written by Omolaywer
One of my favourite things about music is finding an artist that sings and you feel like the words that come out of his or her mouth are the words of your innermost man. That’s how I felt when I listened to Llona for the first time. Imagine how I felt when we first met physically. Llona sounds like the conversations I have with myself. He is my reality check. My pain, my truth, my struggles, my food. My conversations with myself by 1:44 in the morning, and my appreciation for life by the end of the day. He speaks to me, and he’s honest when he talks. That’s how Llona feels to me, like home.
Imagine how elated I felt when he told me for the first time that he was dropping an album titled Homeless. You see, I trust Llona. From when he was the young boy Badmanmide found on Instagram and shared with the team, to the superstar he is today, I trust him. Watching his growth has been like having a good burger, I want to be stingy with it. If I had my way, Llona would sing for only me, but good burgers aren’t meant to be gatekept, Llona has chosen to share his debut album Homeless with the world, and I urge you to have a bite.
He opens the floor and calls you to the battlefield with Still Scared, a song where he, first of all, admits his fear of life, the experiences behind and the journey forward. Regardless of everything this soldier has seen, every battle fought and test withstood, every devil confronted and struggle endured, he’s grateful to be here. He’s joyous in his fear. He’s here for a reason, as he says in the opening lines of Commander.
While reminding his army that as much as they choose to exist in whatever capacity of life they gravitate towards they’re soldiers fighting for something first before anything, he reminds himself of the reason why he’s doing this and who he is doing it for, thoughts that are echoed by Guest Sergeant Wizard Chan. He really frowns against being misunderstood, and he says this on the next song Can’t Breathe.
In a personal song (as is his entire discography really) he reminisces the times in Abuja before his fame as Llona. The experiences that shaped the person you listen to today. Llona tells me he made this song from a place of frustration, anger and pain. The problems faced are really evident in this song, and it’s only right it leads to the next song on the project, Another Day. A testament to surviving in Nigeria and being a young talented youth, another day comes with another problem as he says.
It’s no wonder why this song is a fan favourite among his listeners. He’s back to educating his army of warriors on the issues of life and he maintains this energy on HBP, requesting the services of General Bella Shmurda to reiterate this gospel.
Stranger. The last song in the first half of the war debrief was put out by Llona in the form of an album. A word used for a person with whom one has had no form of personal acquaintance. Ever. Here, it sounds like Llona is talking to a woman who he gave his heart to keep before he goes off to war and she sold it off for some wigs. It feels like he kept love in the hands of a dear lover so it doesn’t get stained by the blood of battle and he came back to a bleeding organ.
Poetic, right? It does feel like and maybe should be the case. It cuts deeper when you find out he’s talking about his dad.
He tells me of how he had to grow up in the absence of his father, the struggles his mom faced and how his father is now a stranger. So much a stranger that Llona looks lost at the ground laying of the man. He cries because he’s seeing his mum cry, not really because he has any knowledge or connection with the father gone to be with the Father. The memory of fatherly affection doesn’t exist. In his letter to the man, he calls him a stranger.
Still, in a writing mood, he pens down a Gangsta Love Letter. Talking to a beloved, he assures of his love regardless of the surrounding circumstances. He reeks of love and it confuses it, so it addresses it to who it may concern, and properly.
Staying on track in the war debrief, Lieutenant Fave joins our warrior to tell of the Cold War at hand. The famous Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union in 1947 was referred to as a cold one because there was no direct military engagement between both parties fighting. Apart from Llona and Fave going bar for bar on this record, another amazing thing about it is the message. We’re fighting a cold war. We don’t need to get physical and exchange blows with the influencing forces of life before we know it. The awareness of what’s at stake should suffice for the period.
There’s no rest on the battlefield, no sleep for those who want to stay alive and Llona knows this, so he doesn’t sleep. To even relax and sleep, he needs a dose from his dealer as he says on Comforter, and it’s only logical to assume no dealer selling the green or in Llona’s case sleeping pills at the war front. It’s why he keeps it moving and focuses on making a Billion Paper on the next record. For himself, his brothers, and his mum, he’s on the road.
Llona has seen and faced a lot, something that’s very evident as he never hides it. He takes time to process the Rollercoaster of emotions on the next song. He takes it all in and brings it to your listening devices. Developing an ability to deeply connect with his warriors, he tells them who he is. A boy painting portraits of pictured promises, of daring dreams from a broken bed.
As he writes the closing lines of his war debrief, he tells his warriors ‘Forgive Me’. Forgive him if he doesn’t end up the way you expect him to. Forgive him if he’s always sad. Forgive him if he fails his city, or if he hurts you. He asks you to see reason with him, as it’s not what you’re thinking.
He’s just trying to feed his family. Stuck in his worries, flying private jets he can not afford, he says “Before we heal, forgiveness is a must, and before we love you know we gats to trust” and this writer assures you that nothing realer has been said by man in the last fourteen years. You can ask your pastor if you want to fact-check.
The interlude on the track is a mirror conversation of Llona’s thoughts with his father. To merit the forgiveness he asks of his people, he has to first of all do that which he expects of his soldiers. He has to forgive his father, as it’s probably the only thing Baba Llona can ask of him right now. In the outro of the album, the character speaking in the background is sampled by
LLona says he wrote a script and the characters in the show’s script had forgiven their fathers but he hadn’t done the same so he felt compelled to forgive and he did, Llona uses this to echo his reality of rolling out of an album asking people to forgive him of crimes he hasn’t even committed and him forgiving his offender. A testament to the greatness called art.
I have only one reservation concerning this project. Llona lied in his war debrief. On Forgive Me, the opening song, he said he won’t live forever. He lied. Llona will end up like Shakespeare. Like Plato and Aristotle. They probably have a seat up there reserved for him, and greats like that live forever because their lifespan isn’t conditioned to their physical time on Earth. That’s linear.
People live forever, and Llona will, because the earth is not our home as humans. We are but visitors. coming and going, lodging in and checking out with birth certificates and death cards, it’s almost a mystery where the concept of hotels came from (laughs). We are all really Homeless, and this is the soundtrack to our journey in life. This is our album.