Inetimi Alfred Odon was born on November 29, 1977, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State. He grew up in a very large family. Now he is better known by his stage name Timaya. In fact, he was the youngest of fifteen children in his family. His father worked as a banker and his mother was a trader.
For his early education, Odon attended Assemblies of God Nursery and Primary School. As for secondary school, his parents chose Nkpolu Oroworukwo for Timaya to attend. The school was also located in Port Harcourt. As a little boy, Timaya often broke family rules and attended late-night music events. Before Timaya’s graduation, his mom let him, his older brother and sister travel to Lagos. Timaya loved the city and after moving out, he gained admission into Lagos’ Ikeja Grammar School.
This was where he obtained his secondary school certificate. Later on, Timaya returned to Port Harcourt and started to become a Banking and Finance major. But he failed his exams and could not finish his studies. Timaya dropped out after his first semester and went to pursue his dream. He moved back to Lagos and joined Eedris Abdulkareem’s hip-hop group. He was just a backup vocalist, but those three years working for Eedris gave him a lot.
He gained valuable experience and learned how to compose good music. Top most interesting facts about Humblesmith The start of music career At that time, he decided to leave the group and focus on his solo career. He began to feel that he wanted to become something bigger than just a backup singer. He wanted everyone to hear his voice and not someone else’s.
He decided to come out of his shade and began to record and collaborate with fellow up-and-coming artists. His first cameo appearance was in a Lagos-based rap group, called UDX.’s musical video. It was at this time that he unexpectedly met producer K-Solo in Mafoluku, Oshodi. Later, this producer helped Timaya record his first major hit “Dem Mama”.
The producer K-Solo, describing the song in an interview posted on August 2013, said that “Dem Mama” was an account of the 1999 destruction of Odi. This is a river side community in Niger Delta. Soldiers at that time were hunting down militants and they were suspected of killing eight policemen. The village got burnt down and numerous people got killed or just lost.
Interesting facts from Harrysong`s biography fans should know After the huge success of “Dem Mama”, Timaya decided to accept K-Solo’s offer and worked with him on seven more hits. For his first album “True Story”, he recorded seven different songs and released it in 2007. Not long after, Timaya started to work right away on his second album with well-known producers Phyno, Jeggs, Akeem D Beat, K-Solo, Spankie, and Terry G.
