A lot has happened to Tems over the past 12 months.
Barack Obama picked Essence, the hit Wizkid track on
which she features, as one of his favourite songs of the year.
Justin Bieber remixed the single, and Drake asked her to
contribute vocals on a song from his chart-topping album
Certified Lover Boy. A clip surfaced online of Rihanna
fangirling with joy on meeting her at the Savage x Fenty
show. She made it on to the BBC Sound of Music 2022
longlist, embarked on her first solo tour, was nominated for
a Mobo, and then a Grammy for best global music perfor-
mance. Oh, and Adele became her music fairy godmother.
So a lot to take in. Are you knackered, Tems? “I am, yes, but
I’m trying to enjoy it.” The 26-year-old Nigerian was on a
photoshoot when she found out about the Grammy nomina-
tion last month. “Four of my guys picked me up and started
bouncing me around,” she says. “But we didn’t really do
anything afterwards because we had to work,
so we went home to rest, thank God.”
We meet in a hotel in east London while
she is in town for a handful of (sold
out) solo gigs. Wrapped up in a
North Face puffer, she does seem
knackered, but thoughtful and
introspective too. “I wasn’t going
after awards, it wasn’t like
anything I had on a list to achieve,”
she says. “I’m still not trying —
there’s no benchmark that I’m
trying to get to. I really just want to
become more of who I actually am.”
In a recent interview with
Rolling Stone, Adele said she had
been a fan since the beginning of
Tems’s career in 2018. A friend had
played her Tems’s debut track, Mr
Rebel — which at the time was
mainly a hit in the alté music
scene in Nigeria — and Adelereached out shortly afterwards. They went for dinner in LA,
she made the introduction to Drake and even played Tems
her 30 album before it was released. Was it for feedback?
“No, I don’t think Adele needs my opinion!” she laughs.
“But I think she just wants to share her music with the
people that love her, and I was honoured to have her share
that with me, that was very special.” Tems confirms what we
all know: “She’s so much fun. She’s vibes, so much vibes.”
Born Temilade Openiyi in Lagos, Nigeria, Tems was
working as a marketing executive until three years ago.
Growing up she had always loved to sing and would write and
record songs as voice notes on her phone. When she eventu-
ally took the plunge and quit the office job to pursue music
professionally, she says: “I didn’t have a strategy to support
myself, I was just living it day by day.” She recorded Mr
Rebel at a studio that belonged to an acquaintance,
taught herself music production from YouTube, and
put together the single’s artwork with her photogra-
pher cousin and a graphic designer friend. The
internet loved it, and it caught the eye of her
first manager; the single now has more
than three million streams on Spotify.
Tems joins a new generation of young
female artists who are all taking owner-
ship of their music from an early
stage. Although she makes clear:
“My reality is very different. I’m
a Nigerian girl and that’s a
third world country. We’re
too busy trying to survive
to think about the music
industry. No one took me
seriously [at the beginning]
and I was like, yeah, looks like
I have to do it myself !”
Tems has one older brother,
and the family briefly lived in
King’s Cross when she was aREBEL
Her debut single has been streamed more than three million times,
she has just been nominated for a Grammy – oh, and Barack Obama,
Rihanna and Adele are huge fans. Louisa McGillicuddy meets Tems,
the voice of 2022 everyone’s talking about
Photographs Ronan McKenzie Styling Verity ParkerMs
The Sunday Times Style • 7