With the long-awaited release of his seventh studio album, Solomon, last week Friday, Mafikeng rapper and businessman Cassper Nyovest took Tsibipians back to his glory days as a hyped hip-hop artist. The eleven-track offering is a core rap feast, and Nyovest was apt to spearhead the drop of the album with ‘018’, a drill song with the lyrical fingerprint of Free State-born star Maglera Doe Boy. Produced by Welkom-bred producer Huey Ozyl, the single’s music video debuted with over 300 000 views on YouTube after only 24 hours.
With the world becoming more and more digital, it’s no surprise that the record’s beat-maker traced the conception of the song down to an interaction on X (formerly known as Twitter).
“It all happened through Twitter. Cass put up a post where he wanted one of the songs for his next album, [Solomon], to be a drill record. Now we never knew it was going to be ‘018‘, but one thing we knew was that a record with him and Maglera needed to be a drill record. And after posting a snippet, I got a DM from him saying that we should rock. I sent him the beat, and the rest is history,” said Ozyl.
‘018’, upon it being unleashed, heralded a repentance for Cassper from his ways as an amapiano artist (even if the reprieve is only for a while), conjuring his Tsholofelo days marked with scathing punchlines, facile vernac flows, and kasi narratives fused into melee-tongued songwriting. With the help of Diaspora rapper Maglera, the joint is a towering monolith of what it means to hail from the North West, in other words, the 018 region.
The two-verse single sees the wordsmiths go pound-for-pound as they both effortlessly straddle the line of code-switching. And irrespective of their differences as creatives – with Maglera exuding natural hardness with his baritone and grim persona and Cassper finessing the mic with streetwise intelligence and charming solipsism – they mesh like well-oiled cogwheels not even a day at work. Their chemistry is reminiscent of Run the Jewels, their song as slick as a Drake-Rick Ross collabo.
“Working with them was bliss because they carry themselves as professionals and have that level of genius where they just make everything work. It was the easiest thing to do. So when I made the song, I was able to make it for them and no one else,” said Ozyl about working with the artists.
Hip-hip is all about repping one’s side. It’s impossible to think about the West Coast without Pac or Dre coming to mind or to mention the East without Nas and B.I.G. popping up. “018” is no different, referencing the dialing code of the North West region to pay homage to the places they found their humble beginnings in.
“The theme of the song was inspired by where we all came from, with me being from Welkom and being raised in Klerksdorp. We all related to the hard streets and the trenches, with Cass being from around Potch[efstroom] most of the time and Maglera being Maglera. The song is all about the 018 region, from the sound to the lyrics,” said Huey.
The rap tectonic plates shifts each year, with every shift bringing new earthquakes that shake the dominant status quo, pushing the growth of newer trends and calling for the evolution of sound and creative direction. With the rise of bass-heavy sub-genres like trap and drill dominating the charts, “018” follows the commercial path. But unlike other songs that aim to impress with a short-lived flash of glory, the song was created to be an eternal banger, living long on the charts and in the hearts of those who follow Nyovest’s music.
“It took a couple of months to create the song since everyone was juggling busy schedules. Cass had to take time off to organise the studio sessions at the farm, and Maglera also had to sort himself out and pull up to the farm. So it took a couple of months, but the one thing that came to mind in the creation of the song was making the biggest song in the country, like a new “Doc Shebeleza”. Something Cass and Maglera would be able to perform for years and years.”
Watch “018”:
