Tribute
By Uche Nwokedi, SAN
I recently read two tributes to Paul Alade, my good friend from St. Gregory’s College who humbly submitted to the virulent scourge of COVID-19 in faraway New Jersey, USA, that has brought the whole world to a standstill.
The tributes by Dapo Olumide and John Obomanu made one understand that when a childhood or old school friend dies, a part of your adventures and escapades with that person, dies with him. Reading those two tributes, I felt a sense of loss and a tinge of guilt. Loss, because Paul was a rare human being and a great talent. Guilt, because I had not seen Paul for about 40 odd years and that made his death more poignant.
You ask yourself, where did the years go, and when did they go? And that is the thing. I should have reached out to him before now, but we are always so consumed by the demands of our daily pursuit. We always think that we still have time to do those small things, such as reach out to old friends.
And so, we put it off until the next time so that we can have more time to chat. But then procrastination remains a consistent thief of time. It keeps stealing whatever time you have set aside to do that, which you ought to have done today, and you never quite get to that next time. Now that the world has been brought to a grinding halt by this apocalyptic scourge, and all we have is time, the things we had set aside to do now we have time have been overtaken by uncertainty and stillness of time.
The word “Ofege” was originally a term we met at St. Gregory’s College, which meant to “skive” or “cut classes”. Ofege was for the rascals or pranksters who were always cutting classes. Then, Paul Alade, Ikechukwu Meme and Ukachi Anokuru a.k.a Melvin, formed their band and called it Ofege, together with Dapo Olumide, Felix Inneh and Emmanuel Ijeh. (Soga Benson joined much later). It was the birth of a musical revolution that has endured and remained evergreen. To start with they were junior boys, who at the time did not even qualify to play at school events such as the annual School Dance, or the Literary and Debating Society social events where the senior boys would be vying for the attention of the girls from Holy Child College and other girls’ schools in Lagos.
Ofege was not the best band in the school at the time, nor were they initially considered the most gifted musicians. It was a period in our lives when musicianship was judged by how well you copied or rendered songs by Rare Earth, Carlos Santana, Sly and the family Stone and Jimi Hendrix.
Most boys wanted to play the guitar like Jimi Hendrix or Carlos Santana, and some did so successfully. Ofege, however were outliers. They were original and composed their own songs. In time, they created their own distinctive sound and style of vocals, that we came to know simply as “Ofege”.
And more importantly they were the first band to record their music and release an album. Band. To this day, I have all their songs and play them from time to time. Interestingly, we had a gateman at Gregs then whom we called Papa. Papa was a great high-life and folk guitarist, and would sit at the gate in the evenings with his guitar and just play through most of the night. He was there to make sure we did not sneak out. Most times we just jumped the wall anyway.
However, any time we tried to sneak out through the gate, Papa, without missing a beat would just chime in, “don’t try it’, Principal says, “don’t do it” and continue playing his guitar. I remember seeing Paul and Melvin sitting at the gate with Papa in the evenings, with their own guitars, so that they could play with Papa and maybe learn his style of strumming the guitar.
Paul Alade was at the centre of the creative core that made Ofege a hit, and the phenomenon that it is today. He was actually an excellent guitarist and started out with the guitar but when they could not find a bass guitarist that would fit into the style they were developing, Paul took up the bass and basically subsumed his first instrument, the guitar so that Ofege could go on to the next stage.
He became extremely good at that and though he was shy and self-effacing, he started to come into his own by the time they released their next album, the Last of the Origins, as the deep baritone of his voice came into play when he opened the vocals of “Sorrow”. Ofege went on to be one of the most successful bands in Nigeria and this was before they sat their O’levels.
Paul was kind and generous. He welcomed us into his home on Ajasa street, Onikan, Lagos, and his parents were ever so accommodating of us. His house became our weekend joint as we converged there at weekends. He was also quite open to other music. I remember that he would make us sit and listen to little known music to us at the time such as “Horse with No Name” by America, and “Remember the Future” by Nektar. He was rare like that. He was an old soul and never ever got into any altercations or contention with anyone, and somehow maintained a balance between the volatile and exuberant creativity of Ikechukwu Meme the drummer, and the stubborn visionary aspiration of Melvin. In fact, he deftly and quietly managed and held the competing creative aspirations of the band so much that Meme fondly nicknamed him “Ogbo” (old man or sage), and we started calling him Ogbo.
Paul, Meme and Melvin played the Mass in the Chapel on Sundays, and would often test the patience of our Chaplain, Rev. Fr. O’Connell by playing up-tempo and funky beats of popular songs immediately after mass so that as we filed out of the College Chapel, we would be humming the songs, to the annoyance of Fr. O’Connell. But then it was to Ofege that Fr. O’Connell turned in 1974/75, when he needed music for the very first Operetta ever performed in Lagos then, which was Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. They delivered in good form. It was the first time the Operetta was being performed in Nigeria, and maybe anywhere in Africa, and it was Ofege that scored and provided the music.
In time, Ofege became the defining alter ego of every Gregorian. It represented our ability to aspire and achieve. It spoke to friendships and bonds, and continues to do so. As the good book says, “it is appointed unto man to die but once and after that comes judgment”.
Paul ran a very good race in life. His unpredictable and unexpected death due to COVID-19 has touched each and every one of us, as we all now desperately maintain a polite distance from our friends, neighbours and business associates. The current situation impresses on us that “the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein”. I pray for the repose of the soul of Paul, that the Good Lord may receive him, and bless his family with health and the strength to bear this loss.
Rest in Peace Paul. Up Gregs Forever
F.A
July 1, 2024
Tags: The Essence of Ofege
