Fahrenheit

The road to success for "Olayinka Shodimu"- aka Fahrenheit - has been a gradual process of construction. And with most stretches of road, there are speed bumps and potholes retarding progress. Such has been the journey of this Nigerian-born UK-based rapper."I didn’t take it serious at first" claims E.F.X. as he was know then. "I grew up listening to all kinds of music, and I mean every kind from Hip-Hop to straight up Rock or even Fuji. As long as it had a good melody to it, I bump that s**t". He points out that his music is influenced by life and good music - stressing the "good".He remembers around the time he first put pen to paper. He was in high school where they had regular battles during their free periods. "Someone would drum on the table and several guys would kick verses". “Back then, we weren’t too worried about the content, it was just who had the most verses" he laughs. It was during one of these battles that he met Nice-t (as he was called back then) who would later turn out to be his partner. They complimented each other greatly and their tag team was unfair to the opposition. Although still skeptical about the whole music idea, they decided to start a group.While he was studying Industrial Chemistry at the Ogun State University, in came two more members - Abuba and 2-Ten- who did Ragga and R&B respectively. They were then known together as F.B.I. "This was a ploy to appeal to the Nigerian market at that time” he explains. “We had to write songs in all these genres so as to boost our marketability then". And if you by any chance ask him what happened to the group, he always replies "The Human Factor - four different guys with different ideas and temperament; it just didn’t work". But not before they made a kick ass album together. Everyone who heard it urged them to get into the mainstream of the industry, but alas, it wasn’t meant to be.He eventually broke out of the group and formed a duo with Nice-T- now known as O-cube. They also made an album together called "Beautiful Rubbish". It was an instant hit in the streets with the ever catchy and hilarious singles "Them say” and “I wan Pose". It was all going great he remembers. "We were getting our fame up and we was almost through the door". But the problem that Indie artistes always face now caught up with them – FINANCE. This greatly affected the promotion and spread of the album. He often refers to that part of his life as paying his dues and he says he has moved on form that point of his life calling it a learning process.Now older, wiser and obviously more experienced, he’s staging a re-entry into the music industry. He’s now on Flavor Records, a new label which he co-founded with a couple of friends, and they’ve set out to lift the industry to greater heights, setting the pace for new standards never before seen in the Nigerian industry as they go on. World Class is how they reason, "New name, new game, new fame, same state of mind / stay on my grind and get dough, f**k the currency" as he spits on one of his verses.Now known as Fahrenheit, he is presently working on his solo project called "1000 degrees Fahrenheit". He has just concluded two singles on the album "Red Hot” and “Sexy Body" working with crazy producers like Campbell Enyioko aka C-Drill and Samuel Oduachuba aka Samklef, Flowrecords. These songs will be hitting the airwaves and clubs real soon so keep your ears to the streets.---------------------------------COMPILED BY ABIMBOLA ‘Jamin ADEBANJO