebrities started dancing and vibing to tracks from the album, and eventually Ojuelegba got Drake’s attention, it was introduced to him by Skepta and Drake decided to hop on it, he did a remix to the song in 2015 and that was the icing on the cake for Wizkid. Despite the criticism, Wizkid did not sit back and throw pity party, he was making moves that would be helpful to his career.

Ojuelegba was named 12th best song in the world in 2015 by faders magazine. What Wizkid said on his song No Lele “my music travel no visa” was such a big prophecy, his music went far to places even himself never thought would reach, he also said “say I go be number 1, as a born champion No lele” on the song, and he went ahead to become the flag bearer and face of Afrobeats, whenever Afrobeats is mentioned in a conversation in the world, the first name that comes out from people’s mouth is Wizkid. People thought Wizkid - Drake work relationship was a one off thing but it turned out to be more than that. In 2016, Drake announced he would be dropping 2 singles “One Dance ft Kyla & Wizkid” and “Pop Style ft Kanye West & Jay Z”, when the songs dropped, Wizkid was the center of attention on “twitter NG”, criticism was flying around on social media, some music fans said he did not get to meet Drake, while some said he recorded his verse on whatsapp. To people’s surprise, the song ended up being Drake’s first song to chart on billboard hot 100 no 1, it spent 10 weeks on the chart (a record then). Who would have thought a song featuring Wizkid would end up being bigger than a song featuring Kanye West and Jay Z. Apparently, Wizkid co wrote the song alongside others, he was credited as a producer and a writer on the song. This song fetched Wizkid 7 billboard award nominations, 3 wins, iheart radio award, BMI award and ASCAP Award.

Fans lamented that music critics made collaborations look wrong just to throw Wizkid’s effort away. Drake’s first and second billboard no 1 hits are features, Nicki Minaj spent a decade without billboard no 1 hit, she scored 2 billboard hits in 2020 with features, J Cole won his only Grammy award with a feature, why do we have to draw the line when it comes to Wizkid? Collaborations do not take anything away from artistes, there is nothing shameful about it.

In 2017, Wizkid dropped another collaboration with Drake titled “Come Closer”, the song was criticized but when the video dropped and Drake failed to make an appearance, the criticism went to a whole different level on twitter, he was shamed by some twitter users because Drake did not appear in the video, which eventually did not have any effect on the song. However, Come Closer went ahead to become statistically one of the biggest Afrobeats songs, it has sold 200,000 units in UK (silver), 80,000 units in Canada (platinum) , and 500,000 units in US (gold).

In a volatile music industry like Nigeria, you need more than just talent to maintain high level of consistency, Nigerians demands are very high and confusing, and Wizkid understood this right from the genesis of his career, he has evolved overtime, doing different sound on different albums. Nigerians say they want the old Wizkid but when “Escape”, a song recorded in 2012 dropped, it didn’t get the deserved attention, Wizkid understands Nigerians so well, he knew he has to evolve and grow, he never followed crowd, he does what pleases him and this has paid off immensely. Listen to Superstar, Ayo, Sounds From The Other Side, Soundman EP, and Made In Lagos, the differences in sound are so glaring and evident, the evolution in his sound is audible enough for the deaf to hear it and visible enough for the blinds to see it.

In 2019, Beyonce curated an album for Lion King movie, she enlisted 6 Nigerian artistes including Wizkid on the album but Wizkid took the spotlight with his outstanding delivery on Brown Skin Girl, he delivered a top quality chorus and verse on the song. Who would have thought the boy from the street of Ojuelegba would sing a duet with Beyonce. Wizkid’s delivery as usual attracted unfair criticism from Nigerians and also praises from fans on social media, critics said “he didn’t write his verse”, “he cannot come up with that verse himself”, his fans came to his defense and brushed off the criticism. Wizkid fans claimed everybody knows Wizkid obviously wrote his verse, they said the criticism was nothing but agenda. Some people did not expect Wizkid to be on the best song on the album, not like they do not know what he is capable of, they just wished he would not deliver. The Grammy award winner has impacted 90% of international songs he has been on, his success rate is very high. Nigerians celebrate other artistes for doing what Wizkid get criticized for, when he features an artiste, critics say the featured artiste carried the song, when an artiste features him, they call it “gumbody” meanwhile if someone else does, it will be celebration everywhere.

On March 14th, Wizkid became the first Afrobeats artiste to win Grammy award, for years, the award has eluded Nigerians, but no one else deserves to have that title “first Afrobeats artiste to win a grammy” than Wizkid, after a decade of consistency, delivery and immense work rate, winning a Grammy award to crown all his efforts and cultural impact on Afrobeats is well deserving. He has won every award he is eligible to win, he won awards no African based artiste has ever won (Billboard Music Award), Grammy was the only award left for him to win and he won that on Sunday, 14th of march. Nigerian Artistes have tried to win this prestigious award for decades, for someone that has never submitted his project for consideration, the award walked to him on it own, he did not have to do too much, he won with his top notch delivery on Beyoncé’s Brown Skin Girl. When Brown Skin Girl video was nominated last year, some social media users said he would not be credited, for information available on the internet, one would think critics would take their time to make some research on how the Grammys work but no, they were so obsessed with discrediting Wizkid with their ignorance. When Brown Skin Girl video was announced as the winner of the video of the year, congratulations were flying around on social media but fans claimed half of these came from people that wished he did not win, and the hypocrisy did not take long before it jumped out. Furthermore, When the other artiste was announced as the winner of his category, the hypocrisy jumped out and agenda started flying around, people started talking about how he won the award through “attachment”, meanwhile they forgot Wizkid won in a domestic category where Brown Skin Girl was competing with Future & Drake’s “Life is Good”. However, Wizkid won Grammy award as a lead artiste, he co owns the song together with Beyoncé, even if he wasn’t a lead artiste on the song, there is nothing shameful in winning a Grammy as a featured artiste. Some people were angry the spotlight had to be shared and Wizkid got people’s attention more than the other artiste, they resulted into trying to throw the win into an ocean but Wizkid FC already promised themselves never to let a Wizkid slander stand again and they did overshadow every agenda that was raised that night, the first Afrobeats Grammy award winner’s fans backed everything they said with facts. With everything Wizkid has been through in the hand of the media, and his cultural impacts on Afrobeats, it’s so sad to see there are still people out there trying to bin his efforts.

With the quality and success of the Grammy award winner’s latest album “Made In Lagos”, his fans hope he submits the album for consideration this year, and hope he does not just submit it for “Global album” category alone, the album is world standard, it can compete with other albums from international artistes in domestic categories. Not many know that Wizkid’s “Made In Lagos” missed out on Grammy nominations because it dropped 2 months after the deadline for submission of songs and projects for Grammy consideration, people started asking why was Made In Lagos album not nominated if it was as good as people say, this was another act of unfair criticism Wizkid got from Nigerians, a simple research could have saved them from asking the wrong question in a bid to slander him.

The 63rd Grammy award night was an eye opener for Nigerians, most people do not know how Grammy works and it is highly disappointing that people cannot even make little research before they take to internet to congratulate someone that was not even credited as a nominee in the first place, the album did not even win the category it was nominated for, one would wonder where the congratulations were coming from, even the person in question did not congratulate herself. Nigeria music industry is one of the biggest in the world, we should try and make some research about how things work in the global market. However, collaborations are part of music, winning a Grammy award with collaboration is nothing to be shameful about, there is no special statuette for solo wins, 1 Grammy is 1 Grammy, nothing like solo or featured ariste on the Grammy website, every winner gets the same statuette and credibility at the end of the day.