Barbie wears a purple gele. The devil wears Roberto Cavalli, not Prada. Miranda Priestly’s Runway would be lucky to have her for their next issue. An angel in love with an angel, carving heaven out of whirlwind romances with the panache of a Lagos hottie caught in New York nightlife. The new 007, a femme fatale with the waist that launched a thousand ships. Helen of Troy, if she were Gen-Z, could sing, and starred as herself in a cinematic auditory experience with grand pre and post-credit scenes. This is the third installment in Ms. Oyinkansola’s long-play universe. Tiwa Savage opened the doors in white and red, once upon a time, but this—no—this is different. This is Starrgirl.
Ask music enthusiasts to define who the contemporary global African Pop star is, based solely on the music alone. Ask them to give you a body of work that best encapsulates what it means to be of Nigeria and the world, belonging to the West and motherland in somewhat frightening measure. They will suggest examples. But by Ebo Taylor, Mariam Makeba, and all the other deities of African music, none released this decade is as definitive of this hybridisation as Starrgirl. There are great albums, quite all right. But if we ever need to capture the ethos of the globalised contemporary African pop star via music and music only, the answer is Starrgirl.
If you came expecting the interiority of 19 and Dangerous and The Year I Turned 21, do accept our apologies. This is not that kind of pop album. If anything, Ayra constructs this album around her newfound larger-than-life status, opting more for relatable threads with listeners than a magnified look into her life. In fact, it could be argued that her last three projects, including the eponymous debut EP, drew from Ayra Starr as Ayra Starr while this is Ayra Starr starring as the character, ‘Starrgirl.’ Enlisting Terry Apala’s ancestral Apala runs on the intro, Dangerous is somewhat akin to Asa’s cameo on Start, off Asake’s Lungu Boy—major difference being that the latter was actually a sample of an existing song, Ẹyẹ Àdàbà. But the intent couldn’t be more similar. Here you have an acknowledgement of her Mobstarr stanbase. A declaration of her moneyed, unfuckwithable status, as on Birds Sing of Money. Starrgirl is geng (Wọn o lè rí mí tán/pretty Gangster, mhen I seen it all)! It’s cinematic, and for good reason.
When we next get in touch with this persona, it’s a new day, and the clock has struck Midnight in New York. The singer moved to the Big Apple in August 2025 following a Roc Nation deal, expressing her anxiety to the world shortly thereafter via Substack. None of that is in the nighttime air when we stumble in. Accomplices Matt James and LONDON create a dance-pop soundscape that’s almost blinding to the fact that she’s describing a one night stand. No names, just diamonds, heat, and red wine. Rollercoaster hips in the mold of Achebe’s No Longer At Ease oiled ball bearings waist description. She disappears again until Misunderstood, a remarkable record for even the greatest of fiends. The sheen fades, Ayra reappears and it’s an unwrapping of doubts and fears over pop rock. But you know why it matters more? Because you can tell that all over the world, there’s young girls listening, venting along, hopefully also finding rapper Little Simz’s more expansive, similarly themed Miss Understood. Dark residues of Cast (Gen Z Anthem) being washed away.
Bonus tracks are still an unforgivable blight on pop LPs, so Treasure, the penultimate track, is essentially where this reckoning concludes. “I do this for myself and the people wey dey follow me for years/I be chaser, and I’m headed for the treasure,” she sings rather convincingly, echoing Àmín and The Kids Are Alright. Gele as diadem. Music for temporary catharsis to see us out.
Ever the student of pop, Ayra’s femme fatale particulars are uncontested on this album in a genre-bending cinematic parade. It’s her sexiest album yet. It’s Joey B naming his sound ‘Sexy highlife,’ only this time Ayra becomes a genre unto herself on the Starrgirl Hot 16 charts. Sapphic R&B singer, Kwn co-leads the Amazing ride, a track dripping with so much luscious sensuality that it’s hard not to imagine purple babies popping up all over the globe sometime in May 2027. “Earthquake in my legs, while the backboard ‘bout to break/Put a hole in the wall.” And then a cheeky line about her lover’s small lemonade-stirring spoon, which isn’t exactly body positive. All the while Kwn is committing someone’s daughter to a 9:30—look up what that means. Without so much as a glance at hapless listeners dapping at sweat, lead single Gimme Dat segues in, as do metaphors about ‘2 by 2s’ and ‘licking stew’. It’s rather fitting that the original stew platformer himself, Wizkid, wails “Goddamn! Arábìnrin, goddamn!” as if struggling to believe all the heat pouring out of this vybe O and Mikababeatz dancehall monstrosity.
She whines like a Tornado too and delivers her second verse with the ease of a rapper. Beyond FOLA’s Messi-level efficiency and cross-cultural penmanship (“And if it belongs to Ceasar, give am to Anini”), this record also highlights an admirable feature of the Starrgirl: rejecting transactional love. Whereas FOLA sings about spraying money when his love interest dances with him, she revels comfortably in her sensuality, requesting that this loverboy do more than flaunt cash or chat. Be not surprised. This is a woman who made Mama Angelique Kidjo sing “When we link up, it’s a mad vibe,” after all. Another lead single, Hot Body, loads up almost immediately and is rather straightforward in its messaging. Sparse as they are, RAGEE’s rolling drums call you to attention as the celestial body oscillates round her axis.
By and by, trans-Atlantic hot girl summers don’t get better than Ayra linking up with Theodora for Ms. Paper. You know how the good-yet-bad thing about bouyon is that every song sounds like a hit? Well, not this one. This is a bona fide heat streak, oui oui. On the second verse, Ayra becomes Doja Cat, rapping the—if you listen hard enough—double entendre, “All white nails when I’m counting up the green.” Theodora gives Ayra a run for her Naira vocally on the song’s bridge as Super Mario-esque notes go off in the background. The album’s artwork isn’t just for show. Take Rema’s Who’s Dat Girl lyrics for it, she’s a “one of one, dangerous” hot body. Her war apparel is a nude, strapless mini gown with block heels for a reason.
Beneath that tough exterior, or more accurately, alongside her sexually liberated visage, our Starrgirl is a softie. There really is no way to listen to the person who crooned Beggie Beggie and assume she’ll be erased without being wrong in one’s assessment. Even better, on the two-song sequence where her songwriting explores the tenderness of uncertainty in romance, she situates her relationship as heaven. Letter To God is a ballad with a rhythmic structure similar to the autobiographical 21 on her sophomore album. Here, we learn that her lover is being influenced by external conversations. And then on the duet with Zayn Malik, Heaven Baby, a song that’s almost redolent of Rihanna’s Stay, both parties plead with each other to stay and make what they have work. This is the song that earns four swivels at your The Voice audition. Forget Ed Sheeran and Beyoncé’s Perfect. Step aside Fireboy and Lagbaja’s back n forth. Submit yourself to the grand piano’s pull. And if you didn’t already notice, ignore how cliché their words are.
As stellar as the songwriting on this album is—and it is remarkably stellar—Ayra sometimes resorts to familiar tricks to get songs along the line. For instance, on Heaven Baby, comparing her lover to an angel without wings and professes that she’d go past the sky for him and that life without him is insanity. Or how food metaphors recurred to the point of eliciting eye rolls. We get it, Queen Mobstarr. You’re a snack, and this is the year where bodies are meat pie and sriracha, simultaneously. In search of lamba on Who’s Dat Girl, she sings about being motivational, like Ken Saro Wiwa, a line this writer cannot bear to hear one more time. Inspirational, you might even believe. But how in the name of Afropop is the leader of the Ogoni 9 motivational?
The clichés sometimes come off successfully, like the simplicity of that one-night romp in New York and not asking for names Barney Stinson-style. Other times, like on Where Do We Go? and the Leon Thomas-assisted Pressure, she just sounds tired. WDWG is a topical record that’s supposed to be about the liminal space post-breakup, where the broken partner still seeks resolution, yet sounds more like one that she and producer ILYA had begun and had no option but to see through. The less we speak about Pressure, the better for us all. Both could have been left off the album just fine, and nothing would have changed. And that’s putting it sweetly.
When the aliens come for planet Earth, governments of the world must do all they can to ensure the extraterrestrials listen to Dance. Yes, it is a dance record—no idea why A&Rs didn’t opt for another title—but that’s beside the point. The point is that Dance represents Starrgirl‘s genre-bending, global-facing soul. An artist born in Benin Republic, raised in Lagos on Disney TV shows and American pop, whose claim to fame involves a prominent Lijadu Sisters sample, with Rihanna as a longtime fan, incorporating Shallipopi-adjacent rhymes about money, intoning in Yoruba, “Àgó fàájì là wá, Àgó ijó tí ya” (We’re in the period of enjoyment, it’s the time to dance), as EDM synths bounce around, resulting in music that can be played in any festival from Ibiza to Ibadan, Lollapalooza to Monochroma. Any more syncretism would be downright illegal, but Ayra Starr makes this record work. She makes the album walk. Sequencing is executed at such a high level that time moves along as if in a trance.
The Headies will be downright prehistoric not to revise the criteria for Producer of the Year from a singular acclaimed song to a larger body of work. But even if this doesn’t take place, The Elements are easily in the running, just for what was magicked on this LP. Amazing. Tornado. Ms. Paper. Misunderstood. Letter To God. Bodies. Bodies. Bodies. Distinct maximalist instrumentals that truly deserve a breakdown video. When this album earns its Grammy nod(s), the Swiss-German duo had better be ready to fly out with co-executive-producer, Don Jazzy, and the rest of the team. Not forgetting RAGEE, and Xize and Johnny Drille who had dual credits, each.
As far as third album curses go, Ms. Oyinkansola has overcome the odds. As far as album of the year contenders go, Ms. Oyinkansola is well ahead of the curve. Someday, someone will attempt to teach on the moment when Afropop truly attained globalisation in the album format. There will be temptations to list certain projects by the Big Three in that bracket. Tell them that the story finds a new beginning here. Contemporary African pop stardom was perfected as a template here. Authentic yet diverse pop belonging to the continent and the world; a scary sight that raises questions of erasure and external validation, but only because it leads back to recognising what makes music African: soul. And you can not take that away from this album, try as the damned might.
All rise for the Queen Mobstarr!
0 Comments
Add your own hot takes