Nigerian Grammy-winning superstar Burna Boy has opened up about his earliest steps into music, revealing that he recorded his first-ever song when he was just 13 years old.
Speaking in an interview with Apple Music’s Ebro Darden, Burna Boy, now 34, gave a nostalgic account of how he created the track using nothing more than a radio, a tape recorder, and soundtracks from video games.
“The first song I ever recorded was by myself,” he shared. “You wouldn’t even believe this. I had a tape, a radio, and I had a tape recorder. I used the beat from video games and some stuff. So I used one from NBA Street, Volume II, and one from Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. That was how I did it. I played the beat and recorded over it. I must have been around 13.”
The revelation adds a new layer of relatability to Burna Boy’s artistic journey, showing how passion and creativity drove him long before the accolades and global stages.
Burna Boy’s journey from experimenting with borrowed beats from popular video games to becoming a global music icon reflects the resourcefulness of many Nigerian artists who start out with limited tools but immense talent.
Earlier this month, Burna Boy also addressed past remarks he made about Afrobeats lacking substance. In an interview on The Official UK Afrobeats Chart Show with Eddie Kadi, he apologized, saying that he had misunderstood the larger role Afrobeats plays in uniting and promoting African music globally. He clarified that he originally described his sound as Afro-fusion because he felt it didn’t fit neatly within the mainstream definition of Afrobeats.
“If I understood then what I know now, I would have gone about it differently,” he said. “Why would I want to destroy what I’m building? I apologise for the confusion.”
From recording his first song on a makeshift setup at 13 to performing at sold-out arenas and redefining African music on a global scale, Burna Boy’s journey is nothing short of extraordinary.
