INTERVIEW:DAI VERSE
Welcome to Tirade World Dai Verse. Congrats on dropping your debut EP: ‘Warrior’s Child’. With seven songs, we’ve got one for every day of the week. What should we play on a Monday?
Definitely ‘Social Misconduct’. It is the third track on the EP. I feel a bit like a rebel today.
INTERVIEW BY: GRACEY MAE
This tracks talks about betrayal and redemption. Have you ever been betrayed and can you tell us how you overcame it?
DAI VERSE: Yes, a few times. The one directly related to the project is being betrayed by my former management. It took a while for me to deal with that issue because while I was trying to deal with the betrayal, I still had to focus on making music. It took a lot for me to be able to get myself out of that mental prison. I trusted them a lot. I saw them as my family. It was bad when I found out the things that they were doing to me. It took a year and six/seven months to get over it and to forgive myself for trusting blindly. It was a while but I'm glad I'm here now.
A lot of new artists coming into the scene are super trusting. If you had to give three tips to an up-and-coming artist, would you advise?
DAI VERSE: Firstly, I would say get a lawyer to check your contracts before anything. Once you put your signature on it, you are bound by the terms of that contract. Let them review the contract properly and tell you the benefits and drawbacks because honestly, no contract will favour you entirely - especially when you're a new artist. It's all about understanding between both parties. The second advice is to continue making music regardless of whatever is going on in your life. Look for a way to stay connected to the music because, at the end of the day, that music is what's going to save you. Thirdly, build a proper community - no matter how small. Connect with people who love you and connect with your music because that community is going to be a huge part of what is going to keep you going when you have doubts or setbacks.
With everything you've been through, you're definitely a warrior but the name of this project is ‘Warrior's Child’, talk to us about your dad. You give us a glimpse into your family life ‘DND’ where you talk about how your parents really sacrificed..
DAI VERSE: My dad's name is Akandu Ikoku Boniface. He died 19 February 2015 and at that time, I was still very young. He tried to show me a lot of things that I'm just beginning to understand. The reason why I believe he was a warrior is the amount of things he was able to do in his time that now I have realised must have been hard. Like I said on ‘DND’, my mom sold her wedding ring for us to be able to eat. She sold something so precious to her, something that was supposed to keep her connected to my dad, when he left the world. She let that precious part of her go, just to feed her children and sustain her family. This EP is the most vulnerable I have ever been as a person, as an artist, and as a human being. I was very wary about going all out and telling my story in the most raw form but I was finally able to overcome that feeling. My father was a warrior, and I am a Christian who believes in God. God himself is a warrior so, by every definition, I am a ‘Warrior’s Child’.
A lot of us were introduced to you through hits like ‘Cocaine’ and ‘Sweet Daddy’ so to see this vulnerable side of you is really refreshing. Why was it important for you to show this side of you?
DAI VERSE: At the time l started having issues with my former management, I went away for about a year and six months. I was making music at the time but I wasn't releasing any music. I wasn't online. People were asking “Where is Dai Verse? Where did he disappear to?” I came back and dropped a song I titled ‘Salt’ in March 2024. It was a good way to explain what I had been through but ‘Salt’ is just one song. There's no way I could have expressed every single thing that I've been through in the past two years in one song. I needed to put out a body of work so people would understand that it was not of my own doing. I did not just decide to stop doing music - it is my life. Music is all that I do. These are the things that I had to fight through. The EP has seven songs; ‘Warrior’s Child’, ‘Save Me’, ‘Social Misconduct’, ‘What If’, ‘DND’, ‘Demons’ and ‘LLF’. Each of these songs signify the things that I went through, the trauma, in life, as an artist, as a human being, as a man in love. ‘What If’ and ‘Save Me’ help me explain the love aspect of it because around that time when the legal issues started, I was in a relationship. When things stopped moving, she left. I realised then, that the relationship was not based on loving me as a person, it was based on my progress as an artist. I was vulnerable with her but I didn't know it was seen as a weakness. Sometimes, I went at least a week without money in my account to be able to feed myself. This EP was a need because people, my fans, my community, had to know what was going on. They had to see that this was what I had to fight through to get back to being able to put out the best music for them. A huge chunk of the idea behind the project was for me to connect to my people and show them that it's not impossible to get out of a setback. We're not supposed to give up. I've been doing music since 2019. A lot of artists put out their first EP in the first or second year. I'm putting out mine six years later and it's still as beautiful as it would have been if I had put it out earlier. This is God's plan.
DAI VERSE: I don't think I'm doing too much to figure out who is for me and who is not, because I have always been a real person. I believe that if I am myself around you, eventually, you will start to show yourself around me too. It is hard sometimes to figure out people's actual intentions for you but it's not so hard, in the sense that, your spirit can tell you how that person feels about you. When you meet somebody, there are things you see that that will make you decide that this person is or is not for you. Sometimes you decide, let me see if I can manage this, but the things you accept in that time are the things that will come to haunt you later. I've learned that. I have been in a couple of relationships, situationships, friendships that have turned out to be really sour. So I've learned some things that have helped me look out for who is for me and who isn't. The moment I know that you are not for me, I distance myself from you without any remorse. I cut myself off from you and move on. Sometimes, it looks like I hate the person, but I don't. Learning was hard because I learnt the hard way. One thing I've really come to learn in the music space, is professionalism. You don't have to like the person you're working with, as long as the person is doing their job and you're doing yours, and everything is working smoothly, we can work together.
You touched on a pivotal story there, where you were in a relationship with a gold digger. How have you navigated making new friends, whether romantic or platonic?
I remember a lot of people were comparing you to Lagbaja. Did he inspire you at all?
DAI VERSE: I am a fan of Lagbaja, but at that time it was not connected to him at all. It was just an enigma that made people engage because they were intrigued. When I used to wear a mask, you could walk by me in the street and you wouldn’t even know it was me. I lived my life as normally as possible. The moment people found out that I am Dai Verse, they started to treat me differently. The people who would be saucy or insulting became so nice and welcoming.
A stand out track on your project is ‘What If’; it’s the only record that has a feature. Talk to us about creating it?
DAI VERSE: Initially, I wanted ‘Warrior’s Child’ to be a solo project. I didn't want to feature any artist because people haven't heard from me in a while. I wanted to give them the full version of me unfiltered but Vasa is an artist whose music and sound I really enjoy and resonate with. When I met Vasa, he told me that I was his inspiration to become an artist. He said that he coined his name off of my own, as in, Dai Verse comes from diversity and Vasa comes from versatility. Both names mean being able to do a variety of things. People have been in my DMs saying he sounds like me and I, like him. There was a connection between us because, personally, I may like an artist's music but not the artist, and vice-versa. Vasa though, is a cool guy. He's very easy going and I like his music. When we made that song, I was looking for something to represent loyalty on the project and he was able to fully deliver on that. He went hard. He showed up and the song came out amazing. It felt right to put him on the project; admitting his name was coined from mine was vulnerable. He looked up to me as an artist before he even started making music. That vulnerability is what I was looking for in my project and he was able to bring it.
“The intention behind that was to create a lasting impression on people. There are a lot of artists, not just in the country, but in the world right now. There has to be something that people would remember you by. When I finally revealed my face to the people that knew me with the mask, their reactions were, “Ah, why you kon dey hide your face before?” So the knowledge that I used to wear a mask has sunk into their heads. It may not work for everybody. To be honest, it was hard to continue to go through with that plan because even while I was wearing the mask, people would come to DM to say “You never ready. You wan blow but you no wan show your face”. It was a plan that I had to stick to no matter how hard it was. I'm not regretting any part of it, all those things have helped shape the kind of person that I am now.”
— Earlier in your career, you wore a mask. What was the intention of being mysterious and what made you reveal your face?
