The Afrobeat hype man: how a shout-and-call craft turned African stages into a business

A university presentation in Lagos set Tobi Michael Adeyeye on the path to becoming one of the pioneers of what is now called Afrohype — a performance style that drives crowds with shouts, ad-libs and explosive energy over Afrobeat.

According to The Guardian, the story began in 2015, when Adeyeye was a history undergraduate at the University of Lagos. His first-semester presentation made such an impression that classmates started calling him Toby Shang, after a 16th-century Chinese dynasty he had been presenting on. He had honed his crowd-working skills in secondary school, as a “ginger-man” in a three-piece band and as a private tutor. By his final year, his catchphrases had spread and his energy helped produce his breakout track, Shedibalabala.

Now 32, Toby Shang calls himself one of the “evangelists and pioneers” of a style some call Afrohype or lamba. He has staged his own rave, released two EPs and runs four School of Hype sessions — day-long classes with an online mentorship programme that have trained a string of new faces.

A hype man neither sings nor raps in the conventional sense. Instead, he delivers shouts, ad-libs and mimicked sounds over new music or familiar reworks such as Dorime, a Nigerian take on Ameno (1996), by the French group Era. Regulars at clubs may hand over money or “spray” it — a Nigerian custom of throwing or placing cash on performers in celebration.

Hype is now standard at weddings, raves and corporate parties. On Instagram, one celebrated teenager records 30-second hype segments on request for people whose friends or relatives have birthdays.

Dami Ajayi, a doctor and cultural critic based in London, said: “Hype men are very good talkers and command the microphone well.” He recalled meeting one at a party in Tirana last month: “He used the pauses between songs to drop funny jokes, many of them quite bold and steeped in gender stereotypes.”

Although the field is male-dominated, some women have made their mark, among them the bikutsi artist Lady Ponce in Yaoundé, nicknamed “the 100,000-volt lady” for her stage energy. Others include Deborah “Hype Queen Baddy” Francis — a School of Hype trainee who died in September — and radio host Melody “M.I.A” Adigo, both in Lagos.

The art of hype in West and Central Africa draws on traditions of praise singing and call-and-response that run centuries deep in communities of African descent on both sides of the Atlantic. In West Africa, the tradition is carried by oral storytellers known as griots. In the United States, it was sustained through the negro spiritual — sacred folk songs written by enslaved African Americans.

These styles laid the groundwork for the atalaku tradition (meaning “look here, look at me” in Kikongo, of the Democratic Republic of Congo), which flourished in Kinshasa in the 1980s and led to today’s hype stage. Notable practitioners include the American gospel singer Kirk Franklin, the Congolese rumba bandleader Koffi Olomide and the Congolese singer Awilo Longomba.

The success of Olomide and Longomba in the early 2000s set off a craze in Côte d’Ivoire, where the coupé-décalé genre absorbed the atalaku trend along with farotement — the flamboyant practice of throwing money at performers or guests at parties. The refrain urging listeners to gallop like horses in DJ Arafat’s 2003 hit — “Tout le monde galope, kirikata kirikata” — went on to influence later tracks by the Nigerian Afrobeats artists Flavour N’abania and Skales.

Côte d’Ivoire’s national broadcaster, RTI, ran an atalaku talent contest for several years. Lili Djely, a woman of Malian origin in Côte d’Ivoire, won in 2006 by blending Ivorian nouchi slang with French, beating the male contestants. In recent years, Ghana’s DJ Awards have added an MC/hype man of the year category as hype has grown there.

Thanks to the success of Afrobeats, Afrohype is now recognised as a full-time profession. As booking fees for artists rose after Covid-19, event organisers turned to hype men — a group once dismissed as little more than voiceover artists. Some hype men are said to command 5–8 million naira (roughly £2,844–£4,550) for a 30-minute to one-hour set.

Still, some observers say hype adds noise to events, encourages ostentatious display and that many performers do not adapt their language or rhythm to suit each occasion.

Even so, hype men have become an indispensable part of the entertainment stage. For Toby Shang, they help joy-seekers and clubgoers back onto the dance floor.

“People are facing so many challenges… they need someone to tell them the money will come next week,” he said. “Everyone wants to look at their phone or show off a Birkin bag in the club. No one wants to dance because dancing is seen as childish. You need a hype man to wake the child in everyone. A 60-year-old woman can dance like a young girl if the hype is good enough.”