Young artistes are moving to Afrobeats because ‘Hiplife’ is absent on digital platforms - Okyeame Kwame

Popular Ghanaian musician, Okyeame Kwame, has explained why Hiplife as a genre has failed to gain traction among younger artistes in Ghana.

According to him, older Hiplife artistes did not make the genre attractive enough or something to be proud of.

Speaking on Hitz FM on December 13, Okyeame Kwame added that this new generation of artistes have adopted different genres to tell their stories better.

He also questioned whether the new crop of artistes take pride in the musical heritage laid down by the older artistes.

“People choose their heroes and follow their pattern because they are proud of what they have done. Are these young people proud of what we have done? Every generation has its own story to tell, and these young people are telling their story by calling what they are doing what they want to call it,” he stated.

Okyeame Kwame further expressed dismay at the disappearance of once-popular genres like Azonto, Twi-pop and so on.

He stated that the decline of such music genres was due to the absence of a dedicated platform to market them.

“Where are all the Hiplife-esque genres that were created after Hiplife? The Al-Qaeda, Twipop, HipDia and HipCont? Where are they? All of them have left, because there is no platform for them.

“That is why two of the genres that young artistes choose today are hip-hop and Afrobeats because you can find them on the major streaming platforms. Otherwise, you would have to put your music at alternative music or world music, which is a maze of music,” he said.

ID/EB

Click here to follow the GhanaWeb Entertainment WhatsApp channel



Ghana’s leading digital news platform, GhanaWeb, in conjunction with the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, is embarking on an aggressive campaign which is geared towards ensuring that parliament passes comprehensive legislation to guide organ harvesting, organ donation, and organ transplantation in the country.