Fame, Fraternity Gangs, Afrobeats, and Civil War |
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- Опубліковано 22 лип 2024
- Today, I spoke with rapper, label owner, and Afrobeats pioneer eLDee the Don. We discussed the post-colonial history of Nigeria, being raised in the generation following a civil war, the origins of Afrobeats, moving to the U.S. without celebrity, and how quickly security lapses when morality is relative.
We also discuss multiple stories that are fully told on the "Nigerian American" Podcast. I highly recommend a listen - link below.
| Links |
For eLDee:
On X x.com/eldeethedon
On Insta eldeethedon...
On Tik Tok / eldeethedon
"Nigerian American" Podcast open.spotify.com/show/0pn5ATq...
Link Tree linktr.ee/eldeethedon
| Chapters |
(0:00) Intro
(0:51) Nigerian independence from Great Britain, the main tribes
(4:13) Forced relocation and civil war
(7:44) Growing up in Kaduna, an American education
(11:15) Relative safety, religious protection
(13:28) Home invasion - why you don’t call the police
(20:59) Moving to Lagos: “New York on steroids”
(24:13) Con frats and militant cults
(28:56) When you unknowingly beat up a gang member
(33:47) Where the name “eLDee” comes from, a passion for music
(37:25) Why there was no music industry in Nigeria post-colonization
(39:13) Integrating a traditional sound and Naija Pidgin English with modern hip hop
(42:43) The Busta Rhymes blueprint: self promotion and building infrastructure
(44:28) What eLDee’s parents thought about his early career
(47:09) Afrobeats and Afrobeat: know the difference
(48:54) The trybesmen years, moving to the U.S., going solo
(52:32) From rap to IT: dual lives of fame and normality
(57:24) How eLDee’s American coworkers found out he was famous
(1:00:44) Culture shock: the outside perception of American racism
(1:04:16) A Nigerian American’s perspective: “this is by far the greatest country in the world”
(1:05:51) You can’t trust mainstream U.S. media
(1:07:22) Nuance: A call for realistic reporting is not a dismissal of the problem
(1:10:39) Soundbites, algorithms, AI as a search engine
(1:13:04) Advocating for responsible intent, not regulation
(1:16:16) Safety is about perception
(1:17:07) Civil War film: the propagation of ideas
(1:19:12) Nigeria in the modern day: no limits on corruption
(1:21:38) When there are no consequences, there is no morality
(1:25:22) eLDee’s message to Nigeria - Розваги
![How His Coworkers Found Out | @eldeethedon on [No Man's Friend]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Qo8QBxjlfBo/mqdefault.jpg)
![How His Coworkers Found Out | @eldeethedon on [No Man's Friend]](/img/tr.png)
![The Frat Cults of Lagos | @eldeethedon on [No Man's Friend]](/img/n.gif)
ELdee!! You can't write the history of Afrobeats without him for sure
eLdee eeee eeee, great interview. The Nigerian music industry needs to give this man is damn flowers!!
OG gave a comprehensive summary or Nigeria in 10mins👏🏾
That's a wrong summary
@@isalas3352 Alright buddy pls give us the right summary..
Eldeee ageing with grace
An excellent discussion! El dee is a boss!!!
How I sat to watch this 1hour 30minutes interview still beats me!!! Eldee knows how to hold a conversation and Garrett thanks for bringing him on!
Just to correct a little misunderstanding, the interviewer might have, having watched the beginning part of this video, the NYSC programme is for one year but some people chose to remain where they were posted to.
I grew upin the 90s listening to ElDee The Don. He was a former member of the Tha Trybes Men. Love this dude.
Freestyle was my fave amongst the 3 trybesmen which had Kabir or so as the 3rd guy. Then they expanded with Sasha, Dr.SID, and co.
ElDee certainly needs his flowers because they had faith in a genre "later called afro beats" when even Nigerians didn't vibe to Nigerian music 🎵. Fantastic interview from GVT
Exactly! Naija peeps WOULD REFUSE to love their own locals singing UNTIL Trybesmen FLIPPED THE MODE! ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Am so proud of El Dee,I didn't know he was this enlightened
the algorithm pushed this because eLDee is my all time favourite and GREATEST rappers both home here in lagos and abroad...and all my friends know how much of a stan i was of this man.. i have not just all his albums burnt to my system from CD to mp3 file..i've met people who know him..personally! he wont even know who iam.. cos i was a kid when he started buzzing however..as a nerd for hiphop i've also got the album with his first crew... the tribesmen..plus he's replied my dms twice..Very humbly..when i asked for a song that was never on any of his albums..a tribute to his friend moraks (RIP)..who gave me a lift from the school B-ball court down to the admin block..playing another track eldee hadn't even released at the time...another fun fact is that his friend and crew member Freestyle was my room mate in the same University of lagos that i attended from 003 to 008..off course he eLDee graduated way before me...but freestyle got his admission really late and never stayed on campus cos of the little celebrity status then but i knew his crib in Akoka. Eldee and freestyle had a Rap beef and even Eldee knows that song is no where to be found except if you are an OG Nigerian hiphop head who got it from someone who has it..i lost it when i got bagged off my laptop in 2016..On the return of the king album they were a lot of shots fired at certain rappers we all knew and Vector and i would argue trying to dissect the subs..eldee is a living legend.. he once rapped in 3 different Nigerian languages on a song..nailed the accent.. still dropping BARS and then he was the first Nigerian rapper i heard with a very clean close American accent...one of the first Nigerian i saw who featured an established American rapper Yung Joc..i mean he opened the flood gates for what afro beats as become today...eLDee made me feel that as an african kid i could rap and be understood by both my people and americans..cos he would switch and show his versatilities even in SINGING!.... I am making something that has to do with him and cant disclose ..i am so proud of him even though i was heart broken when he shut down his music label and retired back to the US. I once met with Timi the blackone and begged him if he could beg baba El to patch things up and do one more song for us with both the tribesmen and DA TRYBE..Another another fun fact Da trybe was naija's version of the WU tang..almost all the members had solo efforts which contributed to african hiphop RAP music as a whole..you are in the presence of a true KING.
BEST COMMENT! You made me relive my teen years with every word you typed and I am a 46yr old WIFE AND MOM who is a music connoisseur! Once I met Dr.SID(part of DA TRYBE) as 200Level student while he was a 300Lev3l Dentistry student, I knew he was a star too. ❤❤❤❤❤❤
ElDee is so intelligent. Bless you Man.
Asin eh. I'm mesmerized by his knowledge
Man this was worth every listening....
When he said "At least British Formal Education", I knew this is an unbridled mind, seasoned, free and extremely conscious. I appreciate you bro.
eLDee has always been able to express himself and his ideas very knowledgeably. Very nice interview 👍🏽
Brilliant pod
Cool interview... and there's still so much more you could've discussed 🙂. Like when eLDee had a small beef with Freestyle (former member of Trybesmen).
I am woefully new to this world of music and it's history! eLDee has so many stories too, check out his podcast "Nigerian American" for now - though we did discuss future interviews!!
I still remember some of Da' Trybe.
2Shotz, OlaDele, Blaise, Sasha
Im a Nigerian (igbo-native) university student studying engineering i can tell you two things
*EELDEE IS VERY INTELLIGENT!
*HIS ACCURATE ACCOUNT OF THE CIVIL WAR MASE ME VERY HAPPY THE GOVERNMENT DONT WANT OUR GENERATION TO LEARN ABOUT THE BIAFRAN GENOCIDE
Correct but it wasn’t a Genocide we were at war and in war there’s always going to be a winner and a looser unfortunately
When America dropped the Nuke on japan Hiroshima it wasn’t called a genoide how then do you define the Nigeria Biafra war Genicide
My dear, dont let them teach you only one sided story, war is not good obviously.
@@fataiadegbenro984it was a genocide they starved the people
@@fataiadegbenro984it was a genocide
@@fataiadegbenro984 it was an attempted genocide. They were going from house to house slaughtering Igbos in the North.
Soldiers and civilians were involved in this slaughter. It was awful. How're you going to describe that as war. This happened before General Ojukwu declared the Republic of Biafra.
Proud of you brother and you are a true legend and inspiration
A truly insightful interview 👏🏽
This was such a great discussion. In really enjoyed it.
Eldee the biggest mannn... loved his rap group Trybe Records. Those guys changed the game
Love this interview ❤
Watched every minute, I loved eLDee growing up, such an intelligent character.
This is a great interview, made me feel very nostalgic as eLDee and the Trybesmen were a huge influence on me growing up. I even met his Aunt at a Cybercafe she owned in Ogba, Ikeja while I was writing my Oct/Nov GCE. I was a huge fan and when I found our his Aunt owned that Cybercafe I spent my entire life there hoping he'd stop my and I'd get to meet him.😂😂😂
Great listen love from Nigeria
Eldee made sense from the beginning to the end
I remember eLDee did a track with OlaDele and Toks. But I was told the track had to be taken down because of the D.A (the was about was deemed to glorify 419 lol)
eLDee baba.😁 Still fresh. Never stopping. Too hot for T.v. I bow to you baba. I'm totally delighted and impressed to see how far you've come😊
The music industry was quite vibrant, to be honest. From pop music in the 80s (Kris Okotie, Onyeka Onwenu, Felix Libarty) to other genres; it was vibrant. Hip-hop just didn't catch on quickly. The early pioneers (Ron Ekundayo & Skid) just didn't cut it. Not until 1991 when Emphasis & Junior & Pretty came with pidgin Hip-Hop, did we start really appreciating that genre of music. Don't forget; the pop songs of the late 80s & early 90s tried to incoporate a bit of rap in some of their songs too.
The industry was quite in the 90s
@@xpager The 90s? I don't think so. Depends on what genre you're looking at. Fuji/Juju music was popping. Reggae wasn't too shabby (Blackky, Ras Kimono). But it was quieter than the 80s. I think it coincided with accessibility of cable television & privatization of broadcasting.
ElDee the Don. Legend
eLDee the Don!!!!
Good video
El dee the don❤❤❤
That’s our legend right there..God bless you @eldeethedon
The Don!
I had a huge crush on him as a teenager. Lol so good
I am your huge Fan! I am 39 now, so that tells you I was old enough to follow most of yours songs even from the days of Trybes men... Eldee is really the don!
Eldee you are a sure guy, but to be more clear we where not tribes but also nations...
A Legend! One of the pioneers of what will call Afrobeat(s) today!!!
Wow! Cerebral!
They didn’t defeat Biafra it was declared no victor no vanquish
Broke down the history very eloquently
What you know about Trybe records 😊
This guy just got documented one of our music industry legends that even the music publications haven't done... This is part of the archival record of how Afrobeats as we know it today came to be. This is gold.
He had Ghanaian 🇬🇭 teachers lol IYKYK
There were lots of ghanaians in Nigeria then. A lot of them were teachers. My own teacher in airforce primary school in Lagos was called Mr Palance. I can never forget him.
👍
What's eldee's podcast name?
It's called Nigerian American! There's a link in the video description - its really good, three whole seasons!
Cool interview. Very enlightening but your parents couldn't have been the 1st set of nigerians that were educated. Have you forgotten that Fela Kuti's (your parents' generation) parents were educated? People have been schooling in Nigeria since the late 1800s
British formal education in Nigeria not outside Nigeria.
@@olanrewajuboluwatife7484 of course that's the subject
He specifically said, in Nigeria. He is correct. Most of the older generation got their degrees from Sierra Leone, US, UK and the Carribbean.
Garrett was a lil lost with hiphop convo😂😂😂he didn't know much about it, Eldee was nice with it tho & didn't even share the majority of the Level of Fame he had, definitely showed he ain't big on it!!! Enjoyed this
And i am shocked Garrett didn't know even the Grammys mail the plaques to the winners u don't take 🏆 the dummy home, The Plaques get to you later same for every Major award shows across the globe
Cults have gone out of fashion.
Where???
In Nigeria, How many youths want to join cults? They are looking for Yahoo Yahoo opportunities@@hfljr3765
and oga don common the way youre narrating sef well sha experiences are different but the words youre using makes it look to graphic nigerian isnt bad at all
the don respect sir but please becareful answer yt people on pod cast cause it kind of looks like he is fishing for bad news for fame
He’s not Nigeria tap pioneer abeg where is junior and pretty before idris and tribes men
A pioneer doesn't have to be one person na....He was a key person at that point and like he explained about the structure thing in music, He was one of the pple that brought structure to the music industry in the name and form of record labels....Listen to understand and not to necessarily criticise please....
Totally got the history of (Con)fraternities wrong, mate.
Absolutely wrong.
Let's have your version, ìf you don't mind please
@@babaaaron It's not a capsule-size story. Basically; the story of The Pyrates Confraternity is the story of Secret Confraternities in Nigeria. They were the first & Confraternities like Vikings & Buccaneers were direct offshoots.
@@temisanokomi9631 yes we all know that. What most of us don't know is exactly how they evolved into the violent cults that they became. I thought eLDee did a good job of shedding light on that, and that maybe you had a different or complementary version.
@@babaaaron Basically.
Secret Confraternities became violent as soon as they started competing. Competing for "land" (meeting spots), members & any other thing you can think of.
Plus; it's young boys/men.
Testosterone rages at that age...
He is right to some extent. In terms of evolution into violence.
Education was a big thing but it's not Western education.
They could read and write Arabic when you guys couldn't read or write.
You analyze things like an educated illiterate so sorry for my language.
A true legend! Goes way back to the now defunct hip hop group trybesmen.
This was brilliant eLDee. One small correction, its not Pidgin English. It's Naija Pidgin.
It's a language that evolved as Nigerians engaged with Europeans and different Africans from Nigeria and other countries who spoke different languages.
It has a strong English influence, but it also is influenced by Igbo, Yoruba, Portuguese, French, Arabic and a few languages from across Nigeria including the Delta languages.
It's our Lingua Franca while English is our national language.
I updated the chapter to reflect this! Thank you for the correction and your insights :)