Pop-sitive vibes keep Stonebwoy Up and Runnin6

24 oct 2024 - 15:35

Published under the Creative Commons Licence

For that boundary-pushing career opus, we might need to hold out until Stonebwoy’s seventh album – but no worries, it’ll be here before you know it. The Ghanaian superstar last dropped an LP just a year ago. In the meantime, he remains pop-prone as Up & Runnin6, his freshly minted sixth collection continues to draw from a commercial toolkit.

Stonebwoy.

That is not necessarily a bad thing insofar as it aims to sustain his cultural dominance. The catch? Stonebwoy’s album titles lately out-depth the projects themselves. Epistles of Mama (2017) barely resembles a collection of motherly wisdom or reflections, Anloga Junction (2020) honours his roots but pales in thematic mass, and 5th Dimension (2023) hardly unlocks higher layers. Up & Runnin6 swims in dance, love and fleshiness. Still, let’s see what deep explanations emerge in post-release media runs.

You can’t exactly fault him at this point. Seeking substance in pop is like seeking romance in a fling – possible, but unlikely. Up & Runnin6, which celebrates his “Afro-dancehall” blend of reggae-dancehall infused with African flair, feels just as transient – a good time, not a long time.

The pop formula also involves tossing various tracks at the wall to see what sticks. By the time the LP arrived on 24 October, roughly half of its 13 songs had already seen some form of release, so, if you think about it, we’re effectively receiving an EP for the price of a full-length. This raises the question of why he didn’t opt for a mid-length project instead, as EPs typically signal transition. Stonebwoy is clearly in flux: he is in between major label deals, and his sound and message desperately need a refresh. Perhaps Up & Runnin6 constitutes the final phases in his artistic shift.

Now, with the full complement of the album, the ones that stick – starting with commercial indices – are the ones that look homeward: ‘Jejereje’, produced by Grammy-winning Amsterdam-based Ginton, but marinated in traditional rhythm and folklore, the romance-infused ‘Betta Tin’ featuring Duncan Mighty (Nigeria), and ‘Shine’, which indulges in SA-led amapianosm.

There are also the ones that solder dancehall with African pop: ‘Your Body’, the Amaria BB-assisted ‘Fvck Up Summer’, ‘Ekelebe’ featuring Nigerian rapper Odumodublvck, and an updated version of the triumphant ‘Overlord’, now guesting blooming Ghanaian singjay Larruso and Jamaican musical cousins Jahmiel and 10Tik.

This sonic marriage is the very heartbeat of the album and has powered all his past works. Blasting off in patois on ‘Overlord’, Stonebwoy acknowledges his abilities within Afrobeats but also stresses that dancehall is where he is most credible: “A me did a feel say fi go drop some hits pon di Afrobeats/ So nuh bother think otherwise, the dancehall give me name.”

Indeed, no other artist – be it his predecessors or peers, in his home country or elsewhere on the continent – has advanced this mission as far, creating a legacy that now expands the possibilities for African artists deep in dancehall practice.

If you’ve kept up with Stonebwoy over the years, Up & Runnin6 offers little by way of surprises. He has mastered the building blocks so well that it now feels almost routine. Alas, even the project’s most innovative, most meaningful spot, was released weeks in advance. Titled ‘Pray For Me’ and closing the project, the track, featuring Haitian rap icon Wyclef Jean, flows between Afrobeats, dancehall and hip hop, touching on tales of survival and toughness. Part of the chorus goes:

Pray for me, my brother
When you see say I dey enter
Yawa o Yawa o

Why? “Cause life can get too hard,” Stonebwoy laments on the song’s hook.

The standout moment on Stonebwoy’s last collection arrived via ‘Manodzi’, his golden collaboration with Beninese great Angélique Kidjo, orbiting a similar thematic focus. You would expect the impact of that record to inform his future work – perhaps on album number seven.