AThe head of a music video shoot on a green road in Kumasi, Ghana’s second largest city, Yao Tog and his friends are sleeping on the edge. Passersby approach the young star to get pictures. “Fame is crazy, it comes almost overnight,” he says. “I am proud of seeing and doing the vision I wanted. We are here now. ”
A year ago, the 18-year-old was able to move between classes on the high school grounds unnoticed, but the thin and incredible figure cannot be hidden now. Ya Tog is currently completing the exams and is one of the city’s most famous MCs – the Ghanaian rapper, who has garnered thousands of fans around the world.
The excavation, which combines huge bus notes with Namer Percentage, is full of fluctuating flows, improved from rap shows in the United States and garbage in London. It has exploded in Ghana over the past 18 months, and is now on the rise in the country and on the country’s music charts. …………………………………………………….. The songs are closely associated with the English mainstream, but have a dark, dark, fairytale imprint of Chicago and New York in poor communities.
Physically, it is the same compassion and gentleness, but it still seems to slide into the video set — and into the microphone in the streets — into an alternative-ego. With confidence and controlling violence, he points his hand at a gun and presents poems about street life in Camese.
A.D. In August 2020, the same single sore, the most common indigenous language, was “revived” in Twi. Stormzy (“Like a Big Brother”, he says) is a re-enactment of the Rex, a rhetorical and controversial poem that revolves around organic, uncontrollable emotions and offensive lyrics between TV and English. Asaka artists. It spread throughout Ghana, and now it’s his mother’s phone ring. She won’t let me go to school, so I play music mainly on weekends. ” “But she is definitely proud of me. She shows my friends my songs, my videos. Pleasing her is a good feeling. ”
Other successful tracks, such as Jay Bahd’s Condemnation, Coffee Jamar Icorso (featuring the same Togo) and Smallgod’s sinner-British-Ghanaian drill headie One – have gained millions of views on YouTube and in Ghana, the music industry has slowed down, with the music industry slowing down. But now he has to accept it carefully.
Many of the videos show the American-inspired sub-cultural lens that has come to life in Kumasi in recent years — reinforced by the Asaka movement — rethinking the city in American culture and group life. Yes and many in the video are branded red bands, partly inspired by LA’s Bloods gang, and Kumasi is called “Kumrika”, other districts are named to reflect American cities. For Kumasi, their flag includes the American flag stars and stripes. Pop smoke from the United States, which was killed last year, has a lasting effect on Pep. His grievances are rooted in Adlibis, with artists such as J. Bahd sometimes spreading his clarity, and others performing his “woo walk” dance.
He acknowledged the American influence, saying, “But it is ours.” The music is from Kumasi – our energy, our history. “It’s our stamp on the culture,” shouts another artist, Don Elvi. In parallel, the American world uses America as an imaginary proposition, but they feel it is based in Kumasi, serving as a signature of their voice and cultural identity, and as an escape from their own reality.
AAt the far end of the road hanging from the red soil, several open and unfinished concrete houses, grocery stores and farm plots, singer Okenet, 22, and a group of artists and producers perform. Music in a large courtyard on a hillside overlooking the landscape. This is a “trap house” – a little more efficient than American culture, a place to prepare and sell drugs. “This is where we do everything, everything is at home,” Okenet said with a smile.
Although those in Kumasi seemed a little contemptuous, trained artists later appeared in the Ghanaian capital, Accra. “As an artist, you have to go to Accra,” says Okenet. But we are showing you that you can do it.
Accelerated growth in Accra has allowed the government to present the image of Ghana to the world – a growing country and a magnet for foreign investment and tourism. It was officially called the “Year of the Return” after the first African slaves entered the United States through cultural events, encouraging Ghanaians to forge strong ties with their homeland. The country has become a popular destination for West African Americans and blacks in the Middle East.
However, much of Ghana’s second city, located in the heart of the ancient Ashanti kingdom, seems to have evolved little. Kumasi’s rich cultural and musical history, mixed poverty, and widespread anger at the country’s rulers make Kumasi the perfect place to live. “We’re really lagging behind,” says Okenet. “People feel neglected by the government. But still, that’s why people really make fun of us. ”- In other words, why young people love and respect their music. They want to put us on the map.
The rise of the Holocaust is a reflection of the genre’s focus in the UK, and the lyrics are particularly violent, to the point of glorifying and inspiring. “It is ignorance,” says Okenet. There was a crime here a long time ago – what we are doing is to show our honesty and experience.
As drill maturity in the UK grew, the genre’s number 1 single and Headie One lifted the album charts to British accolades, still rising in Kumasi. A European tour of Asaka has been planned since Amsterdam and a new partnership is underway.
Instagram videos posted by Stormzy’s birthday party in late July show guests appreciating Okenet’s lyrics. Yes, his first trip to London was with Stormzy on Ghana’s highways. “a lot of [UK] Artists have shown love. Pa Saliyu, BackRoad Gee, many artists. There are definitely more things to come. ”
Time, his Sore Monitor, has done well in Ghana streaming charts and is working on a new album. It has become a process of gaining fame for this self-centered inner person who can no longer integrate into the background.
“Everything happened so quickly,” he says. “I had to get used to it, change some things in my life, I can no longer go to the same places, because everyone is surrounded by love. But I am truly blessed – I believe it is just the beginning. ”