Barry Jhay artfully engages the Yoruba concept of Aiye

A rare combination of ancient wisdom and its rhythm fused with contemporary beats has, for a while, been the target of some of Nigeria's contemporary music stars. Asa, Simi, Adekunle Gold, Kiss Daniel and a few others have all tried to explore this elusive realm with different degrees of successes.

In some cases, as it is with Adekunle, there are moments of total misconception of the nature of Yoruba spiritual culture. But Jhay, having obviously gone back to the roots even as a modern artist, seems to have come across the exact elements that may spell a new and yet familiar path in Nigerian music.

The word "Aiye", which literary can mean "life" or the "world" (depending on the context of its usage in the Yoruba Language), is also a covert name, in the Western Nigerian spiritual belief system, for cults said to secretly run or influence humanity’s fate positively or negatively. Understanding Aiye, to the Yoruba people, is the provenance of all wisdom. In fact, the whole culture of the Yoruba people revolves around the interpretation of life with Aiye in consequential cognition: why does Aiye (a word used only in plurality) act or react; why do they give or take; enrich or impoverish? Without a clear understanding of Aiye’s ways, the people have concluded that Aiye is a mystery.

So in everyday life, when Aiye doesn’t mean the world or an individual’s life, it means mystery, events of the underworld, ways of the occult. Cinema, music, dance, painting, sculpture, literature and other art forms have consistently engaged Aiye in various narratives, making it the most talked about topic in Yoruba culture. 

And this word, in all its ambiguousness, is what Jhay has seen fit to name his first major single. He courts the risk of being found wanting in what his understanding of the word is as a young artist. But wait till you listen to him not just put the word in context, but artfully engaging it in the track.

The song starts with a loud cry of the word "Aiye". The cry is similar to the real-life use of the word. It also shares a similarity to Alhaji Sikiru Ayinde Barrister's shout of the word in his track of the same title. The call comes with echoes, not dissimilar to those used in the soundtrack of the popular 1990s Yoruba film Koto Aiye. And then the beats: contemporary—slow-paced yet groovy. 

The lyrics of the song, however, give the song its most valuable essence. Jhay understands Aiye not as the group Infinity’s shallow interpretation of the word in their track 'Aiye O le'—which is the Christian understanding of it—but in its most cultural and spiritual perspective. The gospel group says Aiye isn’t difficult, only for those who have faith in God. Jhay, on the other hand, says Aiye isn’t hard, only for those who are wise. And then he follows up his claim with aptly used traditional adages. He talks about Ori, which is believed to be one’s carrier of fate in the Yoruba cosmology, saving him from the mock of Aiye.

But what is this wisdom Jhay talks about? A clue might be found in the cover photo of the single: There is the artist's name Barry Jhay; in a bigger size of the same font, the word Aiye; and then cowries of the Ifa divination.

Nobody talks about Aiye literally; expressions are made in parables and adages. And Jhay—like the king of juju music King Sunny Ade, who used Yoruba idioms and proverbs like no other musician in history—drops his lyrics, line by line, in befitting proverbs.

The Yorubas say, “Oro po ninu owe kobo”, meaning: “There are plenty of meaningful words in a proverb that costs next to nothing." Barry Jhay has said a lot in under four minutes.

Buy Barry Jhay's Aiye here

Artist: Barry Jhay
Song: Aiye
Label, Year: Cash Nation Music Entertainment, 2018