9.7
On his “Troubled Mind” opener, Wizkid is ushered in with an extollation by the legendary K1 the Ultimate. The short but heavy fuji blurb is from the traditional burial celebration of Wizkid’s late mother Mrs. Juliana Morayo Balogun, whom the album pays tribute to. It quickly blurs to a softer sober-induced groove where his grief can freely surface, but Wizkid remains miserly with it. “One shot for Mama, yes, I miss you,” he sings stiffly, before he returns to rubbing his sorrows against determination on the track, quite in his upward way of thinking.
Wizkid wants you to feel on ‘Morayo’, even when he wears something of a mask over his own emotions. His new 16-track album weaves a contagion spool from hope, grief, jubilant success and relentless joy. He is at every bend of his rhythms concocting it with intention, making sure. He is perking up from behind the swaying gyrations to glance with knowing of its consequence. He coats his vocals in caviar, sweetening granulated flows upon pulsating instrumentals. “You no go fit to kill my vibe/ I get peace of mind/ plenty money and I dey my high”, he sings on ‘Karamo’. His woes can not slip through this hefty wall of resistance. You must admit, he has become a master at this.
However, when tempos shift between this blasé aura of luxury to sober sincerity, we are allowed to inspect the arc. While the former weaves paths for his stealthy escapes, the latter justifies them. “Omoge, why i no go flex? Blessings dey fall like water for my head,” he sings on ‘A Million Blessings’. And on, he sparks the gbedu and charges it with servile duty: from the throbbing log drums arranged by P.Prime on ‘Bad Girl’ with Asake to the bass-stricken fingerpicking by P2J on ‘Kese (Dance)’.
When he is sure it’s the right time, he slowly blunts the edges with soulful tunes, banking Aylø’s saccharine flair on the plusher notes of ‘Time’. Anaïs Cardot is also his trusted navigator on the airy strings and pristine fields of ‘Slow’. Wizkid’s passionate expeditions are boundless, and as a seasoned serenader he cakely works his magic. He hasn’t lost his slippery touch nor his charming honesty. He smoothly reassures his lovers while mitigating their imminent loss.
On ‘Bad for You’, Jazmine Sullivan takes him on his challenge, “I know that you’re bad for me, I’ll be bad for you too.” He is the smooth lover boy who can’t be caught playing at the shorter end of the string, too close to the danger. However, he isn’t immune to conscience or common sense that goes hand in hand with romance. At some point, on the unfettered strings of ‘Piece of Mind’ with Brent Faiyaz, he lets the veil of burden fall. “Stressful, I know, every other day, another timezone.”
‘Morayo’ is Wizkid’s latest feat in his series of pervasive projects, primed from his origins and aimed at world dominance. To be fair, Afrobeats’ foremost international superstar has had his triumphant run. Fans and believers will always look back to his 2020 protracted impact with ‘Made In Lagos’ that solidified his conquest of global stardom. It was such a peaking success, it proved too hard to replicate on his subsequent ‘More Love, Less Ego’ in 2022. However, that second try made it clear that he had finetuned his global pop style to a sparkling neat standard. For him, domination no longer served a question of how, only when.
So when he introduces ‘Tiakola’ on ‘Après Minuit’, he reclines on his legacy while the versatile francophone act taps from it. Throughout ‘Morayo’, Wizkid feels very giant, playful, then reserved. If that wall cracks, even for a second, he quickly seals it up. “I got to cope with the pain / and got to keep up the pace, you know how I do my thing,” he offers on ‘Lose’.
‘Morayo’ sways with its fullness, round and satisfying. Wizkid puts together a hospitable project, making new rooms in every home while lilting from extravagant afrobeats to the creamier sauce of RnB. His generous feature of talking drum gyrations and intoxicating highlife fusions breathe unbridled excitement into his tunes. And within them, he moves with brilliant transitions, escorted by captivating sample cuts.
Through this album, we can feel his strengthened resilience against the power of loss, and the sort of optimism and purpose that drives a man like him. Against all odds, even when the horizon looks dim, Wizkid looks around, counts his blessings and says that he has found joy.
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