Remember him?
His hit label ‘When the Going is
Smooth and Good” was too hot for the then music world to handle.
Blended with a fine danceable beat,
the song presented a piece rich in morals and advice which the present age
should heed.
Here is WILLIAM ONYEABOR, the man who rocked the
Nigerian music industry so well in the 70s and 80s, AT A GLANCE.
He studied cinematography in
Russia, returning to Nigeria in the 1970s to start his own Wilfilms music label
and to set up a recording and production studio. He was later crowned a High
Chief inEnugu, where he lived as a businessman working on government contracts
and running his own flour mill.
According to the Luaka Bop record label,
Onyeabor "self-released eight albums between 1977 and 1985 and then became
a born-again Christian, refusing to ever speak about himself or his music
again." The label reports that through attempting to speak with Onyeabor
himself, and by talking to people who seem to have firsthand knowledge, it has
been trying to construct an accurate biography of him for the past 18 months,
without success.
In 2014, the music website Noisey,
affiliated to Vice magazine, released a 31-minute documentary entitled
Fantastic Man that documents Onyeabor's history and legacy as well as Noisey's
attempt to track him down for an interview.
2014 also saw a touring supergroup called the
Atomic Bomb! Bandcome together to play Onyeabor's music at a series of concerts
and festivals around the world. The group includes David Byrne (ofTalking
Heads) and Money Mark (of theBeastie Boys).
In December 2014, William Onyeabor
made his first radio appearance on the Lauren Laverne Show on BBC 6 Music,
where he stated "I only create music that will help the world,"
whilst also admitting that he has never played live, and announcing that he had
plans to release new material.
William Onyeabor died aged 70,
peacefully, on January 16 2017, and leaves four children and four
grandchildren.
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