That in our environment, of mostly morally-brain-dead people, we have a musician willing to speak publicly about negative ideas being propagated through music and we have people attacking him isn't in any way decent or brilliant.
No one here is trying to be a moral police. However despite recent advancements and global acclaim, Nigerian music mostly still has a lot of work to do when it concerns lyrical content.
Mostly, songs have just 3 or 4 lines in them. In a lot cases, guys are demeaning women in their music and in their videos, display a lifestyle they can only dream of.
The issue of 9ice follows the recent case of another musician Dammy Krane, who was arrested for identity card fraud in the U.S. That was a classic example of an artiste who hours before his arrest took pictures of himself on a private jet, and then got arrested as he disembarked from it. Clearly, he needed to steal to have that lifestyle. His earnings cannot afford it.
Although his family tried spinning the story to say that the use of the card in question was by the promoter of the show he was heading to, and not by him directly, recent reports from the prosecuting team revealed the singer was arrested while in possession of 10 fake credit cards, 2 of which he used in hiring the private jet he was arrested in.
The song, "Living things", by 9ice was about people who do the stuffs Dammy Krane does. We call them yahoo boys. Probably because the crimes they commit is mostly done to foreigners, we do not stigmatize people involved in it like other criminals. In the song, 9ice referred to those sleeping at night ( Yahoo boys are mostly online at night), as being lazy. in advising the lazy ones, he said " Money no dey fall from heaven, shey you know". He is even spiritualizing crime.
Musicians themselves are victims of cybercrime. a lot of their songs are easily pirated in a digital era such as the one we presently live in. 9ice himself released 2 songs in 2015, and warned all music websites in Nigeria not to upload the songs on their platform, and that he was going to sue, anyone who does so. In the alternative, he wants to people to make purchase of the songs through legal platforms, in order for him to be able to make profit from his hardwork.
This is why Falz calling him out on his song, glorifying cybercriminals is apt and relevant. Why anyone wants to say Falz is wrong is beats me. I mean we can couch rubbish in good grammar, but it doesn't excuse it from being rubbish.
I have read Funmi Iyanda saying that our system is broken, and that, that is more responsible for the issue than any song sang by 9ice. That's okay. But at the very least, his song validates a broken a system and spins it as something positive, and he is someone who should know better.
There are some Yahoo people online defending 9ice, because that also means a defence of their crimes. That's okay also. But let no decent person say Falz isn't doing the right thing. What he pointed out, was the power of the artiste to reach minds and souls through his music and art, and that power in his view should be used for something positive.
Some people support that conclusion,and disagree with the premise, and they think they are brilliant.
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