Swangz Avenue seems to be heavily invested in Azawi’s forthcoming debut album and for many fans, a Vinka afro-dancehall gospel banger came in as a pleasant surprise.
Swangz as a label is purposefully diving into new depths. They outsourced African visionary Ben Mumba to direct Azawi’s street anthem, My year, and these bar-raising patterns seem to be recurring on Vinka’s new effort, Thank God. We should all understand why Vinka chose to ‘Thank God’ as 2021 has been so far good for her. She welcomed a newborn baby and shortly after she paraded a brand new car, a Benz.
Back to the song, it was produced by Diamond Platnumz’ go-to producer Lizer Classic whose signature ad lib Ayo Lizer is synonymous with a couple of Diamond bangers.
Lizer, who is known as magic fingers sure does bring his magic wand to the project as he brings forth a celebration of afro percussions and electronic dance music that meets a heavily present but subtle dancehall bass in Vinka’s psalm to the heavens.
Vinka on this track changes the outlook of what a gospel song ought to be about. She dismisses the notion that gospel songs should be solemn, repentant with no kick of life. She asks the deejay to spin her song in a confident effort to bring God and gospel music to the dancefloor.
The song literally creates an intersection between church and the party as Vinka notes that it is a prayer worthy moment just to be able to be at the dance party or the simple thought of simply shaking your body to good music.
The video
In-house video juggernaut Marvin Musoke shows up to execute the visuals. He has proven himself time and again, working with almost each and every noteworthy industry titan.
He keeps it subtle and uncluttered by restricting the visuals to an unconventional dance celebration that revolves around three scenes, an open golf course plain, what I believe to be the nearby woods, and a church itself.
Vinka is the star attraction that is assisted by a mob of dancers in all three locations. The dancers bring a lot of charisma on set as their varying rhythms and dance moves complement the danceable groove of the song.
However, for a director of Marvin’s repute, he could have done better especially with the dance scenes. Nigerian cinematographer and director Clarence Peters in his masterclass notes that while shooting three or more dancers, he aims to impress with patterns and formation.
Pattern and formation do create spectacle and attract attention to the particular scene. Marvin’s patterns as far as directing the dancers were short on accuracy especially in the woods and at the church. This deprived the visual of the spectacle it could have exuded as it’s a song that’s laden with enormous dance potential.
Nevertheless, the visual is still noteworthy in terms of costuming, video angles, color grading, and the general creative output. The fact that it is at 300,000 YouTube views at publishing time is testament enough.