HOW LAGOS-BORN MUSICIAN, ADEWOLF FOUND HIMSELF IN VANCOUVER
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
When Nigerian-born recording artist, Adewolf, informally known as Ade, set out for Vancouver, site unseen, he had minimal expectations for what his new life might look like. Now, four years into his Vancouver homemaking process, Ade is finally starting to feel settled in a city that is notoriously hard to break into—both socially and otherwise.
Through trial and error, isolation and introspection, Ade has made Vancouver feel like a place he can enthusiastically call home. In this POSTERCHILD Original, we learn how the singer, songwriter and producer found himself in Vancouver and how he’s working to make the city an inclusive, engaging and altogether more interesting place to live.
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
At just 23 years old, Adewolf left the tropical comfort of home in Lagos, Nigeria in search of a different life experience. A more Canadian experience. An enticing multimedia post-secondary program in Toronto would equip him with everything he needed to master communication through several mediums. As Ade became increasingly acquainted with Canadian culture, he simultaneously developed his musical practice, a passion he brought with him from his adolescence in Africa.
“I've always been making music,” explains Ade, over an informal Zoom call. “I was in a group back home in Lagos called Trip City, it was two of us. We were kind of getting traction. We got on the radio, but I stepped back a bit because l wanted to explore different art forms.”
Photos: Mackenzie Walker
Just as Ade was beginning to find his footing in Toronto, a job opportunity pulled him out to the West Coast, where he willingly relocated without a second thought. “I didn't know anyone,” he says. “But I was like, ‘Sure, let's see how it is.’”
Photos: Mackenzie Walker
Ade landed in Vancouver in 2018 with a packed suitcase and an open mind and confidently plunged into uncharted waters. Upon his arrival, he was surprised at his difficulties in trying to find companionship.
“It was hard to make genuine connections to people,” he admits. “Something I didn't take into consideration was that creative community thing. I maybe made an assumption, but it just seemed a lot harder to find, a lot harder to connect to people. It seems like there’s a similar narrative for a lot of people who move to Vancouver.”
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
Ade’s feelings of isolation coupled with the amassing social restrictions of the pandemic forced him into solitude. Although he spent a considerable amount of his first few years in the city relatively alone, the imposed silence created an important space for him to address some of life’s largest questions.
“As I stayed here, I started to get more inspired and more focused on what I wanted to do in my life”, he acknowledges. “I had some kind of existential crisis of like, ‘Oh, what do I actually want to do?’”
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
Those big, nebulous questions spurred Ade to pursue his longstanding creative dreams. “I really wanted to make something that was visually and sonically an expression of an idea that I came up with”, he notes. “That's where the professional career started.”
In shaping his perspective alongside his understanding of himself, Ade began to attract like-minded individuals into his life, who shared his point of view.
“I have more existential conversations with people in Vancouver,” he shares. “I talk about a lot of things that I deal with personally that might be relatable and that I don't hear a lot of people talk about, especially being a Nigerian black man in Vancouver.”
Photos: Mackenzie Walker
It wasn’t long before others began to take notice of Ade’s musical talents. He was the recipient of the Creative B.C’s Career Development grant and was selected for the VIFF Amp Program and 604 Sessions SongWriting Camp. Furthermore, Ade soon met others who shared his creative vision, leading him to form a band.
“I'm starting to build a community of like-minded artists. We meet up every other week or weekly and we just jam and get to see each other's tastes and play our music for each other,” he explains. “It's great seeing other people's cultures and being able to experience how they approach different things.”
Through the formation of his band, Ade came to realize the importance of physical spaces in cultivating support for his newfound community.
“I have a kind of co-owned studio. We have this space for rehearsals and production and things. We host giant jam sessions with each other,” he shares. “We get to see each other's tastes and play our music to each other. That has been really helpful to feel at home.”
Photos: Mackenzie Walker
Ade explains that the studio space enabled him to further develop his sound, a genre he likes to define as Afrohop—a unique blend of Afrobeats, hip-hop, R&B and reggae. With the growing popularity of these genres in mainstream music, Ade reveals his optimism: “Seeing the growth of Afrobeats has been very exciting. I remember moving to Canada 8 years ago and I would play my songs for people and they'd be like, ‘What is this?’. “Now, I walk into Aritzia and Zara and they'll be playing Afrobeat songs on the speakers.”
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
As for his future vision of life in Vancouver? Ade has hopes for a more diverse musical scene.
“Vancouver's infrastructure is not really built for young creatives, which is sad,” he acknowledges. “What we're trying to do now is build systems whereby we can sustain this style of community because a lot of people I know are moving out of the city. I feel like in Vancouver, the system isn’t built to create avenues for different or fresher styles.”
He’d love to see the municipality prioritize cultural life through investment in creative spaces and venues over residential development. “They should put as much importance into trying to create different artistic forums to support different forms of art,” he argues playfully.
When asked to describe his ideal creative city, Ade envisions a utopia where resources are more readily available. He’d like to live in an environment where “Everyone has access to grants. Everyone has access to facilities and venues. Venues for all styles of music and where the city supports creative venues,” he clarifies. “A utopia of culture is really just sharing and moving.”
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
Until then, Ade is continuing to engage with the city, sharing his musical gifts with the people of Vancouver and greater BC with his weekly jam sessions and regular live performances alongside his collaborators.
As much as Ade is gaining momentum on his (very promising) path to musical superstardom, his time in Vancouver has inspired him to maintain a harmonious approach to managing work and play.
“It is important to have a certain level of balance as much as you may want to go out and outrightly devour your dreams and reach peaks that you aspire for yourself,” Ade asserts. “But you know, it's also important to enjoy the process—live life.”
Photo: Mackenzie Walker
