Mr Eazi’s ‘Maison Rouge:’ The Afrobeats Superstar Is No Longer Scared of Boredom
The Nigerian singer talks to OkayAfrica about his new project ‘Maison Rouge,’ shedding his love-hate relationship with the past and learning to enjoy the present.
Mr Eazi’s new EP, ‘Maison Rouge’, calls back to the midtempo, highlife-influenced style he pioneered back in the mid-2010s.by Kamala Molnia
Motion has been a defining feature for Mr Eazi since he emerged in the African music mainstream space a decade ago. The Nigerian singer helped usher in a renaissance in Afrobeats with his signature ‘banku music,’ a hybridized, mid-tempo style heavily influenced by Ghanaian highlife and the distinct juice of Nigerian pop culture. Breakout singles like the Efya-assisted “Skintight” and “Bankulize” didn’t just herald the entrance of a new superstar; they played a huge role in redefining Nigerian and West African pop music.
Following a handful of smash singles and a rush of post-breakout features, including Spinall’s “Ohema” and Eugy’s “Dance for Me,” the singer started bounding towards something broader, incorporating South African house, UK-originated Afroswing, and more into an expansive soundscape on his 2018 mixtape, Life is Eazi, Vol. 2 – Lagos to London.
“One of my superpowers is boredom,” Mr Eazi admits to OkayAfrica. “I really get bored very quickly and, as such, I’m always trying to move to the next one.”
In the years since, Eazi’s creative (and entrepreneurial) restlessness has seen him venture out and wide, as seen in his raft of international collaborations with artists as varied as Nicki Minaj and Bad Bunny. His 2023 debut album, The Evil Genius, collected a variety of music influences to make a statement that he couldn’t be boxed in. Months before that, he released an all-amapiano project with British Kenyan curator DJ Edu as Choplife Soundsystem.
Mr Eazi recorded ‘Love Me Now,’ the closer for his new EP, while his mother was in surgery.by Kamala Molnia
That’s why, amidst all of this movement, Eazi’s new project Maison Rouge comes off as an inspired effort. The 7-song EP is a callback to the ‘banku music’ era of sunny, sauntering chords and singalong melodies. It’s the result of a spontaneous process, even evident in the project title, named after the place in Cotonou, Benin Republic, where he was staying when the songs were recorded.
“I didn’t sit down and say, ‘Oh, I want to go back to the earlier sound in my music,’” Eazi says. “I’d say [the producers] tricked me because when I got in the studio that day, we had [just] finished The Evil Genius, but I called P.Priime and E Kelly because I wanted to make some fresh, less serious sounds. Then I come into the studio and they start playing all these records that have maybe only chords on them and, of course, if you give me those kinds of records, I could make 20 songs on that template.”
Maison Rouge carries all the hallmarks of the ‘banku music’ era: gorgeous guitar riffs, smooth yet thumping percussion patterns, and Eazi singing of love, sometimes from a pining, heartfelt perspective and other times a little more risque. It’s not a simple rethread, though. Wrinkles are thrown in; space-y effects add atmosphere to the twangy guitar chords on “Wait for Your Love,” 808 drums bring a trap-leaning vibe to “Make E No Tey,” while “Bus Stop” is the uptempo wildcard.
The closer “Love Me Now” carries the most weight of all the songs; it was recorded while Eazi’s late mother was in surgery. “It was the first time I had to face that feeling — you know, when you think your parents are untouchable, and my mom was never sick. While waiting for the doctor to say whether it was successful or not, I went into the studio to pour out that feeling.”
Eazi couches his pain in the middle of what comes off as a simple romantic song on a surface listen. “Omo, na when you wan lose person, you go know say you love person/Omo, na when you wan see person, you go know say you miss person,” he sings on the affecting hook.
The singer buried his mother earlier this year, and her passing had a profound effect on him that has affected his outlook on what he does as an artist. “In the past, my relationship with the past was more animosity. I didn’t like the past, and I didn’t like it if anyone tried to take me to the past or a place I’ve been before, like I’m so in love with the future. The difference now is that I don’t have that love-hate with the past and I don’t have that impatience with the future.”
“I’m savoring more now, and I can look back, not to go back there, but to enjoy the fruits of my labor. I guess that’s what losing someone close to you does, because now I wish I could slow down time to get even one more second with my mom.”
The songs on Maison Rouge had been in Eazi’s vault for about two years. Their release is evidence that the singer is in a chill place where forward motion isn’t the driving force for everything he does. “I lost my first love, my mom, and then I committed to the love of my life as well,” he says, referencing getting married to socialite Temi Otedola this year. “Facing those two major events have made me pause, you know, take time and enjoy putting out this music. In the past, I would have been on to the next one, but I’m going to put out this music, I’m going to go on TikTok and enjoy myself and just enjoy this process.”
“I’m not in a rush to get to that next phase; it will come because I know it will come,” he says. “I’ve been here so many times, it will come whether I rush or not. So why not enjoy it?”
