Obongjayar announces new album Paradise Now out May 30 + shares new song ‘Sweet Danger’
PRAISE FOR Obongjayar
“A master at work”
“A life-affirming record”
“Delicately fuses futuristic hip-hop and electronic influences with musical elements from his Nigerian upbringing”
“The London multi-hyphenate is building a unique creative cosmology, charting out a fresh universe one song at a time. His debut album is set to be a bona fide cultural event”
“Among the most engaging voices of his generation”
“Nowadays, “genre-bending” is how you describe an artist when you don’t have anything concrete to say about them, and Obongjayar has long since moved past that empty contemporary cliché. On Some Nights, he isn’t concerned with taking existing musical archetypes and bending them slightly, he’s building something new entirely”
“A cohesive statement that weaves the personal and the political, drawing on both his childhood in Nigeria's Cross River State and a young adulthood spent nurtured and embraced by London's thriving indie/jazz diaspora. Given the rare opportunity to shape himself into someone singular, Obongjayar chose to take it”
“There is a unique spirit threaded through the music of Obongjayar. One need only listen to the opening few tracks of his 2022 record, Some Nights I Dream of Doors, to get the vibe that this is an artist who knows his vision from the ground up. Importantly, it is a vision that requires him to walk to the beat of his own drum.”
“A passage of emotions and feelings that embody the sporadic and probing nature he suggests governs his music... Obongjayar is no stranger to existing in a cross-section of culture, exploring the themes of chasing fulfilment and wondering where he may fit in”
“Make no mistake, you know Obongjayar when you hear him”
OBONGJAYAR
Paradise Now LP
May 30 via September Recordings
PRE-ORDER / PRE-SAVE HERE
‘Sweet Danger‘ is out now, buy/stream it here.
Today Obongjayar announces his forthcoming album PARADISE NOW is coming Friday 30 May via September Recordings. Featuring recent tracks including the hedonistic ‘Not In Surrender‘, the dreamlike pop creation with a darker side ‘Just My Luck‘ and his new track ‘Sweet Danger’ that is released today, the 15-track album is a Trojan horse of some of his most intimate storytelling yet, candy-coated in electro-pop synths, soaring strings and ever contagious percussion. LISTEN TO ‘SWEET DANGER’ HERE + PRE-ODER THE LP HERE.
Produced between London and LA with Kwes Darko (Pa Salieu, John Glacier), Yeti Beats (Doja Cat) and Beach Noise (Kendrick Lamar, Baby Keem, Bakar), it promises adventure through the subconscious of one of the UK’s most thrilling modern voices grappling with everything from self-acceptance and transcendence to grief and loneliness, FOMO, procrastinations and nights you never want to end. Standing testament to Obongjayar’s unrivalled sonic and vocal dexterity, the album features no other artists other than his good friend and frequent collaborator Little Simz on ‘Talk Olympics’ (OB recently featured on her single ‘Flood‘ taken from her next album).
Watch: ‘Sweet Danger’ (Official Video)
Celebrating the announcement, ‘Sweet Danger’ offers a flirtier counterpart to the previous single – OB self-assured and winking over syncopated drums, sultry guitars and a fanfare of horns: “heard you like the bad boys, yeah I’m a bad boy, can’t stop, won’t stop”. A toxic hoedown set in a seedy South London hotel, the video directed by Sophie Jones is a montage of larger than life characters, each leaning into their own version of beauty and danger shot up close and POV whilst riding a mechanical bull – a metaphor for life itself; reckless, sweet and unpredictable.
Last Summer, Obongjayar launched his intimate party series PARADISE NOW at Ormside Projects which since has seen guests and friends alike pass through to perform including Little Simz, Pa Salieu, Kwes Darko, James Messiah, Dean George, Peter Xan, Lava La Rue, Chi, Kwes, Bikoko, Fredwave, Jeshi and more. His next party will be in May with more info to be announced soon.
Born in Lagos and raised in Calabar, Nigeria, before moving to the UK when he was 18 years old, while growing up, Obongjayar found an escape in music. Growing up, Obongjayar gravitated towards American hip-hop and R&B – Eminem, Ciara, Nelly, Snoop Dogg, and his prized possession, a bootleg Nelly and Usher compilation. It wasn’t until moving to London in his late teens that he really began to appreciate Nigeria’s musical heritage. First releasing his own music through Soundcloud, what quickly followed was a string of hugely successful EPs and singles including “God’s Own Children” which earned him an Ivor Novello award. In 2022 he released his debut album Some Nights I Dream of Doors to critical acclaim with praise from the likes of i-D, Crack Magazine, The Guardian, NPR, DIY and more. With a truly unique sound blending everything from electronic, soul, pop, afro-beat and more, his compelling music characterised by his thoughtful and emotional lyrics have led him to collaborate with everyone from Jeshi to Little Simz to Pa Salieu, and most recently Fred Again… on ‘adore u‘, that found the producer sampling Obongjayar’s “I Wish It Was Me” and garnering over 225 million streams globally.
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