In March 2025, Burna Boy and Shaboozey shared a lighthearted moment in Paris where they acknowledged their striking resemblance. Burna Boy turned to the rising star and joked, “You look exactly like me.” The comment, though playful, hinted at something more profound. Also, in a recent interview, he reflected on his collaboration with rising star Shaboozey.
“Here’s an Igbo boy from the eastern part of Nigeria who comes to America as a young guy. He’s flourishing in the country world. If I’m not proud of that, then I don’t think I can be proud of anything in life.”
Beyond just praising Shaboozey, that moment of admiration reveals a kinship rooted in artistic daring and the shared complexities of Black identity across continents.
Born Collins Chibueze, Shaboozey is a Nigerian-American artist who broke into the mainstream with “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” a viral country-rap hit that climbed the Billboard charts and landed him on major stages. His rise is striking because he’s doing it as a young African artist, and also he’s doing it within a genre historically resistant to Black voices which is the American country music.
For Burna Boy, a genre-blurring artist who’s spent much of his career pushing past expectations of what African music should sound like, Shaboozey represents something larger. Their collaboration “Change Your Mind”, off Burna’s new album No Sign of Weakness, is a tender, country-leaning ballad that finds the two artists pleading for second chances to a lover.
Before Burna Boy became a global superstar, he had long rejected tags and labels. While the world has slotted him alongside Afrobeats superstars like Wizkid and Davido, he’s insisted on calling his sound “Afrofusion”, a deliberate act of self-definition. In Shaboozey, he sees that same instinct: a refusal to be boxed in. Shaboozey’s music swerves confidently between country music, Hip-Hop, Emo Rock and Americana sound energy, refusing to pick a side.
It’s also a rare moment of unguarded admiration from an artist who is often skeptical of performative unity in African pop culture. In the same interview, Burna expressed his hesitance to engage in hollow calls for collaboration, saying, “I don’t want to discuss with people that it’s just going to end up a discussion, and there’s not going to be any action.” Yet in Shaboozey, he finds someone whose actions, not words, are reshaping the culture.
Burna Boy’s pride is about more than Shaboozey’s success. It’s about a shared vision of what Black creativity can look like when it refuses to shrink. Right from the streets of Nigeria to stages across the world, Burna Boy and Shaboozey are expanding the map, and that’s exactly why Burna can’t stop beaming with pride, seeing someone from his country doing something just as impactful as he is.
