From Delta State, Nigeria
Recommended if you like Omah Lay, Rema, XXXTentacion, Juice WRLD
Up next Album Night out now
Born and raised in Delta State and now based in Lagos, Strei is part of a new generation of Nigerian musicians turning away from Afropop’s extroverted certainties and towards something more inward-looking. His self-described “Afromood” sound retains the melodic instincts of contemporary Nigerian pop, but softens them into something more atmospheric and emotionally porous. There are traces of Omah Lay in his melancholic delivery, and of the late Juice WRLD in his confessional songwriting, but Strei’s music doesn’t feel like a mix of influences so much as a deliberate attempt to find emotional clarity.
That quality comes into focus on his recent project, Night, a loose, quietly ambitious collection built around the idea of darkness as a zone of release rather than withdrawal. “At night, you can dance, you can laugh, you can express yourself, you can feel,” he toldthe Native, framing the project as a space where vulnerability becomes easier to inhabit. The standout Obobe captures that sensibility in miniature. Over featherlight percussion and a gently elastic rhythm, his voice drifts rather than insists, allowing the song to unfold with an unforced intimacy.
There is no obvious push for virality here, and that restraint is part of what makes Strei compelling. He belongs to a growing cohort of Nigerian artists interested less in spectacle than in mood, using Afropop as a framework for subtler emotional expression. At a moment when the country’s mainstream continues to expand outward, Strei is making music that turns inward – and, in doing so, he is opening up a quietly distinctive path of his own. Mary Chiney
This week’s best new tracks
Imani Imani – Come Together
Signed to Kendrick Lamar’s pgLang label, the SZA-esque Dutch pop-R&B singer dropped a perfect debut album almost out of nowhere this week: the gobsmackingly catchy Come Together is just one highlight.
The Mary Wallopers – Crowns of England
Sure to have Nigel Farage spitting his bitter out, the Irish trad-folk band turn their noses up at England – from Winston Churchill to football fans and St George flags – in favour of their Dundalk home on this spirited anthem.
Aifric – Away
With a sound inspired by living in a Galway grain mill next to rushing water, the singer-songwriter bobs like a cork on a huge swell of shoegazing noise, on the lead track from her debut EP One out today.
Wiki – Right Away
The NYC rapper gets up on the right side of bed for this soulful drill track suffused with a blue-sky mentality; the B-side, Park, is just as good, with Wiki in a laidback lope over a crumpled-up psych-soul sample.
Mal Not Bad – WIDC
There are shades of the LA musician’s former collaborator Mk.gee to the crunching, subtly funky groove here, as they examine their second-guessed emotions with a gorgeous top line melody.
Nicolini – Deep Tissue Killa Riddim (ft Toff Youth)
The drummer from Amsterdam dub-brained groove trio Devon Rexi goes it alone on Quita Maldicion, a new album of dissociated Afro-Latin rhythms: this track is made for a fifth-rum headspace at Carnival.
J and the Woolen Stars – Cut Him Out of Little Stars
By Naarm musician Justin Cantrell, this is a scratchy, guileless accumulation of folktronica twinkles and chords, for fans of Múm or Ulla (the latter is putting this out on their label). Ben Beaumont-Thomas
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