The Boy Who Will Be Star

The guitar man? No. More like GT the Guitar Boy. Looking closely at this guy, what comes straight to my mind is eh, he hasn’t even seen his first outbreak of pimples. He smiles like that, too — a full mouth of evenly-set teeth and eyes that say “callow.” Gbenro, however, has come a strenuous long way. Surprisingly candid, he breaks down the story of his 24-year-old life. Currently a student of Economics at the Lagos State University , GT remembers seeing his father walk out on him, his two sisters and his banker mother when he was barely a little boy. There was also a time when neighbours contributed to keep him school. Do you want sadness, he dark eyes say, I’ll give you plenty sadness. Some of those gloomy experiences have touched the music he plays. Take Dreamer, with which he romances the poor and hopeless. It’s a personal story. After secondary school, GT was desperate to leave for the United Kingdom where he was born but had only spent two years. They turned him back at the embassy because for not living in that country long enough after his birth, he couldn’t be called a citizen. “I had thought that traveling out was going to solve my problems — give me a new lease of life,” he says. That night, he poured his pain into a song, Dreamer. It has become a very popular song. And while he waits for his record to be released by Storm Records where he signed a three-year contract in 2005, Dreamer and the love song, Truly, will be his defining work. GT also admits that it’s indeed hard to measure his acceptability with only two songs. When you don’t have an album, you can’t have a sales figure, can you? He is working hard, though, especially to capture a large audience, he says. I point to him that his songs contain a lot of words in Yoruba. “Well,” he wrinkles his nose, “Yoruba is not the only language I use. I have songs in Pidgin English as well. I want to communicate and the best way to talk to people is to speak the language they understand. If I could speak Ibo, I would do it.” SINCE he played his first gig in 2005 — a free job for one university teacher who moonlights as a comedian and musician — GT is thankful for finding his way to the big stage within a short while. The transition was quick, he reckons, because of the route he took. He met the irreverent stand-up comedian, Omo Baba, at the first show and made him his manager. Weeks after that, he got a spot at an edition of Night of a Thousand Laughs in Abuja . Later, after being impressed by the young fellow, Dare Art Alade led him by the hand to Obi Asika, Storm Records CEO. As Asika once told me, Dreamer was the song that clinched the deal for GT. “I signed a very mature contract,” GT says now, even though no album has been released yet in his name. He doesn’t appear bothered about it. “I think the label is doing well.” Yeah, I understand that. With a cameo in Akon’s video for Mama Africa and the fat fees for some high-octane shows, you will also understand. If the crowd of talented artistes (although now thinning after the exit of Dare and Jazzman Olofin) at Storm Records doesn’t feel like a choking challenge, GT’s biggest headache might be how to do cram school and music into one head. “It’s really difficult” he says when I ask him if he might drop out since he still has three years to go in LASU. “I’m thinking that music is a whole new game,” he says, stratching out his arms on the table. “If someone asks me now what I do, I don’t say that I’m a student, I say that I’m a musician. So I’m thinking why don’t I get more education on music instead of Economics? Fine, I could use Economics to manage my money blah, blah, blah but I want to soak myself in music. Yes, I might drop out. Right now, I’m thinking of taking a course in Sound Engineering. I’m convinced that music is going to work. In fact, it’s working.” Storm record officials have confirmed that the album will be released “sometime in March” so this may be the time for GT to make the decisions. Even if school doesn’t have to wait, he may need to carefully pick the perfect door for his grand emergence having laid a robust foundation over three years.