July here we are and time is running fast through the year. You will not believe it but quite a few things have happened of late. But first a tribute to music greats - Oliver de Coque and Sonny Okosun, they passed away of late. I guess most of our young readers may not know the 9ice's and D'banj's of 20 years ago, but most will argue that these names helped build Nigeria's music and entertainment industry in the 1980's and 90's. May their soul rest in perfect peace!
Its been an interesting last month with quite a few developments, D'banj's gbono feli feli seems to be taking off and quite frankly it is the more popular of the three bootleg tracks (including Maje, Kiwon) to be released in his forthcoming album later this month. Another new track from D'Banj to be released in his late July album has hit the streets - Igwe. Not a bad track we thought but we think its better played at weddings and private parties - not a song to boggie on the the dance floor with - but we'll see now.
9ice has stepped up during an invitation to play at Mandela's 90th birthday in the UK at the 4664 concert - Mandela's prison number. At one point he was on stage with Mr Mandela himself and Will Smith (of Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Hancock etc) quite an honour we thought for our Bariga guy! 9ice's performance we felt was mediocre, with such an opportunity in his hands, the least the Ghanian presenter could do would be to pronounce his name right, but she got that wrong. 9ice was invited to the stage with some other Ugandan artist - apparently he is big! And to add insult to injury - 9ice played a live band version of Gongo Aso to an unknowing international audience - we felt he should have insisted on the original version which was responsible for selling the song amongst African audiences. 9ice - we still love you but when it comes to international audiences seek advice.
D'Jewels is a group we discovered released their album earlier this year. We recommend Soko and Nobody fails. Now this group is a one to watch out for, the melodic style and african fusion is original and appealing, having not fully tested its value on the dance floor, we can only speculate that these tracks by the group D'Jewels will rock!
We can't help but mention Styl-plus, remember them - they were responsible for the smash hit Olufunmi four years ago, well they are back with a new album (back & better) - which surprisingly has been subject to popular demand, perhaps in expectation of another wonderful track like Olufunmi. Their album titled back and better is somewhat mediocre with very little improvements in the quality of their compact disc production and album cover. In terms of substance, well its early days as yet but we feel that maybe two tracks that can go somewhere, but not quite as far as olufunmi - they are four years and I no wan trouble watch out for these tracks! We should be reviewing these songs later in the year after much crowd testing!
Lord of Ajasa is back with a new album - second turning by the right! although still quite new, we would suggest you watch out for these tracks no drama, Ara Awe, and Le fenu so featuring 9ice. | 
9ice (above) the new craze of the town, he is young, talented and a fine boy. His lyrics in Yoruba (mixes the fuji style with mordern hip hop and) has been described as concentrated, but 9ice has made this appealling to mordern Nigeria.
His tracks are captivating, "straight from the heart" and damn right authentic. We would recommend the following tracks which are currently smash hits - Gongo Aso, Street Credibility featuring tuface, Photocopy, Little Money, Ganja man, same nii featuring Lord of Ajasa, Ruggedman & Dj Zeez, Party Rider, Plenty Nonsense featuring Segun Obe.
9ice, keep up the good work, we salute you!
Wetin-dey.com naija's top ten for the
month of July, is quite an interesting one. Naija djs
across the London club scene, felt the dancefloor
reaction to various songs showed a welcoming reaction to new naija tracks - now this is unusual.
Perhaps wetin-dey.com is suceeding in its bid to help promote and attract naija music to naija audiences across the globe, afterall since March when this site became fully operational, our members are over 500!
I present you with this month's top ten naija tracks
for the month of July 2008.
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