We show you already how Burna Boy used dancehall to build his career and become a global music star. Now WMV examines how Wizkid uses the elements of dancehall music to build a record breaking series of mega hits and RIAA certified songs and albums.
2016 was a year that dancehall flourish on the charts and Nigerian singer Wizkid has one more reason to celebrate as his feature collab on Drake’s One Dance with British singer Kyla has been certified Diamond by the RIAA. The single from Drake’s 4th studio album Views was previously certified 8x Multi-Platinum September 25, 2019 by. It is also certified Diamond in France (233,333) and Canada (800,000).
Wizkid becomes the first African artist to be certified Diamond in the U.S. with a single.
The dancehall, afro-fusion, hip hop single, co-written by the artists is co-produced Nineteen85 and Noah “40” Shebib, with production assistance from Wizkid. Crazy Cousinz and Kyla received songwriting credits for the sampling of their 2008 UK funky song “Do You Mind”.
The track reached number one in 15 countries, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States, becoming Drake’s first number-one single in all 15 countries as the lead artist. It topped the US Billboard Hot 100 for 10 non-consecutive weeks and became the joint-second longest consecutive number one in the UK Singles Chart with 15 consecutive weeks at the top.
The cat is no one hit wonder, hi album Made in Lagos, is certified gold by the RIAA as of August 25 2022.
Released two years earlier on October 30,2020, the P2J executive produced project becames the first African album to be certified Gold in USA(500,000). The deluxe edition was released on 27 August 2021 and features additional guest appearances from Buju and Justin Bieber.
With the pace already set with “One Dance” the lead track for the album Essence featuring Tems is also the first African song to be certified 2x Platinum (2,000,000) by the RIAA giving the 32 year old the record of having both the best selling African album and best selling African song in US.
The 14 track album also features Damian Marley. Other stand out features include True Love featuring Jamaican singer Projexx and Nigerian singer Tay Iwar which has sold more than 100,000 units in the US.
Projexx who is the grandson of dancehall pioneer “King Jammy” and the son on “John John” is signed to Warner Records, a subsidiary of Warner Music Group. Amidst his ongoing success Projexx told the Jamaica Observer that being part of a family of musical stalwarts has certainly helped his career but he push on outside of his family ties.
“I wouldn’t say that having Jammys as my grandfather hasn’t helped me in terms of getting recording opportunities or making inroads musically. But majority of the people that I have done work with are not aware of my musical heritage until long after,” he said.
The music video for True Love has surpassed 2.9 million views on YouTube.
In support of the album, Wizkid embarked on the Made in Lagos Tour (2021–2022). The album received a nomination at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards for Best Global Music Album.
For his upcoming tour “More Love Less Ego,” Skillibeng will be his special guest on the multi-city tour with starting March 3, 2023.
The new tour announcement was made on Friday that the St. Thomas DJ will join the “More Love, Less Ego Tour” on 6 of the 19 dates. Ruger will do share dates with Skillibeng and Wiz as well as appear on the remaining tour stops.
