Red Bull Music Festival with SKEPTA
Red Bull’s 6 day-long music festival is back this year to showcase local and international music at various iconic venues throughout Johannesburg. This year’s big announcement is grime superstar Skepta, who will be headlining the festival that celebrates 20 years of the Red Bull Music Academy.
Skepta is a UK-based grime artist from Tottenham who has been making grime music for over 15 years. Along with his brother and fellow grime artist JME, Skepta started the Boy Better Know record label in 2006, and began releasing music under the BBK title. In 2008, Skepta released his second studio album, “Microphone Champion”, which contained the popular “Rolex Sweep” single. Skepta kept a steady and progressive album release schedule and in 2016, he released his most commercially popular album to date, “Konichiwa”, which contained 4 singles that sat on the UK Top 40. Recently, Skepta released his latest “Vicious” EP, which features A$AP Rocky and Lil B. Other notable Skeppy collaborations are with Drake, that started with them referencing one another in songs like “Shutdown”, and grew to Skepta interludes on Drake’s latest album, and even a Boy Better Know tattoo for Drake. 2016 also saw the first Skepta x Nike collaboration, with the widely popular and sought-after 97 "Sk".
This will be Skepta’s first performance in South Africa, with his only performance on African soil being in Nigeria in 2016, Skepta’s country of birth. The grime legend is expected to be accompanied by his girlfriend, supermodel Naomi Campbell. Skepta will perform on the 5th day (7 April) of the Red Bull Music Festival at the Fox Junction. The days leading up to the headlining act are however not to be missed, and include inspiring local performances, an improvisation round robin and a total of 80 artists involved throughout Johannesburg. The full schedule of performances and workshops can be found here and tickets for the festival can be bought here.
Shelflife will also be holding a competition to win tickets to see Skepta this coming Saturday. To enter, head on over to our Instagram page to find out more.
