Rema is most likely gearing for his big moment; the release of his first album.
Okay, I’ll cut him some slack, he’s a good guy. He’s got the talent, the energy and you can see the effort he puts in (even when he’s muttering utter nonsense). That, in this industry, is quite enough, if you’ve got the platform.
So many guys before him have done it, but not a lot has done it quite the way he is currently doing it. The best description of what he’s doing is raving. Rema is raving!
We all love it yeah, but why? Is it because is sound is organic or he’s bringing a fresh sound and leading a pack of young artists who have the potential to take Afrobeats to the whole world, in a new dimension?
Or is it simply because Rema is, a refined copy of Wizkid?
When Rema came, the WizKid comparisons started coming in. He did a song called “Iron Man” in 2019, and that song was all shades of WizKid‘s 2017 hit, “Fever.” The nose-singing, the mumbling, the Igbo words, everything.
Rema kind of drifted away from that vibe, though. At least for a while. His recent efforts, including “Dimension” and “Peace Of Mind,” had us thinking if Rema‘s doing an album, then he’s going to do some solid lyrical stuff on it and not just the WizKid cloning thing.
His new single though, “Soundgasm” isn’t unlike “Iron Man” or “Fever,” for that matter. The jam is banging, it’s got the sound and all, and was produced by London (also known to have worked with WizKid on “Soundman”). This could be a real hit.
It’s got explicit lyrics, Rema talking about sex in the clearest language he could possibly use. Some Chris Brown shit.
“Soundgasm” is really good. But it’s all just Wizkid, and that might be a problem for Rema as we move on, because for one, people won’t ever stop the comparison.
As a matter of fact, I am not even surprised because there are very few major new school pop acts who don’t draw heavily from Wizkid‘s template.
Whether they want to accept it or not, the influence is there. He helped define what is now currently the mainstream sound in Nigeria.
Rema is leading the pack, but he’s mirroring Wizkid heavily, to say the least.
