Sony Achiba – “Nipa Boniayefoo,” from the album, Indian Ocean

Ghanaian hiplife meets Bollywood on this tape. The results are scary. Listen.

Sony Achiba is the originator, and sole practicioner, of hip-dia, the fusion of hip-hop and Indian music. Considering the nature of commercial hiplife production style and the type of Indian music Achiba draws from, hip-dia takes on a singularly bizarre quality.

I’ve heard Sony Achiba alternately described as a visionary and an artist “completely lacking in talent.” You decide. No one can deny the fact that, in early 2004, this song was as criminally over-played on Ghanaian radio as the singles from gospel chanteuse Esther Smith’s Gye No Di cassette. All of these songs still get plenty of spins to this day.

The screeching car tires before each rap verse are a nice touch, bringing that true Bollywood chase scene element into this surreal collage of influences. Vocoder-laced vocals, Sade-esque make-out music beat, and synthisized violins enhance this temporarily ubiquitous oddity.

This was also inside the tape: