Okay on a mission to 'save' hiplife
Not all musicians are apparently happy with the current trend of music in the country. Okay, an emerging artiste in the industry has expressed his reservations in his latest song Hiplife, which features Trigmatic.
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Okay, who has been into music from a very young age, believes musicians in the country are straying from the root of hiplife by referring to their music genres as Twi Pop, GH Rap among others.
In the song Hiplife, the two artistes who describe themselves as “doctors,” try to diagnose the problems affecting the music genre and prescribe medication in order to save it.
In his rap verse, Okay, depicts hiplife as a critically ill patient at the point of death because of the lack of interest by some up and coming artistes in making that genre of music. In what can only be described a direct “attack” on some contemporary rappers, Okay says “they don’t know what they are about.”
He further chronicles the growth of hiplife and attributes this to the work of predecessors like Reggie Rockstone, Obrafuor, Akyeame and Lord Kenya.
Trigmatic who joins Okay in his mission to “save hiplife” in the song lays the blame firmly at the doorstep of DJs and event promoters, accusing them of condoning noise.
“Hiplife is an indigenous Ghanaian creation and we are doing a great disservice to ourselves and the music industry if we ignore it and keep doing all these other genres. Hiplife music has put Ghanaian music on the map and it has the potential to take us even further,” Okay said to Showbiz in an interview last Wednesday.
He advised that in order to see the development of music in the country, the established artistes would have to provide more support to the emerging talents in the form of mentorship and collaborations.
Okay said he entered music because he saw an opportunity to target the youth of the country with his message of empowerment.
He stressed that the youth have enormous potential and through hard work, their dreams would be fulfilled.
Okay, real name, Mathew Amathey Williams has worked with some accomplished artistes such as Kese in Just Bounce, Qwesi O and Chase.