Burna Boy says “there’s no substance” to most Afrobeats music

nme.com:

Burna Boy has shared his thoughts on the Afrobeats genre, criticising it for lacking any “substance”.The Nigerian singer, songwriter and record producer made the comments in a new interview with Apple Music.

Speaking with host Zane Lowe, he recalled his less-than-fond take on the genre, and pointed out how he believes the majority of Afrobeats music is lacking in any deeper meaning.This, he explained, is because he sees many of the artists as lacking any real “life experience”, which results in their final product being about “nothing”.“Half of them, [actually,] 90 per cent of them, have almost no real-life experiences that they can understand,” he claimed in the discussion. “That’s why you hear most Nigerian music, African Music, or Afrobeats, as people call it, is mostly about nothing, literally nothing.”“There is no substance to it, like nobody is talking about anything.

It’s just a great time, an amazing time,” Burna Boy added. “But at the end of the day, life isn’t an amazing time.”Unsurprisingly, the comments quickly sparked upset from fans and clips of the interview soon spread across social media, where many called out the musician for his take on the genre.“Him talking about substance, what have he said bout d hardship we been through in Nigeria,” one user wrote on Twitter, blasting him for his comments. “How many times have he sang about this cruel government… What have he said about ds passed election?”Another agreed, describing the opinion as “ignorance at its peak”. “A great time is not ‘nothing’.