Timaya (full name Inetimi Alfred Odon) is a Nigerian singer, songwriter and the founder of Dem Mama Soldiers- a South South hip hop group.
Background
Timaya was born as the youngest of fifteen children in Port Harcourt, Rivers State on August 15th, 1980 to the family of a banker father and a trader mother. He attended Assemblies of God Nursery and Primary school and went on to Nkpolu Oroworukwo Secondary School Port Harcourt. He however had to change secondary school because he moved to Lagos. In Lagos he attended Lagos Ikeja Grammar School.
For university he went back to Port Harcourt and chose to study Banking and Finance as his preferred course. He however dropped out after a semester because his performance was too poor.
Read Also: Full Biography and Net Worth of D’banj.
Music Career
After dropping out of school, Timaya moved back to Lagos to pursue a career in music instead. He became a backup singer for Eedris Abdulkareem’s group but left the group after three years to start a solo career in music. He started with collaborations with other up and coming artists and released his first major hit Dem Mama after he met with K-Solo a music producer. The song which addressed the 1999 destruction of Odi, a river side community registered Timaya as artist with elements of activism in him and instantly gave him street credibility.
He dropped his debut studio album True Story in 2007 with seven more tracks aside Dem Mama. He released his second album Gift and Grace in 2008 and released a third album De Rebirth two years after.
Timaya has proven to be one artist who is definitely not scared of collaborating with other artists. He also featured on Kefee’s hit song Kokoroko in 2010, his fourth album LLNP (Long Life And Prosperity) was even a collaborative album with Dem Mama Soldiers with the second track Dem No Like Me featuring Ras Kimono a legendary reggae singer.
His album Upgrade with the hit songs Sexy Ladies, Bum Bum and Malonogede featured collaborations with artists like Attitude, Terry G and Vector.
Awards
- He won the Album of the Year award at the Nigeria Music Awards in 2008
- He won the Best Reggae/Dancehall Album award at The Headies in 2008
- He won the Best Reggae/Dancehall Album award at The Headies in in 2009
- He won the Best Collaboration award at The Headies in 2009
- He was nominated for the Artiste of the Year award at The Headies in 2009
- He won the Best Collaboration of the Year award at The Headies in 2010
- He won the Best Afro-Dancehall song award Afrotainment-Museke Online African Music Awards in 2011
- He was nominated the Indigenous Artist of the Year award at the Nigeria Entertainment Awards in 2014
*Please note that this list is not exhaustive.
Net Worth
Timaya’s net worth is estimated to be N1.1 billion.
