For any artiste, upcoming and established, an album release always marks a satisfying culmination of a period of hard work. Especially so, when the album in question happens to be your very first. For Y.D.A, November 27th, 2020 must have felt like one of such moments. He started his music career officially way back in 2017 and has garnened a following thanks to the fine quality of his music. Singles such as “Blessing”, “Amazing” and “One By One” have helped us get familiar with the talented singer and songwriter.
“Make Am” is what he titled his debut album, a 9-track project which contains a fine mix of stimulating RnB, Afrobeats and everything in between. The project has been out now and already boasts of thousands of streams across all platforms, a laudable feat when you consider Y.D.A has operated as an independent artiste throughout his career.
Y.D.A has cited legends like Tracy Chapman as inspirations behind his passion for music and he paid due homage to his love for RnB on the first two tracks – the hope-filled titular intro track and the romantic themed second track (one of the album’s singles) “Woman”. The music progresses to feel good Afrobeat vibes on “My Side” and “Sound It”, tracks that provoke the dancer in you into action. The next 4 tracks feature Afro-fusion instrumentals that bring Afrobeats and RnB sounds together very nicely indeed. Y.D.A is Mr Romantic once again on “When”, “Hold Me” and “Human” while he brings the sensual energy on “Gbadun”. The album rounds off with a slow ballad titled “Here” where he addresses his desire to be a positive influence on the world.
Lyrically, you have to hand it to Y.D.A for his penmanship on the project. He addresses different themes and that helps to keep the album fresh, rather than the monotonous profession of love that often is the order of the day. The lyrics stay simple and adlibs fill up spaces well enough. Yoruba, English, Pidgin, doesn’t matter to Y.D.A; he delivers lyrically in all languages. Vocally, he doesn’t slack either. Easy often does it and he showcases his good voice without doing too much. His flow and melody are consistently good on all 9 songs and he makes necessary adaptations to suite the different beats.
The instrumentals used on the album are an eclectic mix that stay true to the trend of Afro-fusion music rocking our airwaves right now. The sampling of Ty Dolla $ign’s “Real Life” added a smooth vibe to the intro track and perhaps more of such sampling would have improved the already high quality of beats that are on this album. Mixing and mastering come as correct as you can expect; kudos to everyone who worked on this album’s production.
Standout Tracks: My Side, Hold Me
