The cover of Olamide’s new album is a painting of Olamide. He sits bare-chested in grey paint, locs down past his shoulders and arms folded, on a red canvas crowded with handwriting and small drawings: an hourglass, a yellow bus, a rocket, a crown, the words “Genius Child” and a Bible reference, Proverbs 18:16. In the bottom corner it is signed “Alagemo,” with a 16 underneath. He shared it last night with the tracklist for Time & Space.
Alagemo is the other Olamide. On September 25 he opened an Instagram page for his paintings, @alagemomerindinlogun, after the sixteen principal Alagemo of Ijebu land, whom he has been painting there, and he introduced it with a joke at his own expense: “I got tired of waiting for Baddo to complete his project, so I’m now working with this guy,” he wrote. Less than seven weeks later, Baddo’s project has a cover, and the painter made it.
A clip of the painting taking shape starts with a pencil sketch of his face on paper, moves to the same face blocked out in grey on canvas, and pulls back to a studio with easels along the walls and a red canvas waiting.
When he put up the yellow-and-black art for Lagos Nawa in 2017, his post ended with “art by @mojarzido.”
The tracklist is ten songs long, and one other voice is on it. FOLA sings on “Jaiye,” track seven. Lagos Nawa had 17 songs and room for Tiwa Savage, Phyno, Reminisce and Timaya. Last year’s Olamidé had two songs with Wizkid, two with Seyi Vibez, and Popcaan, Dr. Dre, Asake and Boj on the rest. Even in 2020, when he said he “had no plans on featuring anyone” on Carpe Diem, the finished album still had Bad Boy Timz, Phyno, Omah Lay and Fireboy on it. “If I’m going to do anything with anybody, we really have to connect, the person gast be my G,” he said that November.
FOLA is the one he let in this time, and he has spent 2026 near the top of Nigerian charts. “B4 B4,” with Davido and Mayorkun, held No. 1 on the Official Nigeria Top 100 for six weeks, and his own “miss u ii (nriri)” went to No. 1 on that chart in its first full week before topping Nigerian radio too.
“Burukutu,” the one song already out, is track four, and it entered the Official Nigeria Top 100 at No. 9.
Proverbs 18:16 is the verse that says a man’s gift makes room for him. Olamide painted the reference beside his own face, then signed the canvas with his other name.