The Genius of Obongjayar’s “Gone Girl”

Obongjayar is one of the most critically acclaimed and culturally relevant artists in the nigerian music scene. He crafts projects with incredible artistic nous and knows how to create the dreamiest music.

8/25/24

One of his biggest triumphs was his collaborative EP with the talented Sarz “Sweetness”, and more specifically, the track “Gone Girl”. On this track he sings from the perspective of someone who is slowly watching their partner fall out of love with them, and he is not happy about it. From the start he is already pleading and asking what he can do differently to avoid an end he knows all to well. As the track progresses, he’s deteriorated to asking to be gaslit and told he’s just insane. The repeated hook is an interpolation of “Zombie” by Fela Kuti, a song about how Nigerian politicians are not even engaged in the affairs of the nation, and it’s like the country is just being run by zombies. Obongjayar uses it as a metaphor for the feeling that his partner on this song is just emotionlessly going through the motions, moving like a zombie. The pre-hook is just another layer of the desperate nature of the song, and the yearning and longing he feels for his partner. Even through his abandonment issue-fueled episode, he just misses them. 


Overall, this track captures such a specific feeling in such a perfect way, only songs like “Dark Red” and “I Can’t Handle Change”, amongst others I’ve heard, belong in this category. It is an amazing encapsulation of the pain and longing one can feel when they see their partner slowly fall out of love. Obongjayar is a genius, and this song is just the tip of the iceberg, but even the tip is ridiculously cold.


Written By Idk Young J: linktr.ee/idkyoungj