Music of Thursday, 6 July 2006

Source: ghanamusic.com

Ex Doe Mounts New Highlife Project

Ex Doe?s five years sojourn in Canada did not change his Ghanaian outlook as it normally happened to people of his age.

He is convinced now that rhythmically High-life holds sway over many other music types and should, therefore, be fetching much more money for its exponents.

The songster has, therefore, set up a project to update the mixing of very good life tunes in order to make them more trendier and more competitive on the international market.

According to the songster whose real name is Richard Kwesi Siaw Akrofi, his research has indicated to him that many quality High-life tunes have rather low quality type of mixing and, therefore, limit their appeal to the international audience.

He said his project was to provide an updated mixing, which would make the kicks and snares very audible and in some cases try to infuse raps into the music.

Ex Doe said he had already started the project with Paa Bobo on Comfort and Senior Eddie Donkor on Yebu Didi and Sum sumpe.

He said the project would take some time to make its desired impact, because the artistes, whose works were going through such tempering, were seasoned artistes and thus needed to give their concert some touch of artistry even before it started.

According to him, he had almost concluded agreements with Amakye Dede, Rex Omar, Abrekyeba Kofi Sammy and Dr Paa Bobo to use some of their works in his project.

He said another project that was currently engaging his attention was the re-mixing of an album he made while he was in Canada.

According to Ex Doe, his album was originally tailored to the specification of the Canadian audience and was, therefore, a hi-tech hip-pop.

He said since he returned from Canada he had mainly been preoccupied by those two projects, but that at the same time he had also been collaborating with Nana King in show and performances in Nigeria.

Ex Doe is 29 years old, not yet married but has six girl friends. He says he likes being around them. They give him an insight into the world, its problems, its wins and losses.

He has wild and varied interests which include attending clubs to dance, reading, listening to news and playing soccer.

He schooled at Kaneshie C&B Primary and West 2 JSS. He started Senior Secondary School, but according to him, he abandoned his trunk and chop box in school and came to Accra.

He later entered Accra Technical Training Centre to do auto engineering.