LADIPO ESO: LONGING FOR A LASTING LEGACY

Trends come and go. The hip-hop and rap artiste Ladipo Eso refuses to be caught in that trap. He tells Vanessa Obioha about making music that will outlive him

You can arguably say that 2020 was the year many people discovered the music of Ladipoe. Even the rap and hip-hop artiste thought so. First was his single ‘Know You’ featuring Simi.

The single was released in April last year, just when the world was trapped in the gossamer of the coronavirus pandemic. The song would become a sort of distraction from the uncertainties that gripped many at the time. ‘Know You’ was Ladipo Eso’s first single to peak at number one on Apple Music and won him his first Headies.

By May, Ladipo Eso was one of the lined-up artistes who performed at the One Africa Global Foundation and MultiChoice ‘COVID-19 Hope for Africa Concert.’ He performed the emotional single ‘Voices’ featuring Ghanaian artist Efya from his 2018 album T.A.P. (Talk About Poe). His performance further raised interest in him, and by August, he was in the Big Brother Naija House, performing for the housemates.

Ladipoe, as he’s often called, was careful not to label the interest in him and his music as fame. To be sure, he has no qualms with the term ‘famous’ or any of its relatives. After all, popularity makes the music business. But Ladipoe would rather not be disillusioned by the fickleness of fame. He explained it this way:

“It feels to me like discovery. A lot of people are discovering Ladipoe for the first time or putting the name and the face to a song that they’ve already heard,” he says. “So, I am under no illusions that this is ‘blown’ to me. Maybe to some people. To me, it’s that place where you hammer home the point, where people have discovered you. But you need to let them know what you’re about. The work is on. This is not the time to recline.”

If you ask him what his music is all about, he’ll probably tell you it’s about connecting with the people, and that, he confessed, is not an easy task, particularly for a genre like hip-hop that is quite fleeting in Nigeria. One moment, it is the rave of the moment, and the next, it’s in obscurity such that people wonder if there are any good rappers or hip-hop artists left in the country. Not a few advised him to stick with the popular genre afro-pop when he returned from America after studying Chemistry and Biology at the University of North Carolina. It took him a while to be actively involved in music because of these ‘falsehoods’ as he described it.

By the time he started hanging out with people making music and seeing how things are done, he had a stronger conviction that rap music can sell in Nigeria. First, he joined a group known as the Collectiv3, formed by the Managing Director of Universal Music Nigeria, Chin Okeke. The group he said made something that Nigerians were not ready for.

By 2017, Ladipoe became the first rapper to be signed to Mavin Records. It was a deal that both parties benefitted mutually. On the one hand, the record label was looking to diversify. On the other hand, was the artist looking to be ably represented beyond the shores of Nigeria. The union has lasted more than three years. This year, Ladipoe won his first Headies for his collaboration with Simi ‘Know You.’ The winning formula so far for the tall artiste from Osun was to understand what his listeners want.

“I have been making music as an artist since 2013, and I had to watch and observe because rap is a competitive sport. It is who has the best punchlines. But over time, I noticed that Nigerians love their melodies,” Ladipoe explains. “Whether a rapper or singer, we’ve all come to realise that we love melodies. So I cannot ignore that, and I needed to incorporate that in my music. It took me some time.to get over the identity crisis that rappers in Nigeria have and start connecting with people.”

By identity crisis, he meant the hunger of most rap artists to show themselves as the best rappers in the world. It is not uncommon to hear hip-hop artistes talk about their greatness in lyrics or sometimes engage in a rap battle to prove they have the best punchlines.

He points out: “I’m way past the point where I need to prove myself as an amazing rapper. People always think that rappers and punchlines come hand in hand. But for me, I want to create something a bit different. I want to be a great music writer, a great music maker, a great contributor to our culture. I just don’t want to write amazing rap verses. I want to make great songs. For example, when I’m making a song like ‘Jaiye’, it’s not about making strong punchlines. The song has to be amazing.
“The verse to bridge, the hook, the outro, the melodies. I think that’s one thing that a lot of rappers will grow into. It is not just

about punchlines in this part of the world, especially in Nigeria. You have to be patient with them. You can’t overload them in your music, give them a little bit but let them breathe with the melodies. My creative process takes into consideration the listeners a lot.”When creating music, Ladipoe works best in a vacuum. This enables his mind to run wild, immerse himself in the environment and listen to what is happening around him.
“My mind runs a mile in a minute,” he reveals.

He is drawn to stories. Whether he is reading, watching movies or having a conversation, his mind is always taking stock of what is being said and saving it up for a later date. This helps him to write verses that connect with people and immerse himself in their situations.

“It’s difficult for me to write without putting myself in the music. Either writing about myself, my life or somebody that I’m connected to, or how I see things, there’s definitely an element of self-discovery in my music,” adds Ladipoe. “If you are really lucky and a special artist, then people will discover something about themselves, listening to your music.”

He’s been lucky enough to have a fan tattooed his lyrics on his chest. “He tagged me in a video, and that just showed me that people are really connected to my music,” he says.
Ladipoe’s music is redolent of the American hip-hop sound of the 90s, the rhythmical flow, and the poetic lines. His videos also carry this trait, usually laid back, shot in places like a basketball court, as seen in the visuals of ‘Lemme Know’.

His creativity is often seen in his song titles, such as in his feature with Joeboy titled ‘Yoruba Samurai’, a play on his ethnicity and the legendary Japanese warriors. The love song talked about the extremes he would go for his love interest, which included going to war to win her heart. In ‘Rap Messiah’, he described himself as the genre Messiah saving Africa by “bearing all the crossfire, still an all-timer, in the shooting calibre.”
The appellations, in a way, speak to his conviction that rap is not a phase in Nigeria. It is his way of eliminating falsehoods surrounding the genre. So many artistes, he argued, have been dissuaded from the genre because of its non-dominance on airwaves. This explains why he called himself the ‘Leader of the Revival.’
“A lot of artistes like myself were told a lie,” reveals Ladipoe. “Many people told us that our music will not sell in Nigeria, that the industry was not looking for our kind of music.

“That if we really wanted to survive and support our family, we will have to jump on the popular bandwagon. These things, you know, have definitely deterred and broken many artists who have never begun. I have to show the falsehood in that. Time will tell. It’s just patience. I have been patient. I really hate patience. But I have been patient.”

He also debunked the myth that hip-hop artists need to reinvent the wheel to gain prominence.
“The truth is, it is less about the artist having to reengineer themselves or the genre. Our hip-hop music is a fusion. I didn’t have to lie. All I had to show people was that it has always been there,” he explains.

“Rap and hip-hop music has always been popular. They are just looking at it the wrong way. The lens has always been the problem. African hip-hop, African rap will always be that fusion because we are Africans, and that’s how we make music. I don’t think they’ll ever be a time when it’s pure hip hop. It does not have to be. It’s okay. It’s okay to be a rapper that is not necessarily rapping on traditional hip-hop. Once I realised that, I knew my music would be great.”

Ladipoe takes his music legacy seriously. It is one of the reasons he doesn’t jump on trends. He is a firm believer that his music should be a legacy.
“I believe that there’s always been that space preserved for the person that will be seen as an ambassador for rap. A lot of people are so caught up, you know, they’re tripping over themselves to be the king of this or be the best one at this,” he tells THISDAY.

Continues, Ladipoe states, “But what I’ve always believed is that there needs to be somebody that sees beyond, that sees how temporary those labels are, and I need to create something that’s going to last. When I’m gone, when I no longer make music, the people that come after me will say that Ladipoe really was the one that showed me that this thing was possible.

“Tupac used to say that he might not be the one to do it. But he believes he would want to spark the mind that does it. So you have to put yourself out there like that. It’s all about my legacy.”