Remembering the One-Hit Wonder: Soty

ARTISTE NAME: Soty
HIT SONG: Malaria
GENRE: R&B
SUCCESS LEVEL: Moderate/Nationwide
CURRENT STATUS: AWOL
By the time you’ve finished reading this article, a minimum of four African children would be pronounced dead, all slain by the same killer, at the same time but it gets worse. If you’re a slow reader, chances are the number of deaths by the time you’re done reading would be much higher; WHO says one African child dies every 30 seconds from Malaria, now do the math. But before you hurry through my article, bear in my mind that by saving time, you wouldn’t necessarily be saving a life. This is NET, if you feel so strongly about the pandemic called Malaria; you already know the website to go to.
Sotonye Samuel Horsefall, or Soty for short, burst onto the scene with a ballad that found the previously nonexistent relationship between true love and Africa’s number one killer – Malaria. Backed by a combination of heart-tugging strings and a dense layer of percussions, Soty, then a student of University of Calabar, painted the picture of an individual so deep in love, death seemed much more appealing when compared to the fear of being rejected. The lyrics of Malaria were so expertly laid out in pidgin that lovers all around the country could easily relate to the enthralling story.
After a slow start, the song spread like bags of rice at a PDP rally in 2007 and 2008. A below par video was released months later and Soty left her abode in Port Harcourt to promote her hit song. A debut album of the same title hit shelves via Chrome Entertainment a few months later as expected, however what we didn’t expect was the lukewarm response it got from the public. Oh! And before I forget, we also didn’t expect Soty to give us a generous view of her décolletage on the album cover but hey, I’m not complaining and something tells me neither are you. Soty and her minders gave Malaria’s follow up single Igbigi a feeble push and not much has been heard of the songbird ever since.
If you’ve been counting the seconds you squandered on this article and feel a bit guilty that a few African children may have lost their lives along the way, cheer up! Malaria can’t be stopped, not that way at least. Hopefully Soty’s music career is as resilient as the disease she sung so sweetly about a few years ago and music lovers, and lovers in general, relapse into Soty fever once again.
(*NB* Remembering the One Hit Wonder is a series dedicated to Nigerian artistes who found instant fame with one hit song and returned to obscurity shortly afterwards. This series is in no way trying to undermine the efforts of the respective musicians, rather it is dedicated to ensuring memories of their short reign aren’t completely lost.)