Ayra Starr is having her face beat into oblivion for a photoshoot — a makeup artist hovers over her while we speak on Zoom. Unbothered, the 19-year-old musician proceeds to meditate on the beauty and calamity of being young. “You’re allowed to make mistakes,” she says, with expressive hands topped …
Read More »How Rema Became Afrobeats' New Superhero
When Rema thinks about the past two years of his life, a time in which he’s rocketed from Benin City, Nigeria, to global stardom, he’s reminded of the biblical story of David. “He took care of the sheeps,” says the 19-year-old rapper and singer, citing the way he’s tried to …
Read More »Davido's 'Fall' Is Finally Catching On in the U.S., But It Should Be Bigger
The Nigerian style of music known as Afrobeats has quietly entranced a large swathe of the world’s population. “Pretty much every song on pop radio [in the U.K. now] is sort of a Mr. Eazi-style, chill, afrobeats [track],” the producer Riton told Rolling Stone last year. But Nigerian singers have …
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