Grammy and Latin Grammy award-winning global music superstar MR EAZI shares new music today (September 1) along with the title for his long-awaited and highly anticipated debut solo album. New offering ‘ADVICE’, as featured in B.Side Magazine, produced by Ghana’s M.O.G. Beatz, is the third single from the freshly-named The Evil Genius, set for release on October 27, 2023. The 16-track album is now available for pre-order here. Mr Eazi is also the latest artist to be featured in VEVO’s original content series Ctrl., with a stirring, defiant performance of the drill-infused ‘Advice’ out today in support of the track’s release.
Mr Eazi recorded ‘Advice’, with its dark, grimy tones, during a particularly heavy moment in his life, as he watched some of his longest-held relationships crumble under the weight of his success. Sharing his inspiration for the track, Eazi shares, “When you first come up [as an artist], everybody is in love with you, then they want to draw you down. People begin to betray you. If you’re able to survive this stage, you go untouchable. But this is the hardest stage.”
The lyrically dense ‘Advice’ also namechecks a number of African martyrs including former Democratic Republic of the Congo president Joseph Kabila and Ken Saro-Wiwa, a Nigerian writer and activist whose 1995 hanging inspired domestic and international outrage, with Mr Eazi adding, “I was coming from a place of having that energy.”
Record over a two-year period in some of Mr Eazi’s favourite cities, from Ouidah and Cotonou in Benin, Kokrobite and Accra in Ghana, and Los Angeles and New York City in the United States, to Lagos in Nigeria, and Kigali in Rwanda, The Evil Genius features Mr Eazi’s most personal work, as he dives deeply into subjects like love, betrayal, loneliness, and family, expressed through three distinctive acts.
Speaking on the album’s title, Mr Eazi explains that The Evil Genius title is his way of embracing a perception that his business smarts and ambitions disguise hidden agendas. “There’s been this low-key notion that Eazi is this calculated bad guy, and I started to fight this narrative. Then it hit me: This album is me fighting the ‘people pleaser’ in me, and accepting that image. By the time you listen to this project from beginning to end, you will have met ‘The Evil Genius.’ If you still think I’m the bad guy, so be it.”
In a first-of-its-kind fusion of African music and art, Mr Eazi commissioned visual artists from across the continent to create a unique, physical art piece to represent each of the album’s 16 tracks. For ‘Advice,’ he tapped Nairobi, Kenya-based artist Alphonce Odhiambo, known as Alpha ODH, whose acrylic painting speaks to the track’s defiant lyrics.
As he travelled through Africa recording the album, Mr Eazi forged relationships with visual artists whose work he encountered along the way. Noting a lack of collaboration between Africa’s exploding pop music scene and the continent’s fine art creators, Mr Eazi personally handpicked 13 artists, representing eight African countries, inviting them to collaborate in a process he describes as ‘informal and instinctual’. According to Eazi, “Inviting artists to create for the album was from my passion for creativity and expression. I formed a true bond with many of my artist friends. The artworks visually unlock the ideas, emotion, and energy within my music.”
Ahead of the album’s release on October 27, Mr Eazi is inviting the public to experience the music alongside the art at several multi-sensory exhibition listening experiences. The exhibition debuts at Gallery 1957 in Ghana – a significant country for Mr Eazi, where he began his recording career and first rose to fame – from September 13-18. Following this inaugural presentation, the exhibition will travel to London as part of the renowned 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair at Somerset House from October 12-15. Additional exhibition announcements in other cities are forthcoming.
ABOUT MR EAZI
MR EAZI is a musical innovator, business leader and philanthropist. As a recording artist, the Nigerian star is one of the most streamed African artists in the world, with over 4 billion streams, he is also the voice behind afropop hits ‘Pour Me Water’, ‘Skin Tight’, and ‘Leg Over’, as well as ground-breaking collaborations with the likes of Beyoncé and J Balvin. A serial entrepreneur, he founded emPawa Africa in 2018 as a talent incubator program designed to accelerate the careers of African artists. Hailed by CNN, Rolling Stone, Billboard and Forbes for his innovative approach to expanding African music’s global reach, he has grown emPawa Africa into one of Africa’s largest independent music companies, with a track record of breaking global stars like Joeboy and Major League DJz.
Born in Port Harcourt and raised in Lagos, Mr Eazi began his music career while attending college in Ghana. His first-ever recording, made on a whim, became an accidental local hit, prompting him to take music seriously. Blending touches of Ghanaian highlife music and pidgin slang, with Nigerian chord progressions and R&B vocal inflections, he soon developed a mellowed-out spin on afropop, which he dubbed Banku Music, after the popular Ghanaian comfort food dish. Arriving just as afrobeats music was exploding into global consciousness, Mr Eazi quickly became an international sensation, taking Banku Music all over the world. His global travels birthed two acclaimed mixtapes Life Is Eazi Vol. 1: Accra To Lagos and Life Is Eazi Vol. 2: Lagos To London – the rest, as they say, is history.
CONNECT WITH MR EAZI: Instagram – Twitter – Tiktok
MEDIA & PRESS: Please direct all inquiries to Ayo Adepoju: [email protected]
