NAVIO'S INTERVIEW WITH CHANNEL O

Navio

Ugandan superstar, Navio, was in South Africa last week shooting a music video for One and Only, the first single off his upcoming studio album Girls and Whips. To shoot the vid, he chose to work with the team from Tough Sunday production.Channel O had a brief chat with the rapper and got the low-down on the video, his soon to be released album and we got to find out about some of the South African artists he likes.

Tell us about One and Only…
It’s a love song. I don’t do many of those, I don’t do commercial, but this is more party.

You recently shot the video in Durban, what was the concept behind it? 
It was a two day shoot. I was more like a ‘bachelor on steroids’. I got to bungee jump, gorge-dive, go quad biking with models. On the vid, I start off with four girls, going on different dates with them, right down to my ‘one’. We used South African models, we wanted to get girls from Milan, but (shrugs and laughs).

What should people expect from Girls and Whips? 
There’s two sides to the album. We played around on the good and bad contrasts of things. From the songs to the art work (cover). There’s a little more party and because of my nature I couldn’t do a full commercial album. My roots are in battle- I’m a conscience rap revolutionary, it’s hard to shake that off. We thought it would come out in September, but it’s actually good to go.

Navio in studio recording One and Only 

Since you are in South Africa, do you listen to any of its artists?
I actually battled it out with PRO (Prokid) once, we went all the way to top two and he won. He switched on some vernac on me. So Pro, Proverb, Zubz. I’m all old skool. The new guys, I Like a bit of  AKA, Khuli Chana.

You understand Khuli Chana ‘s lyrics?
It’s the way his rhyme flows, the way he puts it across, his rhyme pattern is intricate. He has an effortless relaxed thing about him.