SirBastien’s sophomore project, Mango Island is more of a place than a sound. A collection of memories, feelings and experiences, Mango Island is a fictitious place built around qualities of concepts that can almost be felt, words that can almost be touched, and harmonious instrumentals that nurture every part of one’s listening mind, building up a longing to be physically present within the sound. It is a testament of its creator’s serene thought processes, and a continuation of his previous body of work.
“Mango Island is finding your way out of the nighttime tropical forest you’re lost in to find out you’re stranded on a pleasure island. It’s the fulfillment of Mango, a two part series”, SirBastien says.
“I’ve learned two things, friends are very important because they are your first fans, and, never stop creating. Mango Island has been through more than 10 changes with lots of songs being added and removed every week. You can’t rush quality” is SirBastien’s statement on the lessons he has learnt in the putting together of this project. You really can’t rush quality. As an example, he says “Cosmic girl was supposed to be released with Mango but some issues arose and it didn’t make it but I knew it had to be released at some point”
Building on any previous success can be tricky – expectations are to be met, and new ears are to be dragged into the fold. SirBastien’s approach to the creation of Mango Island seems well thought out and exponentially tilted towards the expansion towards new avenues of his unique sound.
Sir Bastien’s approach towards making music can be explained in simple terms; he seldom writes more than a verse – hence the reason why his songs are short, and why he collaborates with other artistes a lot.
On Mango Island, the features are worthy of each song. Artistes such as Remy Baggins, July Drama, Eri Ife, Flowolf and others made marvelous contributions to the sonic composition of the project, but there is one feature which stands out for its progenitor:
“Maya Amolo’s verse on Cosmic Girl stands out a lot for two reasons, the lyrics perfectly capture the theme of the song and her vocals are very dreamy and spacey which added to the overall ambience.”
Cosmic Girl happens to be the second song on the project, just right after the introductory song, Super Fly, but Sir Bastien says – “Super Fly is the last song I made and the story was already completely written in my mind, it took me one day to get a full demo before I sent it to Yinoluu to add that magic spice.”
Sir Bastien isn’t one to neglect the core of his cultural heritage, so with the Afrobeats sound, he delivers the gift of AfroPop with class as he creates Pillow Head around the genre, but he also makes sure it maintains some form of structure and meaningful lyricism without throwing away the essence of anything Afro – vibes.
Speaking on the importance and Afrobeats and his harnessing of its power in Pillow Head, Sir Bastien says Afro beats slowly grew into a genre of the mood rather than its lyricism. I often wonder why there aren’t more “Beat of Life” songs around. Having lyrical content in an afrobeat song is definitely a plus, because while you can dance to it, you can also catch a story or fun punch lines. Afrobeats to me is the music of producers, people laying vibes on tracks is definitely a very calculated move. I would prefer to listen to proper words, but that won’t stop me from enjoying wini wini wana wana.
Still carrying along the spirit of Afro, Sir Bastien creates Mango Island, the song around which the project was built. You might get carried into the island and hope to never come out of it, but Mango Island only serves a temporary pleasure that only lasts for a couple seconds. Sir Bastien says “If I can get Omah Lay on it” there might be a full version of the song.
Another song which almost did not make the Mango Island cut is Home With You, a song in which Remy Baggins and Daynim feature.
“Home with you was almost scrapped a few times, but with the intervention of certain people, it got its luster back and secured its place as my favorite song. Many thanks to Remy Baggins for bringing the drums to life and Daynim for being such fantastic collaborators”.
In putting together this solid body of work, SirBastien learnt a couple funny lessons which he shared with us in a list:
- Doing collaborations is difficult. Would never recommend!
- Add about 6 months to your intended release date, things will go wrong.
- Might not release music after this for a whileeeee, I’ve done my bit now it’s time to go back to the boards.
However, there are still a lot to enjoy in this period while it lasts. For the following weeks and months to the release of Mango Island, Sir Bastien wants you to know that there would be “lots of merch; bucket hats, Tee shirts, CDs, Posters, stickers, and a music video!”
The music Sir Bastien makes isn’t the type you would come by anywhere, so it is imperative that you support his art in any way you can – listen, share, buy merchandise when it’s announced, put your friends on (many of us are stingy with good music – I could be guilty of this too sometimes lol)…. Just make sure you are contributing in some way or the oher to the greatness of his art because what matters the most to Sir Bastien is “being able to sit back and say (I) did (my) best and for other people to recognize (my) effort”.
