Phyno pulls every music string on “The Playmaker” album

Album: The PlaymakerArtiste: PhynoGuests: Psquare, M.I, Burna Boy, 2baba, Flavour, Decarlo, Mr Eazi, Onyeka Onwenu, Olamide, Zoro, Tidinz, Burna BoyProducers: Masterkraft, Tspize, Benjamz, Tunex, Major Bangz, Chris String, Kezyklef, Del’BDuration: 84 MinutesRecord Label: Penthauze (2016)

Any Nigerian rap fan will understand that the game has been skewed with a feverish push by rap acts to generate pop singles. Phyno currently leads this charge, after the success of ‘Connect’ and ‘Fada Fada’.

“You’re not even messing with my connect, with my connect,” he sang joyfully on 2015’s ‘Connect’. The song had connected him to another level of artistry; one which leans heavily towards retro Eastern Highlife, reimagined for radio and the playlists of his fans. That song became a huge hit.

Now, after adding vocals with Olamide on super-hit ‘Fada fada’ and also to suggestive hits ‘E sure for me’ (‘Olisa doo’) and ‘Pino pino’, the swashbuckling Igbo rapper has named his second album “The Playmaker”. Other vertical pop stars who have laboured all their careers to enjoy Phyno’s current status can’t come close right now.

“The Playmaker” is actually a two-part conceptual album about life stories, women, aspirations, introspection and sounds. Both halves are intertwined with each other, forming a sonically complete body of work.

The first is a direct culmination of Phyno’s obsession with Highlife which has proven financially rewarding and uplifting for his career. The second is a light dip into his Hip-hop roots, where he still maintains echoes of his debut album – 2013’s “No Guts No Glory”. Phyno has developed as an artiste into a direction that is far from that outstanding project. Where he spent time on his debut album rapping his heart out, on this one, he expertly coasts through predominantly as a complete artiste, and the effects are amazing.

He’s arguably the current playmaker of the Nigerian pop music space, with an extensive story to tell, victories to celebrate, and friends to join in on the happiness. He certainly commits to the theme.

After declaring himself the greatest on ‘Best rapper’, he finds new ways to ‘Link up’ with Burna Boy and M.I on another strapping track which serves as standard braggadocio material complete with chest pumping, shots at haters, glaring at noisy bloggers, and a caress of the bank account, which somehow validates all of that aggression. You can’t have aggression and fire shots with a weak bank balance.

Emotions are a strong part of this work. You could feel the maternal thug at your heartstrings as Onyeka Onwenu elegantly carries ‘Ochie Dike (Mama)’. Introspection and thanksgiving power through on ‘Mistakes’ and ‘SFSG (So far so good)’, while love sneaks its way in on ‘Pino Pino’.‘No be my style’, a song about the hustle features the brilliantly blunt line ‘Imma do me cos, so so mu na’e feelu pain mu’ (I will do me because only me can feel my pain)’.

Some core Hip-hop purists may not warm up to Phyno’s versatility on the mic, but his composition and writing skills are difficult to fault. Aided by a crop of producers including Masterkraft, Major Bangz, and Tspize, he keeps the music complete and consistent all through the album, giving the listener a holistic experience of the new Phyno as a man, an artiste and an industry leader.

Where he started off his career as a producer, and then a rapper, he has developed other skills, which sits at the heart of the music making process. This has in turn catapulted him from the East, to the centre of the Nigerian music space, from where he pulls the strings across pop and Hip-hop, rakes in the fan love, and serves as a strong standard bearer for Eastern music. “The Playmaker” as an album is simply a confirmation of his present status.

Rating – 4

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