Runtown is staring at his phone and smiling in his bedroom. His long hair was combed to its full height, as weirdly colored as a section of an iridescent spectrum; blue hues mix with dashes of purple. He raised his head, jumped off from his seat and gave me a hug. The smile had grown wider, “My G!” he exclaimed in greeting.
“How do you feel,” I ask.
“I feel good, G,” he replies.
Of course he has to feel good. Few hours before we meet, his sophomore project, an EP titled “Tradition” has been released globally a week before schedule. It was a pleasant surprise for his fans. They are streaming heavily, sharing it on social media, and expressing their love for the project. The interaction was further helped with support from all major streaming platforms and digital stores. On Apple Music, he already had a titled banner on the carousel, and his songs were being mopped up by playlists looking to update on Runtown. It is enough to feel good.
On one end of the bed, a music industry exec named Henry, was perched, monitoring his social feed and sharing some new takes and reviews about the project. In another room, his manager, Kamal Ajiboye was on a call, attending to business. He didn’t see me walk in as he was gesticulating on the phone. This was the album release situation room. Everyone was in a great mood tracking success an all its indicators where they could find it. Their months of hard work is finally in public domain and paying off.
“People are feeling this project,” Runtown says, showing me a video of a guy in a car in the North, playing ‘Goosebumps,’ a track off the EP. The guy, a dark-skinned middle-aged man, was driving, and mouthing the lyrics into the camera. “Runtown, you do well!” he yelled, before performing a little dance. Runtown laughs, “he should be careful o, nobody should have accident with my music.
“Tradition,” a 6-track EP recorded in the aftermath of his label problems last year came with a vibe. All songs are mid-tempo, possessing a groovy instrumentation, and dealing on the intersection between love and living your best life. On the title track, Runtown brags “You gon love me for my ambition, getting money be my tradition, and I know mothafuckas want to be me broke, but getting money be my tradition.” You can find similar bragging themes all through the project. ‘International Badman killa,” has him mouthing off the fantasy of many young men, “Anywhere we go, two, three girls we get in a row, Badman Killa if you never know…”
No guest was featured in the record, a move that Runtown says was deliberate. “I wanted to possess my art again, and talk about me. This project is all about my tradition, my personal way of doing this. I am a rockstar!”
All of that acknowledged, we settle in, and begin to talk about the project, and why an EP that trumpets hedonism as its main theme is a window into the complete life of Runtown.
Congrats on your project. How do you feel?
I feel great man, because I remember the last time we spoke was based on troubles, and bad happenings, but now we are celebrating new music.
How does it feel to celebrate again?
Bro, I’ve been working so hard. I kind of went ghost for a while. I have been in the studio working on great music. I have actually been working on a full project but we had to slash it into two. This first leg is going out this summer and the remaining five songs are scheduled to drop in the last quarter of the year. It feels great dropping music again. And I didn’t want to drop a single for my fans after this whole wasted time; the whole court issue and… blah blah blah that happened. I just decided it’s time to give them more music and I feel like five bangers for summer, like crazy. We are on top again.
Why did you choose to make the project mid-tempo?
I just needed to create a body of work. That is one thing most artists don’t realize when creating an album or body of work. I made that mistake in the early stages of my career. I thought that just recording an album means you can just put any song. A body of work is like a series in audio form, do you understand? So it’s the same tempo just so it doesn’t really change the pace. But the mood has to change after each song. So it’s like a long ass song but just like different moods. After the first song it switches to the next mood but the same pace, you’re still like moving. So the best way to achieve that is actually mid-tempo.
You were tempted to throw in a Zanku or two?
That’s the thing about me. I don’t follow trends. I never follow trends. Everything I’ve ever dropped was the new vibe. I always just go with my own vibe because everyone is just listening to that now. They need this fresh air in the industry and that’s what my EP is now. It’s just that breath of fresh air in the industry. Mid-tempo music. Everything is moving too fast. I was in the club over the weekend and everything was like fast. Don’t get me wrong, we have bangers o, fast bangers coming o. Me and Sarz, we have one wicked song, it’s on that level. But, I feel for a body of work people need to just sit down and reflect. And I don’t really talk much. I don’t really be active on social media, I don’t really be talking much but I let my music speak for me. “Tradition” is me, my way of life. I put everything into a song form, that’s why every song is lyrical. Whether a love song, whether song about my life, whether a song about success, thanking God for life, everything is lyrical. It’s just a story of me, so that’s why everybody needs to go listen to that EP “Tradition.”
About your way of life. Do you embrace your celebrity?
I live life to the fullest all the time. I’m a rockstar in real life. Not just music life, in real life. I don’t see the need to announce that on social media. I just channel everything into my music. It’s real life like I live it. I actually live it. Everything in my music, I actually live it. That’s just me everyday and you can only know when you come into my world. Sometimes I show a bit of it in my videos. Sometimes I go live on Instagram and people can see the culture. Even when I’m at an event, it’s real rockstar vibes. Even at my shows, do you understand? But I’m always focused in the studio. I said earlier, I’m working on Afrobeats and Stadiums album, and I have like a blueprint already down for that album. And my target was Akon’s “Ghetto” album. But I think that has changed over the years while recording. I feel like I’ve already surpassed that creatively. Do you understand? Music from that era is very different from that of now. Now, we’re looking for that balance in pop culture and Afrobeats culture to make that genre of music really strong and for a lot of people to communicate. So real rockstar, in real life.
Does this level of commodifying your life leave you vulnerable?
I feel it’s the same for every true artist who is true to their art. Every artist. Art is a form of expression, and that’s like letting a lot of people into your space. Letting the world into your world. You’re no longer a private person. When I’m home I’m like, ‘me, rockstar living.’ When I’m out, I’m still like looking out for myself. Do you understand? Now, you’re exposed to a lot of people, you’re exposed to a lot of things. So hell yeah, you have to be vulnerable, you have to feel vulnerable all the time. At the same time, you have to look out for yourself while feeling vulnerable. And it’s okay. Don’t get me wrong. It’s okay to feel vulnerable. You’re in the public eye, you’re in the public space so it’s cool.
So, vulnerability is also your tradition?
If you’re a risk taker, you’d always be out there. Do you understand? Always on the move. You’re always putting yourself in some type of race. You’re adventurous so it’s cool to be vulnerable. It’s cool to take risks, it’s cool to explore. Do you understand?
When did you start recording “Tradition?”
Runtown – The first track I recorded on “Tradition” would be ‘Tradition’. Growing up, I loved that sample, the Donell Jones that I used on that. I always wanted to do something on that vibe and I was just in the studio one time and I just heard the sample like an old school party sample. Like a party starter. So, I just laid down this verse to it and I was like “Oh cool, I should actually keep this.” And I recorded this song three, four years ago. So that shows you how long the album has sat on the shelf and it still sounds brand new. I felt that it had the potential to be like a body of work. I feel like if I’ve put it out there alone at the time, it would have probably wasted. So the second song, I linked up Spellz in the studio. I’ve always wanted to work with Spellz, and in the studio he played a lot of mad beats and I did the normal freestyle thing we do in the studio just to build ideas.
We actually did four songs that day. But the ones we picked were ‘International Badman Killa’ and ‘Emotions.’ I travelled to Paris the following week, because I had my show in February. After the whole Europe tour, I went back to the studio, started building on ‘Emotions’ and I came up with the lyrics. There’s this girl called Monica. I actually have a girl called Monica in Paris (laughs). I was asking Monica, “tell me what you want from me.” Of course, I wasn’t really saying “you make badman sing song for you” but I was just being in the feelings like ‘this girl, you’re messing with and you feel like she is being too demanding.’
I was just in that space… That’s why I told you that everything here in my song is real life. Do you understand? It’s real life. It’s not made up. I write my songs from my heart, my soul, like everything. So everything on my song is real life. For ‘International Badman Killa’, we recorded three versions of that song. I kept on changing the verse because I felt it wasn’t good enough. Because having a song like ‘International Badman Killa’, of course you have to kill the verse of the song. So on the third version, I feel like we nailed it.
How about ‘Goosebumps’?
‘Goosebumps’ has a very interesting story. There’s this producer on Youtube, he’s very popular, named Ransome Beatz. A lot of artists know him, we always go there, seek inspiration, especially artists that produce as well. So I called Ifeanyi Nwunne, who works with my management team. I told him to get Ransome to work on this EP as well. After the tour, I was going to London and he schools in Amsterdam, but he is actually from Nigeria. We linked up. Through YouTube we got his email, we sent him an email and we linked up in London and began to work. Ransom Beatz is really talented and he is one of those producers that can make a hundred beats in 5 minutes. I was just confused listening to all he had. We kept on recording, and I felt like all the songs were good.
I was exhausted, and took a nap. While sleeping, I started hearing the beat to ‘Goosebumps’. I woke up and was like ‘What’s this?’ and he was just like, ‘I just made this one now.’ I just stopped sleeping, and the idea just came to my head because that’s how I was feeling then. You know there are some songs you hear that give you goosebumps when you really get into the music. So I was just like, this is ‘Goosebumps’.
Why did you name your project ‘Tradition’?
When I announced the title, a lot of people thought it was going to be a track, like probably an Igbo song in it. But, that’s a tradition, but I have have my own tradition…
What is your tradition?
I love my culture. I’m a proud Igbo boy. But I have my own way of life. Every single thing you hear on that EP is real life.‘Redemption’ was recorded around when all those label drama was happening. So, I met this girl in Dakar, Senegal. I went for a show there and she was making me happy. At that point, she was my redemption and I put that on a song and boom! That’s how we got ‘Redemption’. Del B was in Dakar as well, Del B made a banging beat for the song and put it out. So everything out there is actually real life, true story.
You know, we could say women inspired this project?
Yeah! Women actually inspired the project. And that could also be part of my tradition as well. So it’s a way of life, tradition. For ‘International Badman Killa’; I was in a space of wow, you just heard a crazy beat, you’re feeling like a bad musician and that’s why that song took time. I did the first verse, I was like ‘nah, this is not what an international badman killa would sing’. I kept on recording until the record was befitting of the name.
So recently you wrote about the state of the Nigeria on Guardian, What do you think is Nigeria’s problem?
Bro, a lot of things are wrong with Nigeria. I was just trying to shed light on the most pressing issues. Just imagine being in a country that has a lot of troubles already. And we’re facing this type of police brutality in modern life. That shouldn’t be happening out here. In some other parts of the world, they always credit this to racial differences when that happens. But race problems are almost non-existent in Nigeria. First of all, the problem of Nigeria like everyone says started with Nigeria’s bad leaders. Not just bad leaders, Nigeria’s bad leadership. So I feel if we can work on good leadership, we’d have a good country. And its not just about the leaders. Everyone is a leader. You are a leader, I’m a leader. So, we would need to go out there and lead by love and example and play our parts. that’s the only way we can change the situation of Nigeria right now.
Do you think SARS should be ended?
Okay, you might end SARS now and they’d bring in another one bigger than SARS. That new group would probably drop hundred people in a day. That one we might have to leave the country and run away from them. I don’t think that is the first measure to take. There are a lot of measures the government needs to carry out. They just need to sit up and listen to the people because if you analyse most of these situations you’d see that these are actually innocent people that were just indicted probably by how they look, probably by their hair, anything. They just feel that oh, ‘you look like an armed robber, you could be an armed robber.’ But, is there anyway an armed robber really looks? I need to see the picture of an armed robber with like dreads and chains. I haven’t seen an armed robber with dreads and chains, so I just don’t know. That can’t be a measure to harass someone. We’ve seen things like this even in other countries. Even countries that are less developed than Nigeria, they have good procedures out there. So, Police brutality should actually be stopped immediately. But I don’t think End SARS is the solution to ending police brutality.
Back to the lighter stuff, there seems to be a bit of a new movement around you. You’re changing your look, a lot of things, what is it all about?
Man, I just got tired of how I look in the mirror. Most of these things I actually do it for my own selfish gain. I’m like I’d just do my hair like this and I don’t care if you like it. So I just want to create. That’s art, you can express yourself. With your hair, how you dress, how you talk, so it’s just me expressing myself. I just want to go coloured hair for a while now, probably for two weeks. And I might even wake up and feel like I’m cutting my hair. And I might even wake up the next week start growing my hair back again. I don’t think it’s that serious, it’s just a form of expression.
What’s your expectation for this project?
I’m expecting this project to do a lot of numbers. That’s why we are trying to put a lot of visibility on this project and make sure that everyone listens to it. Because I really put out my time, everything, my real life. Imagine putting all your real life in songs just to make people happy.
So anyone that has listened to the project has known Runtown?
Yeah. That’s Runtown’s way of life, tradition, on that project. So get to know me and listen to the EP.
Stream Runtown’s ‘Tradition’ below:
