The lead single, “Love, Today”, from singer-songwriter Preyé’s debut EP “Don’t Look Down!”, immediately caught my attention when I heard it.
The song features Ladipoe, who, together with Preyé, makes the perfect collaboration.
It’s hard to believe that the feature almost didn't happen.
Preyé revealed to IOL Entertainment during an interview how fate played its part in making the collaboration happen.
Initially, when Preyé recorded “Love, Today” it had no feature, but she felt it “needed that extra something”. A year later her team locked down Ladipoe, a popular and hard-to-get Afrobeats musician.
Despite Ladipoe’s interest in featuring on the song, his schedule was hectic.
“It got to a point where I was like, let’s forget this, I’m just going to do a verse two or something and just get the project out. On the other hand I was ranting to God, why isn't this happening, this isn't supposed to be this hard.”
Coincidentally, the very next day, while recording the second verse for the song, she got a call to come into the studio as Ladipoe was working on the verse.
“When he was done I said, ‘This is what this record needed.’ I feel like it was God ordained.”
The EP itself was a journey for the Lagos artist, who began toying with the idea of putting together the project in 2016.
However, as life would have it, things just did not fall into place for various reasons.
Throughout this period, Preyé had been working on music which she outgrew before getting to her final labour of love, “Don’t Look Down!”
“I got to the point where I was like, I’m going to pause and pick these particular songs and start with them.
“Even the process of picking all the songs and trying to start with them was crazy. Everything that could go wrong went wrong, it was so hard!
“And that's why this project is a journey of love, because I had to lead with love in order to put everything together the way it was,” she said.
She explained that every single song on the album was special, from the intro to “Red Wine”.
“‘Red Wine’ is about romantic love, ‘Crayon’ is about loving your inner self, ‘Love, Today’ featuring Ladipoe is about love for everybody.
“I decided to lead with love and realised that everything started working out for the better rather than just working on songs with no intention.”
On the EP, the budding songstress gets carefree as she dabbles in R&B/soul, which is something the singer didn't plan on doing.
“This particular project took this form and I didn’t try to change it to make it more acceptable for anybody. I just left it the way it was.”
Preyé did not let external forces influence her sound, nor did she try and go with what’s “popping” at the moment. She just let her own soulful, smooth sound take the lead, and it has worked for her.
“If you listen to the EP without skipping, they sort of lead into each other. It's kind of a soundtrack to my life. I didn’t let external things determine how it was going to come out from inside of me.
“If it was smooth, then I let it be smooth. If any song was intense, then I let it be intense.”
Preyé is an artist to pay attention to. Even Billboard has noticed her. In June, her single “Malibu” was listed by the music chart as one of their top R&B finds.
Preyé recalls how she cried after being told that she had made the Billboard chart.
“Nobody reached out to Billboard by the way, this is just God. We just woke up and saw ‘Malibu’, which is the third song on the EP.”
Her project may just be seven songs long, but every song is packed with emotion, and if you’re an R&B lover and listening to Ari Lennox, Summer Walker and SZA, then “Don’t Look Down!” will hit the right notes.
The songs on this EP will have you in your feels and ready to hit repeat.
“Don’t Look Down!” by Preyé is streaming on all digital platforms.