Musician and former member of the music group ‘Akyeame’, Quophi Okyeame, says he is disappointed about the BBC’s hiplife documentary because he was not featured.
This was contained in a post on social media expressing his displeasure about the footage, calling it “non-factual” and “misleading.”
“I watched this BBC-produced hiplife documentary yesterday on YouTube, and I now completely understand why HIPLIFE IS DEAD. The presentation’s 30+ minute length is very deceptive and devoid of information. Apuuu!!! Wei,” he tweeted.
In an interview with Andy Dosty on the Daybreak Hitz, he stressed that omitting his name and importance in the story of the hiplife genre is disrespectful and a look down on his legacy.
“This is my life’s work, I told my children what I did, and now there’s a documentary without my name in it, and I now I look like a liar in front of my family, and I would not keep quiet,” he said on Hitz FM.
He went ahead to outline some records he and his former group member, Okyeame Kwame, set during their days as Akyeame.
“Akyeame was the first group to put their music on a compact disk and put it in stores. The facts are there. You can tell a story for almost 30 minutes, and all of these facts are missing, and you call it a documentary? No, it’s not,” Quophi Okyeame fumed.
The 27-minute documentary on BBC Africa’s YouTube page chronicles the genesis of the Hiplife genre, its evolutions, influences, and impact.
It features the originator of the genre, Reggie Rockstone; music video director, Abraham Ohene Gyan; music producer Panji Anoff; rappers, M.anifest and Eno Barony, among others.
Quophi Okyeame belonged to a Ghanaian hip-life duo from Kumasi, Ashanti Region. Together with Okyeame Kwame, they performed with lyrics in the Twi dialect of the Akan language.
They have songs like ‘Mesan Aba’, ‘Menko Meda’, and ‘Asa a Aba So’, among others.
