One day we will find the tools to perform an archeology of the internet. For now we are stuck with the primitive magic of divination and search engine algorithms. When it comes to phenomena like cruise beats, our understanding is twisted in a bundle of mystery and ethernet cables. Although there are a few apostles whose memories and hard drives hold the bits and binaries of these digital artifacts. Among them is DJ Tobzy Imole Giwa, a 23 year old producer born in Ondo State, Nigeria and resident of the Iju Ishaga neighbourhood of Lagos. Tobzy is among the hundreds of millions of young people (yes hundreds of millions) grinding it out in Nigeria, a country where things don’t come easy and poverty is in the kitchen. “No work and no food,” Tobzy confirms. Yet he’s found a way to live creatively. Since 2021, Tobzy has become an architect of the emergent musical trend called “cruise beats”; a wacky, sample heavy form of musical humour, ripping cheeky voice samples and placing them atop sped-up Were music, Afrobeats, and amapiano fusions. These “jokes” or “cruises” are injected into TikTok to dose users with one part jiggle, one part giggle. “That’s why they call it a cruise beat, because the voice is the cruise. Cruise means something that is funny or something you want to play back to back,” Tobzy explains. At its most highbrow cruise can rise to irreverent social critique, but mostly it’s a jam for legwork dancers and those looking to vibe out to something quicker and catchier than Nigeria’s standard Afrobeats.
Under the wing of YK
“It was very hard in the beginning. I thought making a beat was easy, but it turned out to be very hard,” says Tobzy of his music making debut. “For people to use it… that is the hard part.” Since Day 1 there’s been a new topspin to the physics of Tobzy’s music production and distribution. TikTok. For this young digital native, the beaten paths of artist residencies, release strategies, PR templates, and industry promo are lost relics… Instead, Tobzy has always thought of his music in relation to his audience and how they can use it. Music ripe for comedians, dancers, and “users” who want to join in on the fun. It’s likely a form of “digital leapfrogging” that others will catch up with. Music for TikTok… huh, who’da thunk? [que lightbulb over Gen Z A&R manager]. And so, from the start, Tobzy learned to build a sound that attacked the attention of users glued to the glossy and fast-paced medium. The Feed₁. To do that, you need to be wild. Out there. And it helps if someone shows you the ropes.
After a year or so of making music on TikTok, Tobzy reached out to another cruise beats pioneer, DJ YK Mule, the self titled “cruise beats originator”. Tobzy found YK’s WhatsApp number on social media and asked if he could help him learn to produce. YK accepted, but for a fee. “When we’re talking about the beat lord in Nigeria, YK is the part,” Tobzy says with respect. In early 2021 Tobzy saved up enough money to catch the bus to YK’s place on “the island” i.e. the upperclass section of the overpopulated economic capital of Nigeria. There, YK taught Tobzy how to use the infamous FL Studios (a DAW omnipresent in developing countries thanks to unlimited trials and simple interface). “Before I went to YK, I did remixes in Serato,” explains Tobzy, who used the DJ mixing software to speed up and tweak tracks in the past. “YK showed me how to play flutes and some piano stuff on top.”
TikTok viral sounds
Harbouring his newfound ability to compose and propose music all his own (though continuing to have a deference for sickly remixes) Tobzy entered a new era of his career. With unmatched velocity, Tobzy produced and dropped song after song, tagging dancer friends like Teee Dollar, Bhadboi Sbm, God over everything, Skilo Richie, and Vicson to help promote the tracks with fresh choreography. The mechanics go something like this: find a funny “cruise” or clip that makes you laugh, sample the vocal, chop and screw it onto a fast, dance-ready beat, release it, tag all your dance friends, watch to see if it catches fire, repeat. It’s a system reminiscent of reggae’s B-Side or “version“ culture, where producers printed an instrumental cut for the block party MC’s to make their mark. Among cruise beaters in Nigeria, it’s the “dance versions” that take precedent. Tracks are thought up in terms of footwork rather than poetics.
A dance from @holuwarquizymih01 to Tobzy’s “Opayan Opadun” with over 20k likes and 1 million views on TikTok. One of the essential ways for Tobzy and other cruise beats producers to promote their sound.
Tobzy’s first viral track was just that. He made a dance version of “Shoday” and it took off. But here’s where some archeology would be helpful. Okay… *takes a deep breath* a lot of cruise beats starts with an Afrobeats melody or rhythm and in 2023 Nigerian Afrobeats artist Shoday dropped a track named “Maradona” that became a mainstream hit which Tobzy then ripped, creating a dance version called “Maradona – Shoddy Remix Dance Version” upping the tempo, adding amapiano’s well-known log drum, and plugging in a series of little quips and sound effects which went viral on TikTok among users and dancers and later pierced back into the mainstream via clubs, street stalls, and local radio. *exhales*
But is this “cruise” if it doesn’t use any funny vocal samples? Technically…. yes? Does it really matter? No. Because even if you’re just listening to the beat you can “hear” what cruise is. Cheeky jokes or not.
Though Tobzy’s prototypical cruise work comes earlier on his 2022 TIKTOK VIRUS SOUND MIXTAPE. Each track is an example of a viral TikTok cruise, followed by an untraceable series of tags to other cruise producers who may or may not have made the sound first, remixed by Tobzy, tagged with even more dancers, and packed together in 30 minutes of mayhem. It’s been the victim of takedowns across the internet, probably due to the careless use of samples and copyright violations. Something Tobzy worked around for a while by creating new profiles with different spellings and capitalisations on his name and then re-uploading the tunes, only to be taken down again. He blames the shitty distribution of DistroKid but there’s certainly more at play.
Even if the copy trolls are trying to shut down cruise online, the sound has now invaded the real world. “This December it was cruise beats they are playing the most. The energy is crazy, you see all sorts of dances,” Tobzy says of popular DJs and public sound systems. Walking around his neighbourhood Tobzy hears his cruise remixes on busted speakers in the street, well into the night at local block parties, and more and more in nightclubs, Nigeria’s music gatekeepers. It’s even made its way into legendary institutions like Femi Kuti’s New Afrika Shrine. Of course, Afrobeats is still “king”. But Tobzy and his contemporaries from the trenches are coming for the throne.
Martyrdom of mara
One of Tobzy’s more addictive tracks is called “Mara Dance Beat”. Originally your author supposed “mara” was some kind of genre. Most mara tracks in the cruise-verse have this light-hearted tinge, bubbly percussives, and some ethereal choir vocals. But Tobzy informs, “Mara is somebody’s name. It was a guy who danced in a different way. Now the guy is dead. He’s late. When he died people started to make videos of his dance.” Now, mara has become a sub-genre of its own. A whole spinoff from the cruise world that orients itself to a dance of the departed. Mara, full name Odogwu Mara, was well loved. His style looks like a combo of the Zaouli dance of central Ivory Coast and old school jukers from Detroit. Lightning fast footwork with plenty of funny facial contortions, bent knees, and suggestive hips. “Mara is fun. Uptempo. The tones, drums, everything is very fast,” says Tobzy, implying not only a dance, but a genre unto its own.
A video if the late Odogwu Mara who spawned the dance style and “mara” musical sub-genre of cruise beats posted by @deekeufi1mp on TikTok.
Going through Mara Odogwu’s legacy online is also to see the energy of cruise beats out in the trenches. These wild dance circles and joyful expressions. “Mara songs and cruise beats make them laugh. They either laugh or dance,” says Tobzy. For him, that’s what it’s always been about, making people laugh and dance. Especially in a situation where people need it. One of the more bizarre TikTok rabbit holes comes from Tobzy’s track “Mugboyo”. It’s full of odd looking people in junky corners with homemade paraphernalia. I asked him about the song and he laughed. “It means ‘smoke and get high’”. Tobzy has a soft spot for stoners and Yahoo Boys getting popped by the law and thrown into prison with exorbitant sentences. It’s unfair. In a world that’s already too tough, he makes music for them as a way to say, “leave them the fuck alone”. “Most people in Nigeria are just angry,” Tobzy laments, “we need to find a party to relieve some stress. Those smokers when they wake up, they don’t have any job. So who’s to blame them to smoke? Only cruise beats is there for them.”
Lagos City Unloaded
So the cruise parties continue, and they’re gaining traction. Plus getting noticed by international media and tastemakers. After a linkup from *ahem* yours truly, Tobzy was able to grab the attention of Nyege Nyege Tapes where he dropped CRUISE BEAT ALBUM in March 2023. It’s one of the first official internationally released cruise beats LPs from a single producer. This led to a European tour with stops in France, Holland, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. “It was great, the people danced and everything,” Tobzy says with a smile, “but I’m not surprised because I see those outsiders using my sound on TikTok.” Now Tobzy is back with another mixtape on Nyege Nyege Tapes, Lagos City Unloaded with an A and B side clocking in at about 25 minutes each. The mixtape is an endless series of remixes from Afrobeats stars like Rema, pop favourites from Sam Smith, or gritty versions of Lil Wayne’s “A Milli”. “And I make use of the old school [Nigerian] style chapo chapo on the beats,” Tobzy clarifies, “and fuji. It was fuji before Afrobeat.” There’s also his friend, confidant, and fellow cruise beats artist Son of Ika Jomakay who shamelessly shouts Tobzy’s name every 10 to 15 seconds. “Fully discordant in the best way,” as Nyege puts it.
Back home, Tobzy and fellow producers like Oma Ibira and Professional Beat meet-up now and then to share ideas and enjoy some music. But bus tickets are pricey, and moving across Lagos can be a burden for a young musician on the grind. So Tobzy produces from his bedroom, not shy about turning the camera on himself to do some footwork for his latest mara or cruise. But he’s got his passport and he’s awaiting the next opportunity to bring cruise to the clubs and partygoers of the world. His mission is pure, and perhaps in it there’s a reason why cruise’s catchy beats and joyful kicks resonate with those abroad. “In Nigeria, everything is fucking worse now. Life is hard. There’s so much to do. But cruise, it’s a way to forget your problems and have fun for a while.” Amen!
Listen to Tobzy’s latest mixtape Lagos City Unloaded and have a bit of fun, even if the world is burning.
