Black Sherif’s journey so far has been one of constant reinvention, driven by his hunger for musical freedom. At just 23 years old, the Ghanaian singer-songwriter has become one of West Africa’s brightest stars, seamlessly fusing highlife, reggae, drill, rap and beyond. With every track, he bears the weight of his generation’s struggles – telling tales of survival, street life, spiritual battles and the cost of ambition – all wrapped in raw, unflinching storytelling, earning global hits like ‘Kwaku The Traveller’ and ‘Second Sermon’ with his powerful lyricism.
With ‘Iron Boy’ – the highly anticipated follow-up to his 2022 debut ‘The Villain I Never Was’ – he delivers an album that speaks to resilience, growth and a sound that stretches far beyond borders. “To be really, really, really honest, I’m at the start of something,” he tells NME. “Whatever I’m doing right now is what I believe my foundation should be. I’m building something from scratch, something that I can trace back to and be inspired by.” ‘Iron Boy’ is not just another album – it’s the bold statement of an artist unafraid to carve out his own path.
What do you think has changed between your first album and your second album?
“It’s more defined. You know on the iPhone, when you increase the definition on a photo and everything gets sharper? That was the mindset that I had for the sonics for ‘Iron Boy’, and part of that was subconscious growth. Me being in the studio for the past five years — I’d be in that studio every day [for] more than half the time in a day. I think doing that repetition has shaped something [in] – or defined – my creating.”
Can you describe the sound of ‘Iron Boy’?
“Cinema. From the toning, the flows and the lyrics, I try to capture moments in pictures by pitching and tuning how I sound, how I say words, how I let guitars respond to me. Even if you don’t know Twi [an Akan dialect spoken primarily in Ghana] or get what I’m saying lyrically, I want you to get the picture I’m trying to make by being one with the beats, trying to paint pictures with actual melodies.”
How did you find your signature vocal delivery?
“I found that through experimenting. There are some sounds and ad-libs that I do out of mistakes, and like how they sound, so I tried to perfect [them]. There are some ways I sing or capture emotions that I learn from interviews or talking to people. The seconds between me saying the words and how the person feels – I live between them seconds, those spaces. I build melodies to raise certain emotions: I don’t know the theory, it’s all intuition.
“[Rapping in Twi] is important for the feeling I try to communicate [through] the song because there are some feelings that I only know how to describe in my tongue, but aside from getting that feeling across lyrically, I’ve learned to make the melody speak the same feeling.”
You really honed your craft on this album – what were your inspirations, and where did you find them?
“You see, there are some moments [in life] that happen and then everything in your mind switches – some random moments that [shape] your morals or your principles. All of these things happen, and then I write about them and actually analyse them. The inspiration sounds surface[-level at first] – if something stands out to me about love, that’s what I write about. But then, when I’m writing about it, I try to explore it from different places and then go deep.”
How do reggae and highlife influence your music, and how do you blend these genres together?
“There’s this pioneer of highlife [called] Kojo Antwi [and] if you break down a lot of his songs, they’re actually reggae. I feel like reggae beats and highlife rhythms and melodies can easily intertwine. They go together so bad. If I have to do something off the top, it’s just reggae rhythms and highlife melodies that come to my head. I hear beats very differently, and the core of how I approach sonics is from an experimental perspective.
“[Reggae] sounds very close to home. My daddy put me on reggae, [and] those songs are my metric of what good music is because my dad is definitely my hero. I judge everything by what I think he would like. I sing [this] song every morning: Don Carlos, ‘Harvest Time’. It was the first song I heard my dad play after he returned from overseas.”
What was it like collaborating with Fireboy DML and Seyi Vibes on ‘Iron Boy’?
“I respect [them] because of the parts they play in the cultures of wherever they’re from. I love Seyi’s language, not just his phonetics and everything, but also what he stands for. He’s like a hood pop star [and everyone] I know from where I’m from is the sage archetype [an embodiment of wisdom and is seen as a mentor or guide with profound insights].
“Fireboy – I feel like he’s [in the] top five composers from Nigeria. I love his music so much. ‘Apollo’ is my favourite [by]him. I listened to ‘Apollo’ for like two months straight, just trying to dissect how he was making that music. When I listen to music and I like it, I try to make my own analysis on why do they think this, how did he make this and how did he do this. I’m obsessed with knowing from the creator’s point of view.”
You’ve also worked with legends like Burna Boy and Buju Banton in the past. What were those experiences like?
“Burna gets me. He’s been making music for half of my life, for close to over 15 years. He’s come across so many sounds and [has] done and appreciated so many sounds that his reaction to my music makes me feel like there might be something in this sound that I don’t even realise. Anytime I meet the OGs, their reaction to the things I do is very different, and what they like about what I do [is] also very different as well.”
Is there anybody who you think might be following in your footsteps in revamping highlife?
“Yeah, a lot. AraTheJay, Gona Boy: those are two emerging artists that I believe are from my tribe; my musical realm. They’re not bending [to] the rules of what people think good music from where they’re from should be. If you want to make music and you grew up in Ghana — especially Ashanti regional stuff, maybe — it’s so easy to make highlife music. It’s a different game to actually branch out and do something different, even to make highlife different.”
What do you want your music to do for future generations?
“[I hope] it gets every kid out of the box they’ve been put in. I don’t think anyone is born to be one person. I hate it when people explain being yourself as just being the average person from where you’re from – that’s generic. Being yourself is being everything you want to be, all at once. I am me every second; I’m an updated version of myself. If you become a creative, you can tap into everything. You don’t need to be perfect.”
Black Sherif’s ‘Iron Boy’ is out now via Blacko Management/EMPIRE.