Saturday, May 8, 2010
CALL him Osakuni Sunday and you will be
surprised that not many Nigerians will be
acquainted with the name. But call him
Original Stereoman – Ekwe, he does not
need any further introduction. That was the
tight spot the talented ragamuffin musician,
found himself recently in Holland.
He was in Hague as one of the participants
at the just-ended Niger-Delta Peace
Consolidation Conference organized by the
Hope for Niger-Delta Campaign (HNDC),
where he entertained the mixed audience
to his kind of music. Saturday Celebrity
engaged him after the three -star
performance concerning and the origin of
the ekwe – sample, his love for women,
dread locks and more.
Excerpt:
It’s a surprise meeting you in the
Netherlands. What brought you here?
I ‘m in Hague for a programme organized
by the Hope for Niger-Delta Campaign
(HNDC) on consolidation of peace in the
Niger-Delta. I thank God for the way the
programme went.
I thought you were a musician, and not a
Niger-Delta activist.
Yes, I am a performing artiste as well as an
activist championing the cause of the Niger-
Delta people – if you want to put it that
way. I’m here because of the campaign by
the HNDC for a better life for the people of
the Niger-Delta. I’m in total support of the
cause the group is championing. I preach
about peace and things that will help Niger-
Delta region grow.
What are you taking back home after the
conference?
I think I’m going home with a positive result
because I believe we have achieved
everything that we came here to do. I will
go home to tell the people what happened
here.
What do you think the government of
Nigeria should borrow from the
Netherlands knowing that the country
shares the same topography that dot the
Niger-Delta region?
Niger-Delta is my mother land and the
international headquarters of Shell is
situated in Netherlands. What I think the
Government of Nigeria should do is to
translate the good things they have seen
here into reality in our country. If you
remember, during the conference, the
whole arguments centered around the lack
of development in the Niger-Delta.
Government officials have been visiting
Netherlands time without number, so they
cannot claim ignorance of the fact that
Netherlands was reclaimed from the water;
so was the Niger-Delta region. We just claim
to be the giant of Africa but yet we don’t
learn anything.
How can we say we are learning or that we
are the giant of Africa when we don’t bring
good things back home for our people.
Comparing Nigeria ’s problem with Europe’s
amounts to making a mistake, because our
leaders travel outside the country on
regular basis and see these things for
themselves. They return home without
doing anything to improve the quality of
lives in this country.
You can see that the Niger-Delta is one of
the poorest regions in the world, people
who manage to own cars among them
cannot even drive their vehicles to their
villages because there is no access road. We
need a quick change of things.
You were half nude when you were
performing on stage. Why did you appear
like that?
It’s how I dress. In the area where I come
from, we believe in our tradition. We tie
wrappers, wear beads around our necks
and sometimes, we put on singlets. That is
how we do it.
I try to bring an African lifestyle into it. My
kind of music is ragamuffin , but I present it
in African style: something close to the
culture of the place I come from. That is the
reason I dress that way, and people
appreciate my style.
Must ragamuffin musicians always wear
dread locks?
It’s not a must for every musician to wear
dread locks. But it’s just that dread locks
bring out the African-ness in a person. You
know we didn’t have combs in those days
to comb our hair. And when you don’t have
a comb, how does anyone expect your hair
to be, punk or layers? It’s my style. I chose
to go this way.
You go by the nickname
Sample-Ekwe. Ekwe is an Igbo name for the
gong. Are you an Igbo man?
Ekwe is a Nigerian word that is most
popular in the Igbo area. I am from Delta
State. We also call it (gong) ekwe. When you
beat the gong, people must hear the sound.
That is how sample came into it.
If you have a product, you sample it for
people to know it first and foremost before
they can patronize you. When I sample my
ekwe, people hear the sound. That is why it
is ekwe in the first instance.
Your dance steps appear to be original to
you, how did you come about it?
Yes, I started with cultural dance, egwu-igba
cultural group. I tried to merge them with
the current dancing steps of ragamuffin
with break-dance, which is why it’s on its
own. I included cultural dance and all that
together, that is what makes it Angle 90
dance step and with my lyrics, what is you
see is original stereo-man -style.
Women always flock around musicians.
What is your experience with women?
I will say women and children are my major
fans. Any musician that doesn’t have
women or children by his side is not a good
musician – His music is not accepted.
Children come around me a lot. I like women
very well because my mother is a woman.
But in terms of sleeping with women, I
don’t indulge that much. I’m married and I
have a kid. So I want the best for my family.
Sometimes, I try to touch them but I don’t
bless them because eh… body no be
firewood sometimes. But man need to hold
himself. Not all that come are good for you.
Some have come to destroy your star. Some
are coming to make you what you are
supposed to be. But, generally women and
children are important in the entertainment
industry.
So when is your next album hitting the
market?
Right now, I’m working on my reloaded
album that is going to come out soon but
apart from that, I am working on my new
album that is due to hit the airwave before
October. Okpemu, agwo turu mbe turu
okpokoro, is going to be the hit track and it
means the snake that wants to swallow a
tortoise is only swallowing an ordinary can,
meaning that, you are swallowing
something that has no meaning.
Am trying to do a gospel song in the album
something like someone that is trying to
destroy what God has created is destroying
an ordinary thing because it will not work.
Those are the kind of tracks in my new
album. It is going to come out before the
end of the year.
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