This week, I have come to the conclusion that the biggest news in Ghana is the reproduction of Bob Marley’s Stir It Up featuring our very own Sarkodie.
Sarkodie has had a good run and this is a befitting tribute to his illustrious career but then it comes at a time that we are at a crossroads in Ghana, musically. We still don’t have an identity.
There’s nothing that is distinguishing Ghanaian music on the world stage and that is disheartening as well as unhelpful to upcoming acts. Anyone starting to do music in Ghana will be doing so from a disadvantaged position because anything a musician comes up with now doesn’t sound original.
Sarkodie solves this problem in Stir It Up based on the little I have heard but doesn’t do it fully. To solve this problem, Ghanaian artists should default, not to Daddy Lumba or Nana Ampadu but to a version of Sark that sings and says way less. Sark made his name and laid claim to fortune through rap music but no matter what we do, the only aspect of his work that’s inherently Ghanaian is his ability to make his art suit everyday Ghanaian parlance and the ability to do it masterfully.
But Gasmilla did it better than Sark.
Gasmilla figured out a way to blend Ghanaianness and music artistry in a way that was appealing no matter who you were. Eight years ago, Gasmilla released Telemo, a track that did well beyond any other song of that time and it was all done in Ga. The fact that a Ga song became an African hit is a testament to the relevancy of artistry in the song.
Since that time, Ghanaian musicians have been trying to replicate that feat Gasmilla and so far one artist–Atom–did it with the same beat Gasmilla used.
In fact, at #WWDC2016, Apple played Atom’s version of Telemo.
We had found the blueprint for global music success at that point. There was no need to change that winning formula but subsequent musicians, typical of Ghanaians, did totally different music and Nigerians quickly took advantage of Afromusic.
Listen to Buga, Odo ye wu, or any Nigerian song that becomes a serious hit in Ghana and elsewhere in Africa and you will see traces of what Gasmilla invented.
We have dropped the ball on that tune but I think it’s not too late. I believe with a little bit of creativity, our new crop of musicians can build on what Gas and Atom did and redefine the music scene for future artists.
The other option is continuing to churn out music that sounds Nigerian in every sense of the word and losing every bit of what makes us unique as a people.