Wizkid disowns Afrobeats

Essence star, Wizkid, has joined the growing list of top Nigerian artistes explicitly creating a distance between themselves and the Afrobeats tag.

The sound has increasingly gained global traction over the past few years and showcased Nigerian talents on the biggest global stages, but Wizkid has spent the past two days announcing on his Instagram account that he's more than the one sound.

Shortly after announcing that his next album, Morayo, was done, on Friday, March 15, 2024, he followed it up with a series of posts including, "I am not a fucking Afrobeats artiste! I'm not Afro anything!"

Wizkid on Afrobeats [Instagram/@wizkidayo] Pulse Nigeria

Many critics immediately labelled the rant a ploy to promote the album and condemned the damage his posturing could cause the further advancement of the sound, but the superstar didn't relent.

On Saturday, March 16, he made a longer post explaining why he shouldn't be called an Afrobeats artiste.

1. He makes other kinds of music

The music star wrote, "Listen, am I an African? Yes! But I do make all sorts of music. Fine music! But I don't want these labelled just Afrobeats. That's like saying every American artiste makes rap. That's stupid."

He later added, "Made in Lagos is not an Afrobeats album, that's a fusion of different sounds. Real music!"

2. Something to do with award categorisations

Wizkid also appears to be bothered about how the Afrobeats categorisations can affect his chances during awards season.

He wrote, "This is why no matter how good or amazing the music we make, be it RnB or whatever the genre, we all get nominated in the one Africa category or the other, I've made songs from different genres of music."

3. The origin of 'Afrobeats' tag

Wizkid also appears to be bothered by the origin of the Afrobeats tag and clearly disagrees with it.

He wrote, "The word Afrobeats was made up by y'all to put all we make into one box. Fela created Afrobeat! I make all sorts of music. Fusion of sounds! "I'm an artiste" before anything else. True to my art."