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10 Takeaways From Grammys 2021

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The 2021 Grammys somehow survived a COVID-inspired six-week delay, not to mention angry diatribes from the Weekend, and put together a seamless, entertaining, music-packed telecast that also proved utterly, bafflingly infuriating. How can all that be true? Read on!

 

 

1. The broadcast itself was a triumph. Give huge amounts of credit to executive producer Ben Winston, making his Grammys debut: His telecast moved breezily across multiple stages, cut past years’ fat and much of the filler, highlighted a huge and diverse array of music and allowed the performers to be showcased at their best. A typical Grammys telecast has terrific highs and embarrassing lows, but Sunday night’s performances were too proficiently and elegantly produced to allow for train wrecks. After a jumbled, clunky, zoom-intensive Golden Globes telecast just a few weeks earlier, Winston showed the world how it’s done.

 

 

2. The awards themselves? Hoo boy. You could see it coming, yet it still felt shocking: The Grammys took a moment, upon handing Beyoncé the 28th Grammy of her world-class career, to acknowledge that she’d just surpassed Alison Krauss for the most Grammys ever awarded to a female artist.  Unacknowledged in that moment was that Beyoncé has a long history of getting passed over for the major awards of the night; she has never won record of the year or album of the year, and she won song of the year only once, in 2010, for “Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It).” Scan a list of the Grammys that Beyonce has won, and note the number of times the modifier “R&B” appears.

 

 

So, when the time came to award the night’s final prize, it had to be Megan Thee Stallion and Beyoncé’s “Savage,” right? Megan had already won best new artist; “Savage” had already won best rap performance and best rap song; Beyoncé’s “Black Parade” had already won best R&B performance, and her “Brown Skin Girl” had already won best music video (which means that Beyoncé’s 9-year-old daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, now has her first Grammy). Billie Eilish, for her part, had won only best song written for visual media, for “No Time to Die.” But record of the year went to Eilish, who spent much of her speech apologizing to Megan Thee Stallion for winning.

With no disrespect intended toward Eilish, who handled the situation well, that’s the Grammys for you: They make progress; they make adjustments; they get your hopes up; they pull the football away at the last minute.

 

 

 

 

3. The call for boycotts will get louder. In the runup to this year’s Grammys, The Weeknd announced that he’d never submit his music for Grammys consideration again after the Recording Academy failed to so much as nominate him for his blockbuster album After Hours. Beyoncé attended but didn’t perform, and she seemed to expend as little energy as possible on the whole affair. The Grammys have a long history of snubbing Black artists at inopportune moments — see, for a notorious example, Macklemore and Ryan Lewis beating Kendrick Lamar in the awards’ 2014 hip-hop categories — and patience is wearing thin.

 

 

4. It was a mixed bag for the big winners. Many observers expected the night to be yet another coronation for Taylor Swift, whose album Folklore earned her six Grammy nominations and some of her best reviews. But Swift went 0 for 5 to start, only to take album of the year near the end of the telecast. Eilish, who famously dominated last year’s awards, hadn’t made much of a splash during the rest of the evening. In both cases, the big wins sneaked up on them.

 

 

5. There was better news in the down-ballot races. While it was a shame to see Phoebe Bridgers go 0 for 4, Megan Thee Stallion was the clear and correct pick for best new artist (though it was kind of a head-scratcher when she wasn’t nominated in that category last year). Fiona Apple, inexplicably shut out of nominations in the major categories, won best rock performance (for “Shameika”) and best alternative music album (for Fetch the Bolt Cutters). H.E.R. took song of the year for “I Can’t Breathe,” a resonant and powerful track. Kaytranada became the first Black musician to win best dance/electronic album in the category’s 17-year history — an outrageous milestone, given the genre’s origins, but a milestone nonetheless.

 

 

6. Get ready for a tiresome new front in the culture wars! Last year, Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion released one of the filthiest songs ever to top the Billboard Hot 100, and “WAP” made its Grammys debut in grandly transgressive, explosively entertaining fashion. Rest assured that “cancel culture” and Dr. Seuss and Mr. Potato Head are gonna have to make room on some conservative fainting couches, possibly by the time you read this.

 

 

7. Somehow, against all odds, none of the performances truly stank. This particular kind of showcase — with careful stage management, good sound mixes, a blend of live and pre-taped moments, many stages to accommodate set changes and so on — allowed artists to do their best work. This was the 3 1/2-hour music-industry infomercial the Grammys craved, and the beneficiaries included both the musicians themselves and a home audience that has been starving for live music.

 

 

8. The Grammys didn’t forget struggling venues. Without turning into a telethon or slowing down the broadcast, the show did a nice job spotlighting a few of the many music venues whose long-term survival has been threatened by the coronavirus pandemic. It was refreshing to see the Recording Academy understand that its industry’s success hinges on not only streaming and sales but also the return of live music and the venues that make it possible.

 

 

9. Trevor Noah deserves more praise than you might think. The Daily Show host maintained a fairly low-key presence throughout the night — he didn’t preside over any skits, and his monologue was limited to a few quick jokes — but he did a deft job moving the home audience through a complicated hunk of awards-show machinery. Awards-show hosting gigs are generally thankless, and he made a hard job look easy.

 

 

10. Finally, it can’t be reiterated enough: The Grammys still have a lot of work to do. It’s not a matter of saying, “If Beyoncé or Kendrick Lamar put out a great record in 2021, it has to win album of the year.” It’s that the Grammys are not trusted, period, by wide swaths of their audience and membership, and any effort to correct that needs to start there. They have to create trust.

That trust can come only through transparency about their process, their membership and their efforts to better reflect their industry and its massive worldwide audience. The Grammys’ typical response to controversies tends to involve artist-specific attempts to redress previous years’ grievances; that’s part of how Metallica wound up winning eight Grammys across six different years after infamously losing best metal performance to Jethro Tull in 1989.

The issue isn’t that Beyoncé should have won album of the year in 2015 over Beck’s Morning Phase or that Lemonade should have won album of the year in 2017 over Adele’s 25, though both of those outcomes were — with no shade thrown at either winner — hard to stomach. The issue is that it’s getting harder for the Grammys to keep on like this without facing a large-scale revolt from the artists whose buy-in they need in order to retain a semblance of relevance.

In other words, they need to step up.

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I Used To Insult Single Mothers Until I Remembered That My Mum Is A Single Mother -Akeem

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I Used To Insult Single Mothers Until I Remembered That My Mum Is A Single Mother

-Akeem Akintola a.k.a. ‘Oko Awon Single Mothers’

 

 

A young man doing well in life is often defined by a disciplined, and purpose-driven approach to his personal and professional growth. 34-year-old Lagos State born social media influencer, Olalekan Akeem Akintola, disclosed in this interview that he has cultivated the habits and mindsets of a young man determined for long-term success before he attained age 21. He said he continually updated his knowledge and skills to keep up with changing demands and trends even before he left Nigeria for Europe in search of greener pastures at age 29. Other than his talent alone, Akeem noted that his becoming successful abroad was not all by luck, but mostly by being kind and respectful. He also revealed the secret behind his popular social media nickname, ‘oko awon single mothers’. And more…

 

 

 

 

 

What do you love about yourself?

 

What I love about myself is that I am a very determined person. When I am determined to do something I don’t look back. I just go into it not minding what the result would be and I don’t care about what anybody would say.

 

 

 

Tell us about your marital life.

 

I was married. But I’m a single father now (general laughter).

 

 

 

 

 

What year did you travel abroad and how did you manage to succeed abroad?

 

I traveled out of Nigeria in 2021. I’m currently in Europe, Germany, South Cyprus to be precise. I worked in the kitchen. To be honest, my experience abroad wasn’t an easy one. Thank God, today I have my citizenship documents and I’m living fine. It wasn’t easy getting to this level. I give God the glory.

 

 

 

Who are the most special people in your life?

 

The most special person in my life is my mum. Then my kids and my mum’s families, especially Sister Iyabo and Sister Nofisat. My mum’s families are so special in my life because they have been very supportive of my life.

 

 

 

Tell us about your experience helping a sick lady, Keji, whose matter has gone viral on social media.

 

This lady, Keji, came into my Instagram inbox and told me that she was sick and needed help. Ordinarily, I do use my platform to help people, especially those who are sick. There was a time I ignored her and didn’t attend to her complaints. But when she showed me the evidence and pleaded that I should help her, I had to support her. I am the person that sent her to see Agbala Gabriel pastor. But I didn’t know that he was going to mess up.

 

 

 

What type of people do you love to be around you?

 

I love to be around people who are friendly, ready to help and very supportive. I do not like people with negative vibes.

 

I Used To Insult Single Mothers Until I Remembered That My Mum Is A Single Mother -Akeem Akintola a.k.a. ‘Oko Awon Single Mothers’  

 

You’re a young guy, why do people call you ‘oko awon single mothers’?

 

There was a time I used to abuse single mothers; what they were doing, why did they leave their marriages and so on. I saw it as an abnormality. But I came to realize that my mum is also a single mother and I said why should I be insulting single mothers when I was also raised by a single mother. So, I had to start making videos about single mothers, praising them and talking about their challenges and qualities. Since that time, single mothers started calling me ‘oko awa single mothers’ (husband of us single mothers).

 

 

 

Do you make so much money through social media posts or you have a job that gives you the biggest?

 

Yes, I make money on social media. I also work in the kitchen as a chef. I’m into kitchen stuff here abroad and it pays me well. Also, I run adverts for people on my platform and I make a lot of money from it.

 

 

 

You are very popular among society women; how did you make it happen?

 

All I can say is thank God. I don’t know how it happened. I just found myself with millions of fans and followers. People really love me, especially older society women who fondly call me ‘oko wa’ (our husband).

 

 

 

What is your success tip for young people like you?

 

My advice for young people like me is that whatever they’re doing they should keep doing it. They should be consistent. Keep doing it, don’t relent and don’t look back. When I started out on social media, I was bullied, cursed. I never envisaged where I am today. I never expected that people would be talking about me sometime in the future. But here I am. I never saw this coming. I really thank God for everything. So, let us just keep doing whatever we are doing. There’s light at the end of the tunnel.

 

 

 

Are you fully in the entertainment industry or on part time?

 

I work and I’m fully back in the entertainment industry.

 

 

 

 

 

You look so young despite your age, what’s the secret?

 

The secret is that I maintain physical fitness, I do regular workouts. I know that a strong body supports a strong mind.

 

 

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Nollywood Actress and Philanthropist Amb. Princess Chelsea R.C. Nwodo Appointed as Chief of Staff to AGN National President*

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*Nollywood Actress and Philanthropist Amb. Princess Chelsea R.C. Nwodo Appointed as Chief of Staff to AGN National President*

Abuja, Nigeria – The Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN) announces the appointment of Amb. Princess Chelsea R.C. Nwodo as the new Chief of Staff to National President, ALHAJI SANUSI ABUBAKAR YAKUBU. This strategic move underscores the Guild’s commitment to excellence and its dedication to fostering a more efficient and effective leadership structure.

 

Amb. Nwodo brings a wealth of experience and expertise to her new role, having served as a National Deputy Secretary (Emeritus) and demonstrating exceptional leadership skills and a deep understanding of the Guild’s vision and mission. A respected member of the Nigerian entertainment industry, she is also known for her dedication to promoting actor welfare and advancing the Guild’s interests.

*A Proven Track Record*

Amb. Nwodo’s appointment is a testament to her outstanding contributions to AGN and her commitment to serving the Nigerian film industry. Her philanthropic efforts and advocacy for social causes have made a positive impact on Nigerian communities, She’s also the CEO of CHELSEA NWODO’S FOUNDATION a foundation known for its unique cultural expression and alliance with many state government including Delta state government and so on.

*About the Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN)*

The AGN is the governing body for professional actors in Nigeria’s Nollywood film industry, established in 1998 with over one million members across the six geopolitical zones of the federation. The Guild promotes actor’s welfare, protects their rights, and advances the Nigerian film industry.

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From Drill to Deen: Central Cee’s Conversion and the Power of Faith in Modern Hip-Hop

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From Drill to Deen: Central Cee’s Conversion and the Power of Faith in Modern Hip-Hop

By George Omagbemi Sylvester 

“The British rap star’s public declaration of Islam sparks global reactions and renews debate about spirituality, identity, and influence in contemporary music.”

British rap superstar Central Cee has publicly announced that he has converted to Islam, a revelation that has rapidly spread across global media and social platforms, drawing reactions from fans, cultural commentators and religious observers alike. The development marks a deeply personal shift for one of the most influential voices in modern UK drill, and it highlights the growing intersection between faith, identity and popular culture.

Central Cee, whose real name is Oakley Neil Caesar-Su, disclosed the decision during a recent livestream, where he stated that he had taken the Shahada, the Islamic declaration of faith that formally marks a person’s conversion to Islam.

According to multiple reports published on February 6, 2026, the rapper confirmed the conversion publicly, saying he had changed his name and embraced Islam, with friends present during the broadcast congratulating him.
The announcement quickly became a trending global topic, with thousands of fans flooding social media with messages of support and congratulation.

What happened, when, where and how
The confirmed facts are straightforward.

What happened: Central Cee announced his conversion to Islam.
Who: The British rapper, born Oakley Neil Caesar-Su.
When: The announcement surfaced publicly on or around February 6, 2026.
Where: The declaration was made during a livestream, widely circulated online.
How: He confirmed he had taken the Shahada and embraced Islam, with friends present during the session.
Before this announcement, Central Cee had never publicly declared adherence to any specific religion, though fans had long speculated about his spiritual leanings.
Background: the rise of a global rap force
Born on June 4, 1998, in London, Central Cee rose from the streets of Shepherd’s Bush to become one of the most commercially successful British rappers of his generation.
He achieved mainstream recognition with his 2020 single Day in the Life and later dominated charts with hits such as Doja and Sprinter, accumulating billions of streams worldwide.
By the mid-2020s, he had become a defining figure in UK drill, blending street narratives with a polished, globally accessible sound.
Reactions and significance
The news of his conversion triggered widespread reaction across continents. Many fans congratulated him, using phrases such as “Welcome to Islam, brother,” reflecting the celebratory tone among supporters.
Others expressed curiosity about whether the decision would influence his music, public image, or future lyrical direction.

Cultural analysts note that religion has long played a quiet but significant role in hip-hop. From Malcolm X’s influence on American rap consciousness to the presence of Muslim artists in both US and UK scenes, faith has often shaped artistic identity.

British sociologist Dr. Reza Pankhurst, writing on religion and youth culture, has argued that for many urban artists, faith offers “a language of discipline, moral structure and belonging in environments often defined by instability.”
Similarly, American scholar Dr. Sherman Jackson has noted that Islam’s appeal among musicians and athletes lies partly in its “emphasis on personal responsibility, spiritual dignity, and community.”
While these are broader observations about religious influence in culture, they help explain why high-profile conversions often resonate far beyond the personal sphere.

Why the announcement matters
Central Cee is not merely another celebrity; he is one of the most commercially powerful voices in British rap, with global reach across Europe, Africa, Asia and North America. His decisions, therefore, carry symbolic weight.

When artists of such stature publicly embrace a faith, it often triggers three parallel conversations:

First, identity: Fans begin to examine how the artist’s beliefs align with their lyrics and public persona.

Second, influence: Younger audiences may view the decision as aspirational or spiritually significant.

Third, authenticity: Critics and supporters alike debate whether faith will reshape the artist’s artistic content.

British cultural commentator Kehinde Andrews has previously observed that hip-hop is “not just music but a social language through which young people negotiate power, race, faith and identity.”
In that sense, Central Cee’s announcement becomes part of a larger cultural dialogue not merely a personal declaration.

The question of a new name
Some reports indicate that the rapper mentioned changing his name after taking the Shahada, though details remain inconsistent across sources.
While certain online reports suggested possible new names, there is no universally confirmed official new name from the artist at the time of reporting.
This remains an evolving aspect of the story, and responsible reporting requires caution until a formal statement is released through verified channels.

The broader context: faith and hip-hop
Central Cee joins a growing list of artists who have publicly embraced Islam. Over the decades, figures such as Yasiin Bey (Mos Def), Lupe Fiasco, Ice Cube, and Q-Tip have either converted to Islam or drawn heavily from Islamic teachings in their music.
In the UK, Muslim identity has long been intertwined with the grime and drill scenes, reflecting the multicultural realities of cities like London, Birmingham and Manchester.

Cultural historian Tricia Rose, one of the foremost scholars of hip-hop, once wrote that the genre “has always been a site of spiritual searching, moral struggle and social commentary.”
In that context, a public conversion is not an anomaly but part of a longstanding tradition of artists seeking meaning beyond fame and commercial success.
What remains unclear
Despite the viral spread of the story, certain details are still evolving:

The exact location of the livestream has not been formally confirmed.

The identity of the individuals present during the Shahada has not been publicly verified.

Any official legal name change has not been documented in confirmed public records.

Responsible journalism requires distinguishing between verified facts and social-media speculation.

Final assessment
Central Cee’s conversion to Islam is a deeply personal decision that has nonetheless sparked global conversation. Announced during a livestream in early February 2026, the declaration places one of Britain’s most influential rappers at the centre of a broader discussion about faith, culture and celebrity influence.

In an era where artists are often defined solely by streaming numbers and chart positions, his announcement underscores a different narrative: the search for meaning, identity, and spiritual grounding in the midst of global fame.

As the late scholar James Cone once wrote, “Spiritual transformation is the most radical form of social change, because it begins inside the human soul.”
Whether Central Cee’s journey will reshape his music or remain a private source of guidance is a question only time can answer. What is certain, however, is that his decision has already stirred conversations that extend far beyond the world of rap.

 

From Drill to Deen: Central Cee’s Conversion and the Power of Faith in Modern Hip-Hop
By George Omagbemi Sylvester 

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