By PETRUS OBI, Enugu
When in 2012 a new radio station in Enugu, Dream FM, went in search of a presenter to handle a programme designed to interact with the people in the streets, it stumbled on Kingsley Egbuna popularly known as Didi Nna Men.
At first, it looked childish and out of place but gradually it gathered momentum and today the two-hour-programme dubbed, Nna Men, which is presented in a funny and entertaining way using the street lingo has infected the people of the South East and environs.
A 2008 graduate of Chemical Engineering from Enugu State University Science and Technology (ESUT), Egbuna hails from Akpugo in Nkanu West Local Government Area of Enugu State. However, before graduation he said he had been in the studio working. Hear him: "I started the radio programme a year after I left school in 2009; I was introduced by one Mr. Chuks Maduduonu who was having a sports programme on Ray Power 105.3 Enugu and I started with a soccer programme until I had a contract with the station to do a South East musical countdown.
"The programme, Nna Men is a divine arrangement; the station needed someone that can really communicate to the streets; a lot of people came for the interview. I would really say I was the last person; I didn't really come for the interview and all that...I did actually, but not the main interview. Why I said it's a divine arrangement is that it's actually when I thought that I have lost it that I got it and here we are in Dream FM."
On how he learnt the slang, "ah men, na nwa ogbe o, we stay in the streets', he said: "I lived at Nnaji Street, Uwani; I grew up in Uwani; and in Uwani if you really ask about Uwani its where most slang come from. So it's the street life out there; it's not the ghetto, but the street. I never knew the programme was going to be like this; it was along the line that I really found out that the street was waiting for a platform to express itself, so the show, Nna Men really gave them the opportunity to do so."
Music life
My music life started in year one in the university though all my life I have been in the choir, gospel bands and all that. I have also been in the Boys' Brigade playing drums; music has always been around me. I have been recording; my first album came with flavour and my second album is right now in the market so, I would say I'm getting to 10 to 15 years in the business but I've been underground.
Stepping stone
I have been in the music industry so I will really give thanks to the Nna Men show that really made people say 'ok, this is this guy'. When I dropped my album nobody knew I was singing; some of the fans, especially the new ones began to know me; that's when I said 'ah! so these people didn't really know me all these while'.
My fist album was in 2008; we didn't really push the album because the songs were very vulgar. It wasn't something I was proud of, it wasn't something I felt will have a positive impact on the street so I didn't push it. I practically withdrew it from the market after we sold about 25,000 copies and I felt like 'no, this is going to corrupt the youth'. It started corrupting the youth so I pulled it out. The title of the album was Umu Ogbe, it features Flavour, Whiz Boy, Snoop Dog, and Space man but it was very vulgar.
But for the new album, we are staying clean; the title of the album is Above, it is an authentic blend of vocal expression; we are trying to re-package the album right now and by the grace of God the album is just about two months in the market, even though we've sold over 50,000 CDs, we are trying to re-package it.
On being musician/presenter/MC
It's been very difficult; sometimes I break down. It's really difficult because sometimes when I finish a show, I have to go to Lagos by air. And I don't like flying; but the showbiz I have found myself is all about traveling by air. So, it's not easy; like today I didn't go to work because I didn't have the energy, I didn't have the strength.
Now the disadvantage of being an MC especially in the East is that first, they won't pay you; also they expect you to talk from now till tomorrow but every professional MC will know that if you have three hours to talk, if you don't manage it well you will begin to bore people and say what they would not like. So, I looked at all these professionally, sought for advice and then I stopped going for MC shows.
Via: Sun News Online