Darey Art Alade had a rare opportunity to market his talent to the African continent when he enrolled for Project Fame Academy in 2004 – and he did a good job of it. But when he dropped his debut album two years later, the LP was received with mixed feelings: many fans who had followed the young man from the Unliversity of Lagos, through MUSON, Chordwebs and Cool Fm felt the Storm records debut did not do justice to Darey’s musical background and talent.
But, backed with great videos (for Escalade and Fuji), and singles like ‘Skills’, the album ‘From me 2 u’ went on to enjoy prominence and make way for Darey as a recording artiste.
Then, as if he heard and agreed with most of the critique, Mr Alade took time off the scene, overhauled his A&R strategy, left Storm records, and began plotting a new direction for his music. It’s taken over two years, and now, dude is back with vengeance!
un.DAREY.ted, his new album released on March 21, is the kind of album most of us would have expected from him after his stay at Project Fame. And, in a country where experiments are the order of the day, and every artiste is trying to hop on the pop wagon, it is cheering news that Darey and his team have dared to record and release an R&B/Soul album that’s devoid of the usual cliches, repetitions, and pop samples.
The 11-tracker is a collection of remarkable music that you can tell is coming from the soul of a passionate young man who has experienced love, heart break, disspointment and devotion.
With near-excellent songwriting, on-point delivery and carefully-selected theme, un.DAREY.ted makes a lot of other LPs look like fast food; and the singer joins the likes of Asa, TY Bello, 9ice, Banky W, M.I. and Sound Sultan in the category of talents who are making beautiful music fashionable again.
From when the music starts, on ‘stay’ (ft. Naeto C), to the amazing ballads ‘not the girl’ and ‘no stars’; through ‘more’, ‘style na style’ (ft. 9ice) and ‘se ti gbo’ (ft. 2face), it’s clear to see where the musician is headed: the direction of timeless art.
You might also want to watch out for ‘let you know’, a song lover boys will really find helpful. Rising singer Pheel joins Darey to kill it on the cut.
The closest to what obtains now, is ‘style na style’, and ‘carry dey go’ (ft. 2face) – two songs that have a bit of the old and new Darey.
And, away from the music: here comes the first album in a while, that carries full credits, album notes, song lyrics amongst other details we take for granted these days…
2 comments
Wow…this guy is so tight.
The guy keeps it professional and that's something I admire about him!