Kolaboy drops 5-track EP, ‘Kola from the East’, featuring Flavour

Fast-rising singer, Nwodo Chinonso Victor, known as Kolaboy, recently released his five-track EP titled ‘Kola from the East’ with classic highlife featuring Flavour and other big names in the music industry.

The Enugu-born artiste revealed that he started music from performing at social gatherings in secondary school.
“I was made the social prefect back then, that was when the music stuff began and I started recording independently in Onitsha,” talented artiste said.

Described his music style, Kolaboy said: “Generally, what we do in Africa is afrobeat but in afrobeat I feel that there are some sub-genres. I am not limited to a particular sound. When I started music, I wanted to be peculiar and do something different from what others have been doing. I came in with the storytelling brand, where you make songs out of stories of yourself.
“The first song I made was a storytelling one, ‘Hello Mummy.’ It was basically a fictional and non-fictional story about myself, and that was before I started exploring other aspects of music, including the highlife part. What I was trying to do with my brand was like a bridge between our ancestral sound and this modern sound. It is much like mashup.”

The artiste stated that one of his favourite songs was “Hello Mummy”, a conversation between a mother and child: “It was more like a letter to my mother trying to explain youthful exuberance. There is a particular way all parents see entertainers. I come from a religious background, there is this perspection they have about all entertainers. I was writing to tell her and explain the reason I am doing music, and I am not going astray because I am following my dreams.”

When asked which song gave him public acceptance and put him in the consciousness of music lovers, he said, “The first song that gave me acceptance wasn’t really an original song it was a cover of Olamide’s song ‘Motigbana’. It was a trend and it was the song that gave me acceptance.”

Commenting on the new EP with five songs, the artiste said: “I am promoting the tracks and extended plays, which contains five song, first is a feature with Flavour titled ‘Normal Thing’, second is ‘Ojabili’, featuring MC Young, third ‘Utotommiri’, featuring Iyi Don, fourth is ‘Eze’, featuring Ojadili One, the fifth one is ‘Uwa Mgbede’, which I did alone. These are ancestral sounds.”

Excited to work alongside big names like Flavour, the young rapper said: “It is a dream come true because they are pioneers and I grew up listening to them, people I watched on television. I have always wanted to make songs with Flavour and I have a feature from Harrysong, and, recently, a song featured Chichotin.”

Talking about how he copes with the competition in the entertainment Industry, with the likes of Davido and Wizkid, Burna Boy, among others vying for airtime, Kolaboy exuded confidence in his craft as he argued: “I believe, a few years back they were also asked how they were going to compete with other stars, probably they were just positive. So, I don’t really see any limit on how to go far in the industry. It is not really a competition; it just like a brand where it keeps going and when a brand goes higher then other people see it as competition. But all I do is my thing and I don’t really see any limit to where my brand will get to tomorrow and I don’t see it as an African brand but I see it as an international brand. Being Kolaboy comes with a lot. Being Kolaboy is a distinction that differentiates me from others, my character, etc.”

Speaking further on his recent EP dropped that is getting airplay and rocking airwaves in the music world, Kolaboy said: “I just released an EP last month. We are working on the video and we have other projects coming up next year, but we have a specific one coming out first.”