BIGSONG:
Remilekun Khalid Safaru (born 26 January 1981), known by his stage names Reminisce and Alaga Ibile, is a Nigerian singer, rapper, songwriter, and actor from Ogun State. He performs in English and his native language, Yoruba.
Early life
Reminisce is from Ajilete, Yewa South LGA in Ogun State, the western part of Nigeria. He was born on 26 January 1981, in Kaduna state, Northern Nigeria. In school, he listened to various genres of local and foreign music and performed in school activities. He developed his rapping skills by emulating rappers like Nas, Jay Z and Snoop Dogg. He studied purchasing and supply at Kwara State Polytechnic.[citation needed]
Music career
He recorded his first song in a studio in 2006 and recorded a hardcore rap album at Coded Tunes, but the album was never released and he decided to focus on his studies and complete schooling.[citation needed] In 2008, Reminisce returned to the music scene, performing a rap verse on a track titled “Bachelor’s Life” off 9ice’s sophomore album titled “Gongo Aso”. His first single, “Ever Since”, featured 9ice, and was a story about his life till that moment. His second, “If Only”, was a love song produced by Dtunez, where he showed his versatility as singer and a rapper. Both songs established Reminisce in the Nigerian music scene.[citation needed]
In 2014, TIME Magazine named Reminisce one of the seven “World Rappers You Should Meet” He was also named by Nigerian music site, NotJustOk, as one of the top three hip hop artists of 2014.
His song titled “Local Rappers” in 2015, which he featured Olamide and Phyno had some controversial comments from fans as they felt the song was targeted at rappers who rap with English language such as MI and Mode9. In 2015, Reminisce was named a brand ambassador for the Orijin alcoholic beverage brand.
Reminisce is signed to Edge Records and is also the founder and creative director of LRR Records.
Book Of Rap Stories
Reminisce’s first album, Book Of Rap Stories, was released on 31 March 2012. He started recording the album since 2010 after linking up with the studio producer Sarz at Edge Records Studios. The studio allowed him to carve a niche for himself and make the album bilingual.[citation needed]
He went on to release the track “Kako Bii Chicken”, a commercial song which is recognized as the breakout single. After this, other songs like ‘If Only’, ‘2mussh’ were released. The album was a 13-track album with production credits to Sarz, Legendury Beatz, Joshbeatz, Jospo and PastorChild, The album did well commercially in the southern part of Nigeria.
ALAGA IBILE
His second album, ALAGA IBILE, was officially released on 15 November 2013. The album featured acts like Wizkid, Naeto c, Davido, Olamide and Sossick and the singles Eleniyan, featuring Wizkid, Fela, Daddy featuring Davido, Fantasi and 3rd World Thug. Reminisce worked with music producer Sossick, who worked on 80% of the album, and also worked with Sarz, Chopstix and Jospo.
The album sold an estimated million copies before the end of 2014. In 2014, Time Magazine named Reminisce as one of seven “world rappers you should meet”.
Baba Hafusa
Main article: Baba Hafusa
Reminisce’s third album, Baba Hafusa, was released in 2015. The Baba Hafusa Album project has already broken barriers and charted unknown territories. Just recently, Reminisce became the only hip hop artist in all of Africa to have an album debut on Billboard Charts World Music category at no. 12.
With over 500,000 copies sold in Nigeria in 2 weeks and the album claiming the number one spot in iTunes for more than a week – The Baba Hafusa album is already arguably as one of the most successful hip hop albums in Nigerian history.[citation needed] Described as a “genre busting album”, it was a strong contender for album of the year with music critics and fans alike applauding the fusion of sounds to form a unique blend of hip hop, fuji and afrobeats.
Vibes And Insha Allah EP
Reminisce released the EP Vibes and Insha Allah in July 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria. The EP garnered over 4.5 million streams on Audiomack in 4 months.
The music project consists of 6-tracks and features the artists Fireboy DML, Mo Safaru and Fatimah Safaru. Production was completed by Tmxo, Krizbeatz, Sarz and others.
