Emeka Akumefule, known professionally as Blaqbonez, is a Nigerian rapper signed to 100 Crowns, an imprint of Chocolate City. In 2019, he was profiled by The New York Times as one of the new guards of Nigerian music. He is widely known for his controversial self-proclaimed status as the "Best Rapper in Africa", which became the most talked about topic in the Nigerian hip hop space between July and September 2019.
Early life and career
Emeka was born on 29 January 1996, to an Igbo family and grew up, exposed to the Yoruba and Urhobo culture in Nigeria. He was 13 years old when he discovered he could rap, and his journey into music was a result of happenstance. He self-discovered his talent while listening to the radio with his cousin, when the song of a 12 year old rapper was played. His cousin liked the song and challenged Blaqbonez to come up with his own lyrics, since he liked criticizing rappers. Few minutes later, he had enough bars for a verse, and that was where it all began. His parents were not in support of his new found hobby, and he secretly pursued his passion. While in school, he dropped his first project, Hip-Hop in Blaq, and participated in competitions. Blaqbonez started exploring his rap skills very early, and at 16, came 1st out of over 3000 rappers in Nigeria, who participated in Terry tha Rapman's Zombie competition. As a result, he and was featured on Terry's album World Domination alongside Olamide, Vector, Mode 9, Spellz which was released in 2012. Five years later, Blaqbonez featured Terry on one of his projects. He emerged 1st runner-up in Vector ’s king kong competition, won the Rhythm fm Freestyle Fury and became RhythmFm’s artiste of the month, became the Hennessy Vs class captain, part of the Soundcity blast cypher, also released his much talked about mixtape CTAT "Cssette Tapes and Tvs" grossing over 60,000 engagements in streams and downloads, which is his third mixtape, following hip-hop in blaq and the "unfinished EP". In an interview with The Punch newspaper, he said his "Best Rapper in Africa" proclamation was a response to a diss track and need towake up other rappers in Nigeria. He was recently described by The Guardian as 'carrying the torch of Nigerian rap' and on 2 January 2019, he was listed by the same publication as one of the "Top 10 Artists to watch in 2019". Blaqbonez has released 8 EPs and a mixtape.
2018: ''Bad Boy Blaq''
Blaqbonez released his eighth EP Bad Boy Blaq on 31 August 2018. It was released as part of the L.A.M.B project, a series of three hip hop albums that attempts to reawaken Nigerian hip hop. Bad Boy Blaq was executively produced by M.I Abaga and released through 100 Crowns, a label imprint of Chocolate City. The EP was the last of three releases and was preceded by M.I Abaga's . A reissue of the EP, titled Bad Bloy Blaq Re-Up, was released in February 2019.
2019: ''Mr. Boombastic''
Blaqbonez released his ninth EP Mr. Boombastic on 25 October 2019. A day before the release of the EP, Blaqbonez released the promotional single "Jesus Is Black ". In it, he tells Kanye West to postponed the release of his ninth studio albumJesus Is King, which had the same release date as Mr. Boombastic.
