At Burna Boy’s ‘Lagos Loves Damini’ Concert

Ferdinand Ekechukwu

Afrofusion artiste, Burna Boy has had a fantastic music career. He has earned numerous accolades and recognitions to show for it.  The African giant has sold out iconic venues such as Madison Square Garden, State FarmArena, 02 Arena London, and a slew of other venues around the world. He had a splendid 2022, releasing chart-topping album and singles that dominated local and international charts. His monster hit “Last Last” even made it to Barack Obama’s playlist for 2022.

The Spaceship Entertainment frontline act and owner, after touring the world heavily in 2022, decided to kick off 2023 with a homecoming performance in Lagos. But that didn’t go down well as planned last Sunday January 1, 2023, coincidentally same day shortly after the Grammy-award winning superstar was named one of the greatest musicians of all time by Rolling Stone, an esteemed music publication which released a list spanning 200 singers it said are among the all-time greatest.

The New Year’s Day show, which was slated to start by 6 p.m. Nigerian time, was said, did not see Damini Ogulu aka Burna Boy climb the stage until 3:30 a.m. Aggrieved fans did not hold back in airing their grievances after waiting over 8 hours for an hour performance at the Burna Boy’s concert dubbed ‘Lagos Loves Damini’. According to the show attendees, via social media, no sort of apology was issued by the singer, but he instead went on to claim he would have left the event if not for fast rising street-hop act Seyi Vibez.

Though his die-hard fans did stayed back and enjoyed the concert despite the long wait.  He performed till about 4:42 AM which was just over an hour, taking fans on a journey of his timeless hit songs and they sang along. While he performed, thousands of fans began to gradually make their way out of the venue. Burna Boy delivered his international smash hit ‘Last Last’ and the heartbreak anthem brought the show to an end.

He would later issue a statement for his late appearance and attribute it to some technical issues and blamed the show handlers at WonderX. According to him, he arrived on time and planned to start the show at about 11 pm. But with the challenges with the audio, he had no choice but to delay until it was fixed. He also suggested he was going to invest in world-class infrastructure for hosting concerts.

While some of his fans accepted the apology others still raged on social media as a video of Burna Boy kicking a fan from the stage dominated Twitter timelines with a simple search for “Burna Boy”. Burna Boy while addressing fans at the show stumped on the face of a supposedly overzealous fan who attempted to climb the stage. In the video making rounds on social media, the fan was seen as he fell off after the unexpected kick.

Nevertheless overzealous, a true fan of Burna Boy should know it’s really a challenge for him coping and has once addressed people who jump on stage during his performance at concerts. 

Thj I’ll 9k k e music star had said he knows it is all love when fans decide to jump on stage but it took him a long while to get used to it. However, Burna Boy added that he is different and he can’t be sure if the ‘stage jumper’ is someone he has offended in the past. The music star then noted that since it is also a show of fan love, people should try their best not to startle him too much so he doesn’t do something crazy.