“(Fela Kuti) fought for freedom and used his music to do this also. His music is a powerful thing.”

Irish Hip-Hop is only getting bigger at the moment and Huva is certainly part of it. Recently premiering his new video ‘Friend Indeed‘, we caught up with him to ask him about where he sees his music going in the future.

Dropping hints of new music with Bobby Basil and a project, it’s clear that Huva is showing no sign of slowing down in the coming months and that he’s certainly focused on his music

You recently premiered ‘Friend Indeed‘ on District. In the song you detailed frustrations with ‘fake’ friendships, and how people will only call on you when they need you. Has this affected you in your career?

I don’t think I’ve gotten to the stage yet where it’s affected me in my career. It’s been a factor in my life and I think it’s something that I’ve learned from and can now understand better going into my career. I can bring that energy into a track. I can now see what is or isn’t best for me.

The Irish hip-hop scene is bubbling right now, many new artists have risen onto the scene over the last year. Bobby Basil, Kojaque and Luka Palm to name a few of my favourites. Is there a relationship between you all, and can we expect any collaborations with other Irish artists in the near future?

I have a good relationship with Bobby Basil. I’m featured on a track he’s got coming up, and it’s really sick.

I love working with Bobby. I’ve got a track I’m looking to get him featured on. I have a relationship with Luka Palm. I’m not that close with Kojaque, but I think he’s sick and would like to work with him in the future.

I would most definitely love to work with other Irish artists. I don’t want to force anything, but I’m sure that I’ll have more collaborations in the future.

Are you working on any solo projects at the moment?

I’m working on a mixtape at the moment. I’d say it’s about 80 per cent completed right now.

I just have to refine one or two tracks and make the quality better. I’d hope to release it in a round a month or half. It should be out before the start of summer.

The video for your track ‘5AM In Dublin’ was shot on two smartphones. Was the video a challenge you set to see the best kind of video you could make from a low budget.

It wasn’t really much of a challenge. The guy that shot ‘Prize My Soul’ was with me and we were thinking “why not try something different?”. We just said, “let’s shoot it with a mobile phone and see where we can go with this”.

Everything is being done on smartphones so we thought why not shoot a video on one? We shot it with two Samsung phones, we put the Samsung logo in the video in case they see it.

Why did you use imagery of Fela Kuti in the background of your video for ‘Prize My Soul’?

I’m from Nigeria originally. He fought for freedom and used his music to do this also.

His music is a powerful thing. The sample in the beginning of ‘Prize My Soul’ is actually Fela Kuti talking. We were watching a documentary and thought it was perfect so we put it in the track.

Would you draw inspiration from both his music and his human rights efforts?

Yes, most definitely I would. At the end of the day, what he’s talking about and what we’re talking about, it’s what happens. I’m listening to him right now, but he’s been dead for a good while, that just shows the powerful and spiritual his music is. I’m definitely inspired by him.

Do you think that coming from Nigeria to Ireland has influenced both your content and sound in your music?

Yes, first of all, it influences the way my music sounds and the way I sound compared to a typical Irish artist. Nigeria is an English speaking country. Our accents are very different to Irish accents and they’ve been there since we were born.

If I’m talking to my peers I can have the Irish accent. When I’m making music, I like to bring in my Nigerian background to set me apart from other artists. You can hear it from my sound.

What can we expect in the future from HUVA?

Lots more work! The support I’ve been getting is really reassuring, I appreciate every single bit of support I’ve been getting. Especially from you guys, I am very grateful. That alone is reassuring, like okay, “yeah man you’re doing it” and there’s a reason to all of this.