Why Bez Is An Incredible Musician

Nigerian music is extremely mainstream right now with every Tom Dick and Harry throwing together dumb lines with a catchy hook and calling it a song. Everybody wants to be the next Wizkid and that is one mentality that needs to be dry-cleaned from the minds of our upcoming artistes if they are to come up with something relevant and productive. As if the songs are not bad enough, they have decided that we most definitely need to be spoon fed with utter mediocrity so they direct and film meaningless videos rich with skimpily dressed ladies who are ever ready to brandish their hind quarters to the cameras and the viewers at home.

Being an ardent lover of alternate rock, Bez appeals to me in the same vein as the likes of Chris Daughtry, Ed Sheeran, The Script and The Fray to mention a few. Bez sets himself apart from the crowd in more ways than one and that, I believe is what will keep him relevant in the Nigerian music industry for years to come.

When I'm in a club sipping on something like vodka or a bottle of Moet Rose, oh yes I do want to dance to Wizkid and Timaya and the rest, but when I want to listen to music with a message coming from the mouth of a Nigerian, I choose Bez. On those long strolls round school with the breeze bouncing speedily across my skin and soft rock music subtly penetrating into my ears through my headphones, I skip a lot of songs on my playlist but when I get to a Bez song, I cannot but pause to listen to his beautiful voice squirt musical melodies into my ears and my mind.

From Zucia Daya to Super Sun and most recently, Say, Bez has been keeping his music real and true to his chosen genre. Let's look at his most recent work, 'Say.' Bez's Say is a beautiful song that tells a thrilling story which the video portrays effortlessly. Directed and written by Kemi Adetiba, the video features the chic and beautiful Ify Jones starring alongside Bez Idakula in what could be termed as a short movie. Bez meets the sleek Ify at the beginning of the video and from there they both embark on this deeply romantic experience which culminates in a marriage proposal by Bez to the lovely Ify who appears to be quite belated at the gesture. All seems to be going well until Bez wakes up the next morning and his boo was long gone with a simple 'sorry' plastered on a mirror along with a kiss as a goodbye message. Apparently, we get to realize that Ify is actually married to someone else and is even a mother. She returns to her family after what seems to be a fling with Bez who is left devastated. Shout out to Cool FM for making the song stick in my head, it has been playing over and over again in my medulla oblongata and I just can't get enough of the song. Its that tune that was played by the trumpet or saxophone, I'm not sure which, but that tune is extremely infectious.

The video is really appealing to the eye with nice costumes and an aesthetic scenery. It was shot in well selected locations(definitely not in Nigeria). The video is clean and crisp and it synchronizes perfectly with the song. Definitely an international standard if you ask me. The romance in the video is very real and colorful and it grabs your attention ever so raptly. I would love to use this medium to beg all those shooting videos for their songs, please take a cue from Bez and tell a story! You don't need a girl to twerk till her butt cheeks break off and fall to the ground like two loaves of Agege bread before you can be satisfied and say you've done a video.

Cinematography is an art and whether it is a music video, a movie or even a short advert, it must not lose sight of that simple ideal.

I look forward to more of Bez in the future. The likes of him, Ese Peters and Praiz are the reason I believe there is still hope for the future of Nigerian music.

By Ehimhen Obehi

Student Pulse Reporter