Buju became BNXN. BNXN became the Captain. The Captain is Still in Charge. This is the premise of Daniel ‘BNXN’ Benson’s 30 September, 2026 drop. Originally intended to be a deluxe to the singer’s sophomore album, all six songs here are a manifestation of ethos he’d declared on Never Stopped, off his debut project, 2021’s Sorry I’m Late EP: a talented thoroughbred workhorse aiming to write his name in gold despite comments from detractors. But also, a lover boy; a sensitive, confessional loverboy. If you take out that track’s messaging, cloak it in candid writing with a mature voice and spread it over 16 minutes, you’ll have distilled the essence of Still in Charge, for the most part.
Artists are constantly working towards their next bodies of work. Hence, the allusions to being a product of all their music from before, including amateurish releases. Where the essential divergence occurs on this journey is with knowing what leads new records. Foreseeing moments when bowing to fandom is a slow death, blindsided as they are by absolutist perceptions thus ignoring what’s needed. Listening to BNXN and Sarz speak about conceptualising The Game Needs Us, one senses this sentiment of righting a wrong, at play. And although the EP was undeserving of its title—brilliant as it was in some parts—the point still stands about meta-awareness being essential to artistry. Still in Charge is aware of its existence as a phase in his story. Subconsciously, BNXN realised that the narrative of the six songs here overlapped with Captain, yet functioned better as pieces of a standalone project. It just so happens that the T.Y.E team opted for an utterly dour photograph to be the project’s visual vehicle.
At its fluffiest, the EP serves us a duet with FOLA that’s frankly out of place. Shamaya is easy listening Afro R&B scrounging together emptiness from two exceptional artists with chemistry. FOLA sings about missing his lover, reassuring us about keeping mum about whatever it is they have on. Save for two cheeky lines about finding it difficult to focus during sex with lights on and preferring her phone on DND—Rema on Woman—there’s little to engage with. BNXN’s verse afterwards is more vivacious, salvaging what’s left of the piano chords. It exemplifies the central conceit plaguing most of this EP: safety in clichés. Like how the chorus jumbles together a promise to spray money like Alao Akala, pulling up in an Agbada—very original lyrics, guys. Kudos!
On the other end of the spectrum, luxurious Afropop shines bright on the EP intro, Ẹja Mẹja. Sweet, sultry saxophones are punctuated here at intervals by timpani and just the slightest burst of percussion. Asake glides across the production with just a hint of resistance, as if worried that if he gives us any more lamba, ears might combust. And of course, because we’re still in the year where bodies are food items, you can figure out who the “ọmọdé mẹta” are. He extends the M$NEY motif here, reminding us that life wasn’t created for one person. “They say money na vanity, so I carry the vanity spend am on vanity.” Talk to us, Ololade Mi
When BNXN comes on, production goes up a gear by doing the opposite of what most would expect and stripping instrumentals down altogether. Like Asake, his thanksgiving is to both Allah and Jesus—Yoruba syncretism in motion. Something about the slightly muffled vocals in the final second lead back to OBA. But man oh man! Blaisebeatz and Freshy outdid themselves. This is music for dingy club corners and sweaty, cloudy nights out with people.
The three-track stretch afterwards forms this EP’s spine. First comes Online, a humorous apology for the singer’s sustained offline presence leading up to the project’s release. For an artist so notoriously internet-thirsty that even his pre-fame tweets are popular, BNXN’s sabbatical from the webs—one of his self admitted favourite places—couldn’t have gone unnoticed. Rather ironically, he sings “Isọkusọ lo má ń pa data, omo ìyá mi,” which is hilarious in its accuracy, but also the passable hypocrisy. It evokes the same messaging as the Kizz Daniel and The Cavemen hit, Oshe, where Vado brags about troubling timelines and consuming “all their megabytes.” BNXN calls for all to focus on the now (“We’re in the moment, f’ẹjọ́ lẹ kàn máà sọ”) amid twisting rhymes on the second verse. Moralistic, but fun, propelled by Telz’s jazzy Amapiano-and-synth.
If you want to understand why Fiokee remains in high demand, listen to 16. That’s a bass line to make Victor Uwaifor proud. Rightfully overwhelming the other instrumental some times, playing second fiddle to kicks and snares at others. It’s quintessential BNXN, a musical cousin to Back Outside in chord progression. 16 draws from his experiences working as a 16-year-old, spliced with appeals to an estranged lover. Yet again, the 2nd verse proves to be our clincher. Suspicions about backing vocals lead to a not-so-surprising find, past collaborator Qing Madi. Both belt out an addictive hook primed for singalongs (As an aside, 16 sounds like a vestige of Sincerely, Benson).
Deliberate Workings, which begins the second half of Still in Charge, is easily one of the best exhibitions of BNXN’s talent across his entire discography. Over Blaisebeatz’ log drums—reminds one of the Italy Refix with Blaq Diamond—the ex-Spaceship Records man makes a case for why and how he’s come so far. It’s all deliberate work, deliberate hard work that’s supposedly not understood well enough. That’s why he’s now so rich but can “still gym his back account.” That’s the secret to the never ending fame, he claims. It’s what elevates his style. BNXN is all braggadocio, culling the modesty of Online for an outright declaration of superiority.
For a parting punch, he returns with a callout to an unnamed ẹ̀gbọ́n. Publishing splits lost from 2024 to 2026 and revenue funnelled into said person’s cousin’s account, no doubt painful to reveal on wax. Pain has become resentment. But unfazed, BNXN pushes on, proclaiming that “Ilé ti mo wọ, o dì ilé owó/ Ọ̀nà tí mò rìn , ó di Ọna ọlá” (“The house I go into becomes a house of wealth/The path I walk becomes a path to wealth”). Anyone can air their grievances on a track but not everyone can make you relate to their vim, to the point where this writer is almost too certain that people will make this their personal anthem. Deliberate Work succeeds due to its raw relatability beyond BNXN’s context. It is a memorable, sincere record—the type that acquires mini-documentary status, years from now.
In a perfect world, this EP skips Shamaya straight to the outro, If You Like. Unfortunately it doesn’t, so we’ll take what we get. Semzi’s Ikigai / 生き甲斐, Vol. 1-styled upbeat, uptempo bounce and amped up womps are the soundtrack to the victory lap—if you consider sassy declarations of love to be that sort of thing. Who but a nonchalant warrior leads with “I would really like to be your baby, but that’s if you like” as a pickup line? Our ‘Verse 2’ theory also finds fruition here as BNXN slips into a melodic hip-hop flow on the break and second verses (Little wonder why he insisted at the virtual listening that we hadn’t heard him rhyming on this level before). Six of six second verses being superior in terms of flow, melody, and everything else, doesn’t particularly augur well for future compositions; regardless of whether or not it is unintentional.
On Still in Charge, BNXN finds new pockets, reworking old flows and delivery patterns tastefully while still furthering the same essence of 2021 Buju. This, of course, is problematic when he blatantly defers to 2021 Buju’s songwriting tics. A pop culture figure here. An unnecessary comparison there, like how he places himself in the same bracket as Elon Musk on two tracks (Online and Deliberate Work). It’s good for easy listening until you want something more and find yourself returning to TGNU’s Emotional High and Aduke (Sweet Tea) off his debut. Surely, artists from that 2020-2022 class can find newer ways to keep their pop songs culturally rooted without all this fluff. Surely, it’s not so difficult for writers of their esteemed cadre. We’re fast approaching the 2030s where these cheap tricks won’t be sufficient. Just ask the 2010s class.
This version of BNXN is one we wouldn’t mind hearing more of. And we really can not stress just how right he was not to make this a deluxe, as it feels closer in narrative to The Game Needs Us (think Already and Deliberate Work). Signs of BNXN’s age are creeping in too, evident when you think of his approach to the romantic records on this tape. Having listened through his various phases and faces on Still in Charge, our request is for a project where he goes even further inward and elevates his relatability factor. A man in charge can always control more territory, after all.
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