The Beginning of Psquare
The existence of musical P-Square
started in St. Murumba Secondary School, a small Catholic school in Jos,
Nigeria. Identical twins Peter and Paul joined their school music and drama
club where they began singing, dancing, and mimicking songs by MC Hammer, Bobby
Brown and Michael Jackson.
They later formed an a cappella
quartet called "MMMPP" (M Clef a.k.a. Itemoh, Michael, Melvin, Peter
and Paul) made up the group. Getting high on inspiration from their music idol
Michael Jackson, they began break dancing in Jos, they also formed the group
called "Smooth Criminals" in 1997. They withdrew M Clef from the
group "MMMPP" which later was changed to "MMPP". Their
artistic talent and precise dance routine soon made them household names in the
city of Jos, where they performed at school functions and other occasions.
Later in 1999, Peter and Paul
returned to music school to develop their skills on keyboard, drums, bass
and
rhythm guitar. Their work includes the soundtracks for a number of films like Tobi,
Mama Sunday, Moment of Bitterness and Evas River.
Later in 1999, they applied for
University of Abuja to study Business Administration. The Smooth Criminals
disbanded when its members left to various other universities. Subsequently
Peter and Paul formed their own group, which they called "Double P",
later "P&P", and again "Da Pees", until they eventually
settled for "P Square". They used to be managed (don’t know if they
are still managed) by Bayo Odusami aka Howie T, a seasoned concert promoter and
the CEO of Adrot Nigeria Limited.
In 2001, "P-Square" won
the "Grab Da Mic" competition, and hence Benson & Hedges
sponsored their debut album, titled Last Nite, which was released under
Timbuk2 music label. P-Square was also nominated as "Most Promising
African Group" in the Kora Awards three months after the release of their
debut album. They eventually won the 2003 Amen Award for "Best R&B
Group".
In 2005, P Square released their
second album, Get Squared under their own label, Square Records. This
album was marketed nationwide by TJoe Enterprises, although they were still
managed by Howie T of Adrot Nigeria Limited. The video for the second album held
the #1 position on the MTV Base chart for four straight weeks.
They have an ever growing fan base
across South Africa with a particular stronghold of diehard fans in Cape Town.
The group has performed alongside
the following international artists like Ginuwine, Sean Paul, Akon and Busola
Keshiro. The members of P Square are now located in Lagos.
Late in 2007, they released their
best selling album so far, Game Over. It has sold 8 million copies
worldwide.
In 2009, P-Square released their
fourth studio album, Danger. The album features collaborations with 2
Face Idibia, J Martins and Frenzy. The first single called "Danger"
is a hip hop song with cutting synths and a frog bass baseline similar to an
Eminem song.
On 4 April 2010, P-Square was named
the Artist of the Year at the KORA All Africa Music Awards in Ouagadougou,
Burkina-Faso while they were in London for a Concert at the Troxy, and they
will receive a whopping sum of $1 Million Dollars as the Award Winners, in
Ebebiyin City.
Controversies
The duo are reported to handle most
of their production/beat making in house. The band has been faced with many
controversies for their habit of sampling western songs and popular hits in
their records. They have addressed the issue many times in interviews as well
as in the lyrics of their songs. Technically speaking, P Square does more in
the line of reconstructing the drum patterns, chord progressions or lyrics of
the sampled songs as against actually cutting parts of the song and directly
sampling into their production. This accounts for the largely electronic feel
of their sound.
Some of the songs which have been
called up on this account include "Get Squared", "Game
Over", "Danger" and others.
P-Square attracted headlines because
they reportedly turned irate when they were notified by organisers in the
middle of their performance at the Guinness Show about some change in plans
which would affect the length of their performance, and that of the next act, 2
Face Idibia. As reported by vanguardngr.com, the info apparently stirred up
resentment as Peter immediately said "I don’t know why, anytime a foreign
artiste comes to Nigeria, they (show organizers) wan to treat us like slaves in
our country". Although initially they continued their performance but
midway through, they threw their microphones to the ground and angrily stormed
out of the stage saying, "We are leaving; they don’t want 2face to come on
stage" They were said to have immediately left the premises of the show,
but after intervention of the show organisers, they came on stage later with
2face for a performance, but later on were apologized to.
Relationship
On 8 August 2013, Peter Okoye got
engaged to his long time girlfriend, Lola Omotayo. On
Nov 17 2013, Half brother of P-Sqaure group Peter Okoye, Had his traditional
wedding with his baby mama and the event was attended by NO 1 Richest man in
Africa and Chairman of Dangote Group Aliko Dangote.
Some
of Their Awards and Nominations
Hip
Hop World Awards (The Headies)
|
City
Mag 9th Awards Show
|
Nigerian
Music Awards (NMA)
|
Channel
O Music Video Awards
|
MTV
Africa Music Awards
|
KORA
Awards
|
Lil
Perry Productions
|
BET
Awards 2010
|
MOBO
Awards
|
Ghana
Music Awards
|
MTV
Europe Music Awards
|
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