Time now for ‘Time 4 Me’
Staying visible and relevant in the fast-changing world of popular music is always a hard task for many artistes but singer Becca has continued to show her survival ability from 2007 when she hit the scene with her Sugar debut album.
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She now has a new 20-track album under her belt which she calls Time 4 Me. Her fans had speculated for about three years that she was bringing a collection. Though the wait has been long, they can take heart in the fact she is finally here with some heart-warming material for all.
The singer gave indications from the Sugar album that she did not want to be pigeon-holed and she seems to maintain that stance on the Time 4 Me album. The songs, which she refers to as a journey inspired by her thoughts and emotions, vary in theme and tempo to get listeners constantly hooked.
There are musings on life (Naked I Came), romance-coated pieces (No Away; Nsroma; Odo Why), feel- good, danceable stuff (Dan Maliyo; Follow The Leader), concern for the world (Streets), call for fun (Stomp It Up) and awareness of God (Jesus).
The songs all seem tailored to tell specific stories and she wraps them in her beautiful voice to offer listeners something to savour.
Becca has performed on several occasions in Nigeria, thus accruing a substantial following there. She has therefore cleverly packaged tracks which one can easily tell are meant to shore up her presence in that country.
Three well-known Nigerian acts: 2Face, MI and Kefee are featured on Bad Man Bad Girl, No Away and Dan Maliyo respectively. She even sings in Yoruba on Ma Sunkum Mo ( a Yoruba expression meaning Don’t Cry).
Becca does well to hold her own on the album but input from other specialized brains helped to pull off the clever collection. Electric bassist Philip Acquah, keyboardists Johnny Fingers and Kwabena Akwaboah, percussionist Oko Ashieboye are among the instrumentalists that add a lot of groove to the songs.
American music producer Rick Bacchus, who has produced or written songs for world-famous artistes like Alicia Keys, Stevie Wonder, Christina Aguilera and Backstreet Boys in the past, was firmly in Becca’s corner for the socially-relevant Streets song.
Several other brilliant Ghanaian producers also worked on different tracks.
Time 4 Me is a good collection any young, ambitious singer can be proud of. Fans who buy copies would also be proud they did.
By Kouame Koulibaly