Burna Boy is soaring over the crowd at Amsterdam’s Ziggo Dome, yelling the Yoruba term that loosely means “move your legs.” His six-foot-one frame explodes into the air, seemingly powered by enough energy to fuel the Space Drift Tour race car he zoomed onto the stage in earlier. Wearing a blue custom Botter jumpsuit, he looks like some kind of Afro-futurist astronaut, ready to fly even higher.

“He gives his all. And when he comes off [stage], you’ll see him in the dressing room, falling flat out on the floor and shaking,” says his younger sister Ronami Ogulu, who’s also his stylist and creative director. “Then he comes up and we patch him all together and we go again the next day.”


Three days later, Burna is in South London and decidedly more earthbound, slouched in an antique red leather chair. He takes long, drawn-out puffs from his Backwood, taking care that his denim Off-White ensemble doesn’t turn into a designer ashtray. He speaks in aphorisms, like “It is better to stick with the devils you know” (why he keeps family, including his sister and “momager” Bose Ogulu, on his team) and “I hope for the best and am prepared for the worst” (when he thinks about the future of the African continent). When he laughs, tiny diamond tooth gems glint at the edges of his kilowatt smile. When he’s finished answering a question, he gestures toward me with his hand and sternly commands, “Proceed.”


Especially for a fellow African who shares his passion for our motherland, an audience with Burna feels a bit like one with a dignitary. And while he may have just flown here from Amsterdam a few nights before, his exhaustion does not take precedence over his calling — his mission — to spread his signature Afro-fusion music all over the world. “It has always been my vision to build a bridge between all Black people in all parts of the world through the music and performance,” he states. “Music is the No. 1 messenger.”

The 30-year-old artist, born Damini Ebunoluwa Ogulu in Port Harcout, Nigeria, now splits his time between London and Lagos. And as his career gets more globe-spanning, the concept of his homeland seems to only become more and more important to him — and central to his identity as an artist. After pandemic delays, he has finally been touring the songs from his fifth album, Twice as Tall, released nearly two years ago on Atlantic Records/Bad Habit/Warner Music International and his own label, Spaceship Collective.

It won the 2021 Grammy Award for best global music album, along with the praise of Nigeria’s minister of information and culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, who called the award “a global endorsement for the Afrobeat genre of music that has propelled Nigeria’s increasing dominance of the music world.” And Burna is adamant that his signature “Afro-fusion” sound — a blend of Afrobeats folklore, dancehall riddims, hip-hop swagger, reggae and R&B, all sung in his distinct baritone mix of Yoruba, English and pidgin — is leading the way.

SOURCE: http://uphorial.com/post/burna-boys-global-vision-taking-afro-fusion-to-the-next-level