Following a solid debut album, a slightly underwhelming EP, and a critically acclaimed sophomore album—there was deservedly a lot of hype around OBO’s next effort at a full length project. On Friday 13th of November, 2020, David ‘Davido’ Adeleke finally released his highly anticipated 3rd Studio album ‘A BETTER TIME’, which was named with reference to its predecessor, his 2nd LP effort ‘A Good Time’, released exactly a year ago.
‘A Good Time’ is a project laden with celebratory and merry themes, and Davido promised to deliver something even BETTER on this tape as he honestly believes he is in a better place. He took a cue from his last project and curated 17 tracks, featuring 12 artistes, including Global superstars such as Nicki Minaj, Lil Baby, Chris Brown, Young Thug, Nas, Hit-Boy; African heavyweights Sauti Sol, Tiwa Savage, Mugeez of R2Bees, Sho Madjozi, label mate Mayorkun, and rising stars CKay and Bella Shmurda to complete the lineup.
Davido doesn’t waste any time in ushering us into “a better experience” with the first track ‘FEM’, which was the first released single and already a smash hit across African Airwaves, garnering over 15 million streams across all platforms before the album was released. He follows this up with the beautiful soon-to-be wedding anthem ‘Jowo’ which reminds us of ‘1 Milli’, co-incidentally the second track off his last album as well. Davido professes his love for his other half over Napji’s subtle piano and drum kicks. Davido has a reputation for delivering sultry lines and melodies on love songs, and “Jowo” is one track that is definitely going to age very well. Moving on, he enlists Chillz for the club banger ‘Something Fishy’ which definitely gets you moving your body on first listen, with the catchy hook and banging beat. The album rolls on with this tempo into the Nicki Minaj assisted ‘Holy Ground’. Nicki has almost never delivered a bad verse, and she continues in that rich vein of form as she fits in seamlessly on Speroach’s Afro-beat, delivering one of the major highs on the project. She switches her flows cleverly and with the smoothest of cadence, transitioning between singing and rapping effortlessly.
The beauty of this album is how it manages to infuse and experiment with different type of sounds and genres. Although not the most cohesive project, the overall track selection still culminates to produce an album filled with Bangers.
He draws elements from the South African inspired Amapiano sound on ‘Heaven’ and ‘I Got A Friend’ which features Mayorkun and SA sweetie, Sho Madjozi. He doesn’t fail to deliver on both songs. Prodigy and DMW label mate Mayorkun makes another guest appearance on ‘The Best’, where Davido boasts himself as the best to ever do it in the Afrobeat scene. Mayorkun introduces and sets the tone for the track produced by DMW resident beatmaker—FreshVDM. Mayorkun delivers a noteworthy feature performance, and strong arguments can be made for his effort to be crowned as the highlight of that tape.
Davido was born in Atlanta and his western heritage has always played a part in impacting his sound. On ‘A Better Time’, he pays homage to this background with tracks like ‘Shopping Spree’, featuring Thugger and Chris Brown and the second single from the album ‘So Crazy’ with Lil Baby, which had a mixed reaction from the public upon its release days before the album. He also invites Nas and Hit-Boy on ‘Birthday Cake’ which sounds like a total miss, and should really have been left out of the album.
Davido’s sound and delivery keeps maturing over time and this is very evident on borderline romantic tracks like ‘Very Special’, ‘Mebe’, ‘Tanana’, and ‘Sunlight’, where his lyrics and passion cut through the speakers into your ears in a very enticing manner. Davido has been a major player in the industry for over 10 years and he keeps adjusting to the ever-changing waves of the Nigerian afro pop scene. He showcases this again by linking up with CKay on the experimental but very interesting ‘La La’. He starts the song with ‘Yo This song feels so good mehn, that bass, that bass, yeah I love the guitar’ and goes on to deliver sweet melodies, with backup from the talented CKay. The album peaks AGAIN. Towards the tail end of the project, Davido brings in Streethop hotcake Bella Shmurda for ‘Fade’, a track where Bella doesn’t seem to hit his usual high notes and pitch but still made a very solid effort, before closing the album out with ‘On My Way’ featuring Kenyan legendary band ‘Sauti Sol’, perfect outro? maybe, but perfect collab performance? I’m not so sure.
VERDICT
A Better Time was indeed truly a better effort, with a lot of highs and very few lows. The production and engineering on the album deserves a lot of credit, alongside the impact of the featured guests who took up 70% of the album. The sequential arrangement of the tracks may not be too noteworthy as there’s no central theme to the album, but the music flows from track to track in a laudable manner. The 17-track length is another factor which might put some listeners off, with each track averaging 3 minutes and 10 seconds. In an era where shorter songs and shorter length albums have become the popping trend, Davido decides to be defiant and go all out. There are a couple of skips on the album which could’ve been ditched to deliver a 14/15-track, hard-hitting project filled with bangers. On the overall, OBO still delivered on his promise of taking us through A BETTER TIME, and this album would be remembered as one which was at the forefront of the Afrobeat Revolution to take over the World.
Standout tracks: FEM, Jowo, Holy Groud, The Best, La La.
