Music
Continentally Speaking: Santi
Get to know one of the new generation of independent artists coming out of Nigeria
When he started making music in the late 00s, Santi had no idea that within a short time, he would've caught the attention of Wizkid, who was impressed by his freestyle rap over Drake's "Juice", or that his idol M.I. would one day count him as a leader among the nu-gen of indie-pendents coming out from across Nigeria.
And though he started out as a rapper rapper, and for the past 3 years resided between Dubai where he was studying, and Nigeria where he calls home, it's two events which led to the emergence of Santi, the un-pinnable artist formerly known as Ozzy B: Hearing the indomitable Santigold's music, and getting introduced to the sound of Vampire Weekend, more especially the songwriting talents of Ezra Konig.
Santi was born in London in the early 90s. "My mom had a couple of kids before had me. I was pretty much like an egg." He and grew up in Lagos. His younger sister came seven years later. His father descends from a royal family in Benin, and is every bit the traditional African parent.
"I come from a family of scholars and A-listers. Me doing music is kind of not really the best fit for him, so I try not to stress him as much as possible," he says.
Santi credits his mother for spoiling him just a bit, yet also keeping him woke to the ways of the world. Those lessons, he carries to this day. His father, a deejay at family functions, was responsible for his music education.
"He used to just buy me new CDs; he would buy something for himself, and buy me something that was hip," Santi recalls.
His references, hence, stretch from Fela's Afrobeat to the 90s pop-punk of Blink 182 and stadium/stoner rock of RHCP, the dancehall of Shabba Ranks and more. He grew up on that, and a tonne-load of television.
His tight-knit Monster Boys crew -- Bankyondabeatz, GMK and Genio Bambino -- have been making music with him since 2009 when he stepped onto the scene, and are responsible for a large part of his musical output; "all the mixing, all the mastering...since we were like 17, 18," he says. Odunsi, who appears "Gangster Fear" off of Santi's critically acclaimed third project "Suzie's Funeral", forms part of the extended family. He recorded it in-between Lagos and Dubai, where he's been studying for the past 3 years.
The transition from Ozzy B the rapper to Santi the free-wheeling multi-genre Lagos kid ready to set his generation's minds ablaze happened in parallel to real life changes.
"When I started to work on Suzie's Funeral, I had lost friends; life was just coming at me in a very, very weird way. I just sat down and I said to myself 'yo man, I'm trying to be Santi now, so some shit has to go.' People who didn't really know what I was trying to do, or who I was trying to become, they had to go. For me to become Santi, I had to kill off all those things, which I then transformed to Suzie. She's my vice; my love life; all the things I killed off," he says, explaining the motivation behind his current project.
These memories he collects and pays tribute to on songs like "The running", which wouldn't sound out of place as part of a morning jog playlist; the droned-out "Demon flow" with its updated flows and goth-appropriate influences; "Cruel 689" with its anthemic, dancehall-appreciating bounce; and "Summer Time", a golden ode to the summers of his childhood and its oddities.
Santi's follow-up to Suzie's Funeral shall be released end-2018, hopefully through a newly-inked partnership with the North Carolina-based indie imprint Immaculate Taste.
"I have put one leg in. It's time to say now 'Santi's coming full-on'. The channels that we've got onto could put us on a higher level, more or less."
The recently-released single "Freaky" is meant as the prelude to the album. Speaking about it, Santi says of it: "I was heavily influenced by Nigerian music as well, it is an integral part of who I am. [The song] came about from an old song named Shobeedobeedoo by a Nigerian artist named Ikechukwu. I remember hearing it in high school on the way home every day. I had plans for a long time to sample the beat but the day finally came when Genio finally made the beat and the rest was history."
The video is a miasma of part-theocratic imagery inspired by the videos of religious fundamentalist Helen Ukpabio.
"When you hear my songs and you see my videos, and you see the story and you see stuff you've not seen before, you'll connect with me more, like, 'Okay Santi, this is you, this is what you do, I get you," he concludes.
Are you ready for the warning?