Get to know Kyla Cole The Voice Behind Shaku Shaku Chinese

Digital music and social media have completely overhauled the music industry, globally. A long-lost song can boom on all of our faces out of nowhere. A typical example is the popular trended music cover of Jermaine Edwards’ Beautiful Day by a child, Rushawn. It blew the song and earned the artist a Sony deal. A Nigerian artiste by the name, Kyla Cole is enjoying this feat.

When Kyla Cole’s 2017 single “Shaku Shaku Chinese” went viral on Tiktok in 2023, it was like a dream for him to start getting calls informing him that his long-released single was going viral on Tiktok with over 150,000 videos. The song has become a trend and music stars such as Ayra Starr among others have been seen vibing to the song.

The music however has been in bad light owing to criticism by mostly Chinese. They consider the song derogatory, racial and baseless. It has somewhat become a tale of much ado about cultural appropriation. The artiste has mixed feelings about this, that it wasn’t in his intention to speak down on any group of people. One may wonder how the song came about. He described the moment as,

It was just a freestyle in the studio and I was in the mood to do music, though have been wanting to do something unique, iconic and different because I think that is what will make my sound stand out since mostly everyone does the same sound in the Nigeria music industry. Shaku shaku is a slang in the street and also a dance step.

As the saying goes thus, one man’s food is another man’s poison. As creative, there should be a sense of social responsibility in the kind of work we put out to the people for consumption.

The Kyla Cole story doesn’t end here, though the Shaku Shaku Chinese song went viral, most of the credits and streams were not accorded to him. While the song began to hit the trend, an anonymous duplicated the song as his content on all platform and earned the stripes. It took a while before he realised that majority of the plays were not accorded to him. Thereafter, he sought a team and all of his content copyrighted and the duplicated version removed.

Kyla Cole whose name is Ibikunle Lekan is the last child of his parents. He discovered his love for music during his teenage years. His influences are D Banj, Wizkid, Davido, Burna Boy, Wande Coal, Brymo and many others. He considers himself a versatile artiste and does what suits his soul but majors in Afro-hip hop. He draws inspiration based on his mood and what’s going on around him.

ALSO READ:  Long Awaited: Davido Releases new album ‘Timeless’

Kyla Cole is reaching for the stars and has worked with a couple of artistes such as Zlatan, Reminisce, Remi Aluko, and Small Doctor.