Angolan-born, Australian-raised artist, Lisa Viola, talks about her first professional gig and why she chose to focus on Afrobeat.
Alisa is signed on international deal to Nigerian record label, Dream Empire Music and she is now working with the same producers that delivered Afrobeat hits for Grammy award-winning Burna Boy.
Lisa revealed she has been in Nigeria for over a year now and she’s loving it. She loves the heat in Nigeria because she’s a heat person.
Talking about her type of music, (a video emerged where she was rapping) Alisa revealed that she’s a singer and she is not cool enough to call herself a rapper.
Lisa revealed that one of the reasons why she probably got signed to DEM was because they saw that she had suffered a lot (she laughs). Explaining more she shared that it’s never a struggle for the people outside but the people inside know and understand the struggle.
Talking about how she got signed, Lisa shared that her CEO knew she was an independent artist with an EP and six singles, he asked where they could come in and they strike a deal.
Talking about her style of music, she said;
“I don’t know if I chose Afrobeat or Afrobeat chose me but I’m part of the Africans in the diaspora. When you’re raised outside of Africa, you’re always put in that Afrobeat category and I grew up dancing a lot. I started as a dancer.
“As a dancer, I was doing shows and opening for artists so it was a natural progression for me. For me, Afrobeat was a way for me to connect back.
“For a long time living outside Africa, people have this shame to say i am African. Over there you have people putting up the American accent, trying to find themselves in a white society.
“There was this stigma unfortunately oversees. When the Afrobeat started breaking in like, Davido’s Skelewu, we were proud. We were the ones putting it out there. My accent is an Australian accent.
See the video for more!
