Afropop artist Taves has released his new EP, Popstar SIDE A, capping off the most defining year of his career. The project follows his breakout single Uche Jombo, a flip of Wizkid’s classic “Don’t Dull” that became his most successful record to date across streaming and press, and the introspective Isn’t It Beautiful. Together, the two singles set the stage for an EP that captures Taves at his most assured and his most honest.
Taves has been building steadily since 2019, moving fluidly across Afrobeats, R&B, and alternative pop, earning recognition from Apple Music, Billboard, and The Headies for his 2024 project Are You Listening?. Along the way, he has collaborated with well-known Afrobeat stars including Show Dem Camp, BNXN, Ladipoe, and L.A.X, and Popstar SIDE A continues that creative momentum, with production from Arieenati, Spax, OG Sterling, and Samklef, and Wizkid credited as an additional composer on the project’s standout single.
Popstar SIDE A moves across eight tracks, tracing the emotional landscape of a young man navigating love, pressure, faith, and self in Lagos. Chaos opens the project in the thick of competing demands: a relationship pulling at him while he tries to stay focused on his work. Isn’t It Beautiful and Simone sit in the messy middle ground of love, one a quiet confrontation with the white lies that hold a relationship together, the other an intoxicating pull toward a woman he knows is trouble.
Deliver Me is a reaching out, Uche Jombo a confident celebration of a woman he cannot stop thinking about. Preaching turns inward on a harder kind of night, financial pressure and quiet desperation driving him to prayer. Space carries the weight of a love he lost through his own selfishness, and the project closes with Take Me Away, an honest admission that despite everything, she could still take him back in an instant.
On Popstar SIDE A, Taves opens a window into a year of growth, self-discovery, and intention, sharing a version of himself that feels more real and fully formed than ever before. The project is Taves’ way of moving fluidly between love, desire, connection, and self-reflection; drawing from real experiences and portraying them in the most intentional way he knows how, as he leans into both the fun and the honesty of who he is. Popstar SIDE A invites audiences to celebrate the relationships that define them while stepping, alongside Taves, into a more confident and self-assured sense of who they are.
