Otile Brown attracted the ire of a section of Kenyans after making a controversial statement moments after he landed at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) from the US where he had been for a whole month.
Speaking to vloggers at JKIA after arriving back in the country, tile noted that language barrier was one of the main hindrances of Kenyan music not competing favorably with music that is composed in the English language.
He further suggested that Kenyan musicians should stop using the Swahili language in their songs, claiming that the local language limits musicians from going global.
Otile’s statement rubbed some people the wrong way sparking lots of criticism. The singer however came out to to defend his statement in a series of posts on social media.
“Don’t confuse hype with being global my friend. Go to a global platforms like Spotify and see how a song like #bounce by Lexil ft me is doing. A song which some of y’all don’t even mess with that much it has even made Lexil msanii wa juzi one of the most listened artist on Spotify from the east. How?? It’s the sound na kizungu kiasi kukitumia and make it relatable to our people and the world or else you’ll sound like a wanna be coz our English so clean, Otile wrote.
“Saw Nick Mutuma saying Swahili community is about 70 million and so we don’t need the world and I’m like why are we even having this conversation then… Why are y’all comparing us then coz if that’s the case then we’re doing just fine. Why talk ish like we ain’t doing enough. Coz if we’re talking global then we’re talking 02 arena typa ish,” he added.
Otile further noted that he will continue to do more songs in Swahili fused with English.
“And I rest my case don’t get it twisted I love, respect Swahili and I believe in it and I will give more music in Swahili…. and this conversation it’s for the entire East and Central Africa not Kenya alone. You’ve been programmed kuwekea Kenya lawama. If talking global then it’s the whole of East. We got work to do.. Muache ku deflect. My country Kenya has taken so much blows. It’s enough… If Kenya was a person ingekua inaugua depression. I love my country Kenya no matter what… We’re the ish kwani.”
