Is Olamide Positioning For a Long-Awaited International Crossover?

Following the rapturous reception of his recently released eponymous album, Olamide has announced a concert in the United Kingdom, his first show in the country in nearly a decade. The show—organized by Cokobar, a stalwart event organizers hub which has worked with a glittering cast of artists ranging from Burna Boy to Fireboy—is scheduled to be held at the vaunted 12,500 capacity OVO Arena in Wembley. The announcement has been met with riotous excitement, so much so that the booking website crashed a couple of times as it struggled to keep pace with the deluge of bookings. Olamide’s UK homecoming makes for exciting news and conversation but also raises the question of what it might signal for his career. 

It’s impossible to fully grasp the ramifications of this story without first situating it within the broader context of the Afrobeats to the World movement, which took flight in the mid-2010s. At the time, the vision of global dominance that previous generations of Nigerian pop stars—D’banj, P Square—had relentlessly tried to effect, with little success, suddenly started to materialize. Wizkid’s Ojuelegba was the canary in the coal mine. As the story goes, Wizkid released the song—Ojuelegba—in 2014 without the slightest idea of the epic role it would play in his career. On the album to which it belongs, Ayo, there were other songs which looked more promising: Jaiye Jaiye, Caro, and In My Bed. Fate would however have the story swivel in a different direction.

Skepta recruited Drake for an unofficial remix of the song, which stirred so great an excitement in Nigeria and the diaspora, foreshadowing the cultural efflorescence that would fully take root years after. Soon after, Drake recruited Wizkid for One Dance, an Afrobeats song which went on to become one of the biggest songs in the world. Meanwhile, in 2016, Davido’s explosive form caught the attention of foreign label executives culminating in a record deal with RCA, a subsidiary of Sony Music. The following year the label would recruit Wizkid to their ranks, beginning a multi-pronged effort at proliferating Afrobeats—or their interpretation of the genre—to the rest of the world. 

Burna Boy joined the fray in 2017. After his homecoming show to the UK—his UK travel ban ended the previous year—he met with Matthew Adesuyan, founder of Bad Habit, an imprint of Warner Music’s Atlantic Records, and his partner Kirk Harding, for dinner at 805 Restaurant. In the upscale restaurant in South London, they had a conversation which ultimately culminated in Burna Boy singing with Bad Habit, Atlantic Records, and Warner Music. 

Against this glittering backdrop Olamide—single-minded, iconoclastic, bristling with fervor for the local Hip Hop scene—decided to head in the opposite direction, planting his feet even more firmly on the Nigerian music scene. In 2016, a period when strategic international collaborations were vaulting Afrobeats stars to the global stage, Olamide announced, in an interview with Goldmyne TV, that he would never pay for an international feature, and that fans should not expect any international collaborations from him. Over the years he remained indefatigably faithful to this credo. 2024, however, marked a departure from this—which we can interpret as a willingness to finally tap into the diasporan market. Dutch singer SABRI is featured in Olamide’s IKIGAI EP, as is Russ on the remix of Hello Habibi. His just-released eponymous album likewise features Jamaican Dancehall artist Popcan and UK-based singer-rapper Darkoo. 

It’s not just strategic international collaborations that suggest Olamide is finally set to tap into the diasporan market, the aesthetic codes of his just-released album, Olamide, bespeak this. Take the video of Billionaire Club which features Wizkid and Darkoo. Mirroring the rollicking opulence that crackles through the song, the video is steeped in depictions of excess. But it’s in the video’s rendering of wealth that we begin to glimpse Olamide’s intent: the codes of wealth are all interestingly Western. In one scene, we see two masked fencers dressed in white, dueling in a tastefully minimalist hall. In another, we see the trio—Olamide, Darkoo, and Wizkid—swat golf balls in a sprawling golf club, watching with contentment as the balls accelerate through the sky. 

The announcement of a UK concert is the final piece of the puzzle. With Olamide presumably at the cusp of an international moment, the question of “why now?” tugs at us with increasing pertinence. Why now? Why not in 2016, the early days of the Afrobeats to the World movement, or 2021 or 2022, when the movement received a fresh injection of momentum by way of songs like Essence, Love Nwantiti, Last Last, Kulosa, et. al? Part of this is probably because his music has naturally evolved over the years. As he has grown older, the boisterousness of his early work has gradually made way for a calmer sound. Which is to say that having inadvertently arrived at a sound that happens to be more acceptable to a global audience, crossing over simply becomes a question of positioning himself marketing-wise, as opposed to changing his sound.

Another clue comes from a recent interview with YouTuber Korty EO in which Olamide reflects on his career. He’s grateful and proud of having spawned some of Afrobeat’s most luminous acts, he tells us, but success in the managerial role he has assumed in the past several years has taken a toll on his career. Now with Asake out of the label—earlier this year he chose to strike out on his own—and Fireboy at a stage in his career where he is mature enough to make decisions for himself, Olamide finally has the freedom to try out ideas that can advance his career as an artist. Olamide’s UK show may be an isolated incident. What’s more likely however is that he’s positioning himself for an international crossover.