Two weeks ago, ID Cabasa released Anytime Reimagined, which features street pop acts Bella Shmurda and Ayo Maff as well as the Port Harcourt rap duo of Ajebo Hustlers. The track is a reimagined version of 9ice’s soul-baring Anytime from his Tradition album of 2009, a song that Cabasa produced while they were both under the umbrella of his label, Coded Tunes. It marks the fourth installment in his “Reimagined” series which began in 2023 with the Vector-assisted reprise of 9ice’s Photocopy, as ID Cabasa continues on his unique mission of bringing Afrobeats classics to life through new voices.
Two decades ago, ID Cabasa’s contribution to Nigerian music was more direct. As a founding member of Coded Tunes, the young Cabasa (real name Olumide Ogunade) was instrumental in shaping Yoruba Rap and South-Western Afropop. He produced the bulk of 9ice’s first three albums, crafted Olamide’s debut, Rapsodi, and worked with a constellation of rappers in Lord of Ajasa, 2Phat, Reminisce, Seriki, Ruggedman, Durella and more. In the 2000s, Lagos’ Rap scene was thriving in mainland hubs like Yaba and Surulere, and this was the arm that would evolve into Street Pop in later years.
Over time, Coded Tunes began to fade, and with it, ID Cabasa’s visibility. Olamide departed after one album, leaving to record his scintillating sophomore YBNL and establish his own record label. 9ice founded Alapomeji records after releasing Tradition, his third album, and while both parties initially insisted it was an imprint under Coded Tunes, it marked the beginning of Cabasa’s diminishing presence on 9ice’s subsequent work. The pair would later reunite on 9ice’s 2016 album, named in Cabasa’s honor.
Even after losing his heavyweights, Cabasa continued as a quiet force in Yoruba Hip-Hop and Street Pop circles. He earned scattered credits in Olamide’s later albums, 999 and Carpe Diem. Notably, he was behind the boards for Bella Shmurda Vision 2020 Remix (featuring Olamide), the young Street Pops star’s breakout, and joined forces with Olamide and Wizkid for 2020’s groovy Dancehall smash, Totori. Now, as the producer winds down on making beats for others, he’s taken to creating new music himself, albeit with a twist: these songs are reworked from older Nigerian tracks, sharing a name and a sampled chorus with their blueprint versions, while boasting brand new production—often in an entirely different genre—and a fresh set of artists delivering all-new verses.
The first entry in the series was a reimagination of Photocopy in 2023, which Cabasa had produced for 9ice fifteen years before. This new version bore a clean, crisp Rap performance from Vector, whose sleek verses provided a certain polish. It came at a cost—9ice’s hook and post-chorus did not survive the transition, and the new version lost some of the original’s musicality. Still, Cabasa was not aiming to outshine the original, but to bring it to life in a new vessel. Last year, amidst a string of public denouncements of Afrobeats by some of Nigeria’s top stars, he described such criticisms as symptoms of “identity crisis.” His reimagined series, he explained, was intended to “create a bridge between where we are coming from, where we are, and where we are heading in the Afrobeats story.”
Bere Mi Reimagined was a reenactment of the cultural shift that has occurred in the Yoruba Rap scene over the last two decades. The original song leaned heavily on Rap, with gritty verses from 2Phat interspersed with a well-taken 9ice chorus. In its new form, ID Cabasa translated the song to modern Street Pop, with Zlatan and T.I. Blaze combining with style and vivacity.
With Olufunmi Reimagined, though, ID Cabasa made a few changes to the formula he seemed to have already perfected. It was set on an Afropop beat—a departure from the AfroRnB that Styl-Plus built the archetype around, but one that fit right in with Cabasa’s concept of modernization. However, in its transformation, it strayed too far: none of the guests quite matched the high bar for expository songwriting that the original had set, and ODUMODUBLVCK, with his particularly jarring verse, appeared out of place on what was meant to be a romantic song. Even without the thematic mismatch, reworking beloved songs is always bound to raise eyebrows, especially in Nigeria, where smaller creative liberties like extra songwriters and sampling are still often frowned at. Besides, the choice of song—a much beloved classic—was always going to stir animosity from the listeners who believe sacred cows are best left untouched.
Still, Olufunmi Reimagined performed excellently commercially—buoyed by its weighty guestlist and, perhaps, the controversy it spurred. The fourth song in the series, Anytime, retraces a few steps from it—Cabasa returns to 9ice’s signature blend of Hip-Hop-Pop, and back to a track he personally produced. Like Bere Mi Reimagined, it features a section of modern Street Pop, in the soulful streetwise duo of Bella Shmurda and Ayo Maff, while the vibrant Ajebo Hustlers provide their unique Port Harcourt flavour. This time they are able to align more precisely to the original’s ideals: Ayo Maff’s tear-jerking recollection of his father’s passing and his mother’s struggles fits perfectly beside 9ice’s similarly-themed chorus.
ID Cabasa continues to walk a delicate line: crafting reimagined songs that are neither too close to the originals that they become duplicates, nor too far that they risk disrespect. There are a few that will question how effectively he’s struck that balance so far, but ID Cabasa can take comfort in the knowledge that these songs consistently rekindle a conversation around their original inspirations and, by extension, the history and legacy of Afrobeats, which was always his central aim. Nigerian music has undergone an immense evolution in recent decades and is sure to evolve even further; ID Cabasa’s “Reimagined” series seeks to serve as a bridge between past and present.
