On the night of his performance at the O2 Arena, Asake arrives on scene on an army helicopter marked YBNL. Rotors are audibly whirring, lights are blinking and Asake himself is descending from a ladder, about to land on one of the most iconic music venues in the world. For a man whose mainstream debut was less than two years ago and who has spent a lot of the time since then making prophecies on his journey in music, being one of the only four Nigerian artists to ever headline at the O2 Arena is a crowning moment. But if this epoch demonstrates yet again how much Asake is on the fast lane, the performance itself shows that despite his much-famed lyrics from Sungba to Lonely At The Top, Mr. Money does waste time, sometimes.
The singer arrived nearly two hours late, at 9:50 PM, just as the DJ and the energetic hype man were beginning to lose the crowd’s attention. The O2 Arena has a curfew set at 10:30 PM on Sundays, with a reported fine to be paid by artists who violate it, but if Asake was worried about having to trim his performance, he did not show it. Aside from his elaborate entrance, there was a tribute to the two people who died in a stampede at his last performance in London. It was well done, but felt very impersonal. After these introductions, it was clear Asake had put out a well rehearsed, very coordinated performance and he was going to stick with it despite the time constraint. One song led to another, right on cue; once or twice he tried to interrupt his performance to speak to the fans without success. He probably should have tried harder, though, if only to put a personal touch to the tribute from earlier or offer an apology and an explanation for his tardiness.
Still, he went through his planned setlist, going through songs from his first and second albums, as well as a few from before. These songs, he weaves into sonic eras, being backed up by Ghanaian band, The Compozers, who wax and wane through the exuberant and the emotional corners of his discography. First he belts out bouncy tracks like Organise, Sumonmi, Dupe and Mr. Money in succession as the crowd responds energetically. Later he breezes through Dull, Ototo, Muse, Nzaza, Baba God and Trabaye, and here the instrumentalists are needed to put a spiritual feel to these songs.
It helps that a lot of this second batch of tracks are prophetic of the heights he has reached today: “Promoters dem don dey call/ London girls, I dey come”, he sings on Trabaye, released eighteen months ago. He, however, throws in an unknown song, Body, from 2020, into this slowed-down mix and so the track is robbed of both the familiarity to fans and the energy of the performer. At the O2 Arena, Asake attempts to be energetic and even spontaneous but there is a certain regimen to everything; before he reaches for the flamethrower-like device a crew member is already handing it out to him. His interaction with the crowd for songs like Muse and Nzaza feels more like ticking off a list than a passion-fueled moment.
This choreography helps with organisation and control, needed for his first night on a stage this grand, but it takes a little away from the natural feel of his performance. His own energy levels, too, are noticeably off, and at each stage of the performance he appears as exhausted as he would if he started at the 8p.m. he was actually billed to begin.
Asake has spoken in interviews about how he tries to make his live sets feel a lot more special than streaming at home, and his concert shines on these principles. His biggest strengths are the sheer brilliance of the songs he created these last two years, as well as their sonic enhancement here with the help of the Compozers. His guests certainly help too. Olamide and Tiwa Savage get the crowd going when they come on at different times, but they suffer mic issues that barely let them vocalise their music. Fireboy, thankfully, is free of this. His duet with Asake for Bandana was one of the night’s best moments.
Some other guests and songs, though, feel unnecessary in light of the reduced time he was working with. Like calling on Fridayy for a performance of Blessings, or Tunde Bayiewu for Ocean Drive, the song that inspired Sunshine. Since he could not filter out only the best songs to appear in the one hour fifteen minutes he was able to perform for, he was forced to end abruptly, and with a number of tracks—2:30, Terminator, What’s Up My G, Remember—unperformed, presumably on the other side of his rushed exit. Whatever delayed his arrival marred what was to be a great performance, but he has proven here that he has all the fundamentals to thrill a crowd this large in a venue this special. Like he said, he will be back.