Cult of success
“Hey, when we talk about the wolf! » In a lounge of her label, Chimamanda Pearl Chukwuma, 18, turns wide-eyed towards the television mounted on the wall, connected to a channel broadcasting music videos. There is indeed a resemblance, but also a chasm, between the young woman sitting in front of us, accessible and spontaneous, in jeans and a wool jacket, and the singer with blue hair and sparkling jewelry who, on the screen, drives a large engine launched at full speed. In a Bonnie and Clyde scenario, the latest music video for Qing Madi – her stage name – was released two days earlier.
Qing Madi is living her “Lagos dream”. A few years after leaving his hometown of Benin City – a “village” compared to the “New York of Africa” – it only took a song posted on TikTok, at the end of 2022, for everything to come to a head : titles, collaborations, concerts, interviews and signing with Sony. In the bright offices of the major which overlook the lagoon of the Nigerian economic capital, she seems to sincerely marvel: “Everything happens at once. It’s just crazy! » To keep her feet on the ground, she says, her mother regularly sends her to fill the fridge.
You’ve probably never heard of Qing Madi. But more likely from the prolific music industry of which she is one of the latest rising stars: afrobeats. The genre is one of the hottest on the planet, according to Spotify. With 14 billion streams on this streaming platform in 2023, it has recorded an increase of 700% since 2017. One of its biggest hits, Calm Down, by Rema, has entered the closed circle of one billion streams .This music mixing hip-hop, R&B, dancehall and African rhythms has over the last fifteen years patiently conquered Africa, then Europe and the United States. And it all started from Lagos.
In the sprawling and festive megacity of 20 million inhabitants, Afrobeats is everywhere. From the sputtering radios of taxis to the most exclusive nightclubs, including the brand new tramway, where, on small inlaid screens, its slick and colorful clips make users absently tap their feet. The rich brag about inviting celebrities to sing at their weddings and the whole city seems to shudder when superstar Wizkid, who hasn’t been seen for months, sends out an angry tweet towards another artist.
Cult of success
Afrobeats has its “star system”, and at the top sits a trinity, adored, wealthy and adorned with nicknames to match its excess. Wizkid was the first. In 2011, at barely 20 years old, he recorded his first album, simply titled Superstar. A hit, followed by numerous hits and collaborations, including One Dance, with Canadian rapper Drake. Wizkid, the “machala” (nickname which praises his greatness), is “a national treasure”, bows a communicator.
He is closely followed by Davido, who, in the 2010s, made all of Africa and beyond dance. “With a portable Mac, I make you a hit”, boasted to Le Monde in 2017, the leader of the “30BG” (“gang of 30 billion”, in reference to his fortune), a coat of arms worn by his relatives on heavy pendants set with diamonds.
Then comes Burna Boy, who brings success further, stronger on the international scene. The self-proclaimed “African Giant” (name of his fourth album, released in 2019) fills stadiums, won a Grammy for best album (for Twice as Tall, released in 2020) and is in 2024 among the most influential personalities of the Time.
“I’m a rockstar,” he blurted out, again to Le Monde, at the end of 2021 in the suite of a Parisian palace, a Balenciaga boot planted on the coffee table.
In Nigeria, an oil state marked by extreme inequalities but also by a cult of success, this new elite displays its flamboyant life: private jets, Ferraris and haute couture fashion shows. Even in the lyrics of the songs, which, in addition to love, evoke in a mixture of English, Pidgin and Yoruba the obsession with success and money. The very young Ayra Starr dedicates her hit Rush to them: “My friend, nobody likes to work/But you have to fight if you want to eat. »
There are some nuances though. Many of Burna Boy’s titles sing about hardships (Ye was the anthem of the movement against police violence « EndSARS », in 2020), Omah Lay tells of depression and addictions, while Naira Marley likes to provoke the Nigerian authorities, making notably in Soapy the apology for masturbation in prison.
In Lagos, Afrobeats makes young people dance, but they can also project their dreams of a better future, and above all accessible to all. With the exception of Davido, son of a wealthy businessman, most of the artists come from very popular backgrounds. Wizkid, born into a family of thirteen children, grew up in Surulere, a poor neighborhood in the vast mainland where most Lagosians live. MohBad, whose mysterious death in September aroused great emotion, that of Ikorodu.
