Fresh from the growing success of his breakout single Arike and incredible musical year he had, Nigerian singer and songwriter Kunmie has shared the intimate backstory around the release of his resonant love song; Arike.
While appearing on the Bottled Confession; a popular Nigerian podcast where Tolani Diamond and Nikki Adeps feature creatives from the entertainment and fashion industries, Kunmie disclosed that the record that we all not only love, play on repeat on our playlists and is quite a constant on the charts and on radio; Arike was originally composed for and with Oxlade in mind.
You could wonder why Oxy, well over the years, Oxlade and Kunmie have had a close working relationship; beyond creating soul leaning tracks but also in writing songs, ideas, lyrics and penning melodies.
“I used to be a songwriter. I used to write for Oxlade. I still do sometimes. That’s an amazing guy. I used to write for a lot of them. Don’t wanna count to many names.”, he said in the interview.
Kunmie went on to reveal: “I wrote Arike for Oxlade. When he heard this song he didn’t like. Normally if I send Oxy like if I if, I’m writing for Oxy you know and I send him a song or I send him an idea, he’s one of my favorite people to write for and I send him an idea he’s always very oh I love this let’s but for this particular one, one he just complimented me for the song. He wasn’t trying to sing it or anything. He just told me that bro just keep this song man, like just keep it to yourself.”
The singer still on the same interview said that this was his very first song, and after it marked the start of his transition from a songwriter to an artist.
A decision that started as an encouragement from Oxlade to Kunmie to keep the track and make it his own would soon go on to massively rack up millions of streams, peaking at #2 on Spotify’s Global Viral Chart in early 2025, attracting over 186,000 user-generated videos using it as a sound, and overall 60+ million streams across Digital streaming platforms as of late 2025.
In addition to his viral success, “Arike” also debuted at No. 1 on the Spotify Nigeria Viral 50 chart, further cementing Kumie’s presence on the music scene globally and pushing the visibility of debut EP, Before We Became Strangers on which the song appears.
The track’s vulnerability and simplicity further amplified its popularity as well as Arike’s, which was further propelled to new heights with the Remix to it featuring Simi and Mabel; an indicator that the appetite for softer and more emotionally grounded Afrobeats records grows day by day.
This fi of creative outcome is not unusual in music history. Internationally, Sia is one of the most notable examples of a songwriter whose work initially meant for others became defining moments of her own career. Her hit “Chandelier” was reportedly offered to global stars Rihanna, Beyoncé and Adele before she recorded it herself. Similarly, her album This Is Acting largely consists of songs she wrote for others that were turned down, only to become massive hits under her own name.
Closer to home, Joshua Baraka previously revealed that he had written Omukwano (Love) with the intention of offering it to Rema Namakula. The idea never materialized, and Joshua later released the song himself alongside Winnie Nwagi.
Read Also: I Had Originally Written “Omukwano (Love)” For Rema Namakula – Joshua Baraka
These stories are just a few examples of how songs sometimes find their true owners through instinct and timing. Maybe with Artificial Intelligence in the picture, perhaps it will be fun to listen to a reimagined version of Arike as done by Oxlade, or any other tracks that have been mentioned above.
Related: Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Music: Evolution or Erosion?
Is there a song you know that followed a similar path? Let me know in the comments.