Innocent Idibia, King of Nigeria’s pop music, better known as TuBaba, set the internet abuzz; with a first of its kind e-concert for Easter celebration. The show was powered by Trophy, a leading alcoholic beverage.
Hosted by his beloved wife, Annie Idibia, it was an a typical music concert devoid of physical audience; but witnessed by live audience trapped in their homes in compliance with the global lockdown to slow down the rate of Covid-19 infection.
The audience watched from different parts of the world and the reactions were quite phenomenal. The number of views online kept soaring and dropping till it hit 680 views.
Relying on social media tools like emojis, many in the audience were able to express their excitement as TuBaba performed some hits from his early years in music as well as a few from his latest Warrior album.
Using a simple set, Annie, the show host introduced TuBaba’s one-man-show. Though the audience could hear a few backup singers, they were not on camera. Not even the other band members were visible. TuBaba punctuated his energetic performance with a few moments of yabis, ranting about the social realities and why Nigerians need to hold the government accountable.
He stirred emotions in the audience as he sang his classic song of conscience, U No Holy Pass from his award-winning 2004 album, Face to Face. Ordinarily, the night-crawlers would have danced really hard but they only posted emoticons to indicate dance while some repeat the lines.
For the call and response hit track from the 2006 Grass to Grace album, See Me So, the audience responded in kind, just the way they would in alive concerts. And then the icon ended the performance of the song with ritardando in Edumare bless you o.
Freebies
While TuBaba was taking a short break, deliberately distancing himself from his wife, Annie selected three lucky winners from the audience to win a sum of N10,000 each. The trick worked as the show recorded more views afterwards. TuBaba gave a tongue-in-cheek performance with Street Credibility. He said that since no one is on the street, the song’s lyrics might as well change to “House Credibility.”
That was his cue to educating his audience more about the reality of the global pandemic and why everyone needed to stay at home. He also joked about “Amaka” stressing that “Amaka should stay at home.”
TuBaba‘s Amaka jokes are not strange to his fans. They are able to connect it with the character he painted in one of his 2018 collaborative songs, Amaka which featured Peruzzi. Fired by innate passion to perform, TuBaba‘s performance was upbeat, unwaveringly entertaining even without the physical audience.
Relying on the audience’s votes, he rounded off his first e-concert with the smash pop hit; Implication from his 2008 album, Unstoppable.
TuBaba, in the spirit of audience-performer connection threw his top into the audience of empty chair. And the online audience reacted simultaneously with witty comments.
The legendary artiste, has made a powerful statement with this E-concert; to make lockdown pleasurable and indeed memorable for years to come.
