{"id":23743,"date":"2019-04-12T12:02:13","date_gmt":"2019-04-12T11:02:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/?p=23743"},"modified":"2020-05-10T22:03:46","modified_gmt":"2020-05-10T21:03:46","slug":"review-tay-iwar-gemini","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/review-tay-iwar-gemini\/","title":{"rendered":"With Gemini, Tay Iwar follows the trend of not following a trend"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-23745 pam-featured-content pam-featured-content\"   src=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Tay-Iwar-Gemini.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"700\" srcset=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Tay-Iwar-Gemini.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Tay-Iwar-Gemini-759x531.jpg 759w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Tay-Iwar-Gemini-661x463.jpg 661w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Tay-Iwar-Gemini-465x326.jpg 465w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Tay-Iwar-Gemini-375x263.jpg 375w\" sizes=\"(min-width:1010px) 759px,100vw\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/p>\n<h4><b><\/b><span style=\"color: #fd7065;\"><b>The Benue state born Nigerian\u00a0singer\u00a0delivers an hybrid album featuring\u00a0Alt\u00e9 movement artistes like Odunsi and Santi.<\/b><\/span><\/h4>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As a part of the\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">LAMB<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0August projects, foremost Nigerian rapper MI Abaga released <em>Yung Denzl: a study on self-worth<\/em>. In sharp contrast to his night-out themed \u2018Rendezvous\u2019, it was a psychological confrontation, a look-into-the-face-of-the-enemy kind of project.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On that project, Tay Iwar got production credits on two songs in which he also featured. In a Twitter post in September, he revealed that the songs were recorded over a three-day session, in his Jungle studio inside Bantu, Abuja. Tay was also working on his debut project.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Prior to the release of\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gemini<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, the Benue state born Nigerian artiste Tay Iwar had released two projects, both EPs. 2014-released <em>Passport<\/em> was understandably varied in its music \u2013 the then sixteen-year-old tried basically everything to know what fits. Two years later, he released <em>Renascentia<\/em>, a sharper focus evident. In this time, Tay had risen to the frontier of acts whose music was peculiarly beautiful; shiny objects from afar, they seemed to be. Still, to some, the music they made was inaccessible and the personality they projected was an overly curious attempt at being different. Alt\u00e9, they were tagged.\u00a0<br style=\"clear: both;\" \/>\u00a0<br style=\"clear: both;\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kPtVeRD3A6Y\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br style=\"clear: both;\" \/>Years later, the Alt\u00e9 movement would be heralded by the break o<span style=\"color: #333333;\">ut of acts like\u00a0<a style=\"color: #333333;\" href=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/tag\/odunsi\/\">Odunsi The Engine<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a style=\"color: #333333;\" href=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/tag\/santi\/\">Santi<\/a>.<\/span>\u00a0Odunsi\u2019s debut project\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">rare.<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0was a fine attempt at collecting a vast number of musical influences, and filtering it through the personality of its curator. Sometimes, this curator (Odunsi) is Nigerian; sometimes, he is not. He is just an artiste, with a song to sing, a story to tell.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tay\u2019s story, as seen in his contribution to the aforementioned MI album, is one to deal with the self. Littered across the internet are face shots of the man. With every picture an introduction to his self, his music amplifies this further. His voice, terrific and beautiful, has sung characters into life, the mundane becomes pristine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">With this knowledge in mind, it is imperative that the debut project of Tay Iwar is viewed in the lens of different ornaments being shone on by one light \u2013 Tay\u2019s singing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Among songs in the sixteen track project, about five has been released previously, with three songs (\u2018Miracle Girl&#8217;, \u2018Space\u2019 &amp; \u2018Sugar Daddy&#8217;) making up \u20181997\u2019, meant to preview\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gemini<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. This time, Tay, alongside Odunsi, was signed to Universal Music Group. The label had extended its outreach to Nigeria, hoping to put some much needed financial power to the new music coming out of the country. \u20181997\u2019 however, was much more than a business move to keep the investors and the demanding fans happy. It showed the extensive nature of the forthcoming project.\u00a0<br style=\"clear: both;\" \/>\u00a0<br style=\"clear: both;\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-23750\" src=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1125\" height=\"778\" srcset=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1.jpeg 1125w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1-759x525.jpeg 759w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1-1010x698.jpeg 1010w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1-661x457.jpeg 661w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1-465x322.jpeg 465w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/IMG_017B2CE084A8-1-375x259.jpeg 375w\" sizes=\"(min-width:1010px) 759px,100vw\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br style=\"clear: both;\" \/>\u2018Miracle Girl\u2019 takes the tale of Icarus as a metaphor over lush acoustic guitars, Tay sings of wonderful sex. Odunsi\u2019s Yoruba infusion made \u2018Sugar daddy\u2019 an infectious hybrid of some sorts. Whereas it started with a heavy bass, elements of afrobeats quickly come in. &#8220;Space&#8221; \u2013 whose visuals was recently released \u2013 presents the focal point of Tay\u2019s artistry. \u201cLeave me alone,\u201d he sings, as if aware of the media buzz and fan demands and ever-increasing eyes on his person and art creating process \u201cspace is all I need\u201d. The song alternates between dreamy and revolting. Features Santi and Prey\u00e9 compliment the theme perfectly.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gemini<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0sees Tay return to <em>Passport<\/em> form and even though his songwriting is less dense, it makes for a balanced listen given the oft unpredictability of his production.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is demonstrated perfectly in the opening songs. \u2018Satisfied\u2019 thrives mostly off Tay\u2019s singing, the production stripped to a minimum of soft drums and a piano riff. \u2018Monica\u2019 however, possesses a vibrant neo-funk production, fine company for the similarly enunciated lyrics. \u2018Fell in love with you and I almost died,\u2019 Tay sings.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2018Weather song\u2019 is even more urgent, as Tay sings \u2018you\u2019re a star in the fucking sky\u2019, those words preceded by a chant-like singing of the word\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gemini<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many other songs follow the trend of not following a trend. Makes a curious observation \u2013 since Tay has once said in an interview about\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gemini<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0being about the ever needed understanding of the self \u2013 that these songs were made to be brilliant in their individuality. Certain A n Rs will call it careless track listing, though. Some may even go as far as question the purpose in its song selection process.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As earlier mentioned, the glue binding these songs isn\u2019t sharply pronounced but there\u2019s the likelihood that this is intentional. Tay, after all, is the curator of his collection and, while this doesn\u2019t elevate\u00a0<\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Gemini<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0past criticism, the knowledge of self is revealed after intense meditation. Sharing this project is a front row seat to that and we should be grateful.<\/span><\/p>\n<h5><span style=\"color: #fd7065;\">Read next:\u00a0<a style=\"color: #fd7065;\" href=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/odunsi-interview\/\">Odunsi, the poster boy for the African sonic revolution coming from Lagos<\/a><\/span><\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Benue state born Nigerian\u00a0singer\u00a0delivers an hybrid album featuring\u00a0Alt\u00e9 movement artistes like Odunsi and Santi. As a part of the\u00a0LAMB\u00a0August projects, foremost Nigerian rapper MI Abaga released Yung Denzl: a study on self-worth. In sharp [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":23745,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9373],"tags":[],"location":[8172],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23743"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23743"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=23743"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=23743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}