We were bursting our brains about the next artist to bring to your memory and then it struck! Zule zoo!
Zule Zoo is a music group made up of 2 guys from Benue State. These guys are Micheal Aboh and Al-Hassan Ibrahim.
The two artistes who hail from different homes for ages were united by fate. The two who have a striking resemblance have been addressed as twins on several occasions. In a bid to clear this one of them said “We are not twins but we have been very close to each other from our childhood days at school.” They are just friends.
How did Zule Zoo start?
Ibrahim Alhassan and Mike came to Lagos in 1996 to attend an audition for the National Troupe of Nigeria which left them disappointed.
“After the NTN’s audition, I had no fare to go back to Benue State, so I decided to stay back and sweat it out with life. There and then, I started working hard to ensure that I realise my ambition to become a star in my lifetime. About that time, Mike who went back to Benue immediately after the audition later returned to join me and that was when we started researching on how to actualise our dream as we later came up with the name, Zule-Zoo, meaning ‘Forgotten warriors never die’,” explained Ibrahim Alhassanin an interview.
Their music career almost ended as soon as it began because their debut song ‘Kerewa” was banned by the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation when it came out in March 2006. Instead of silencing them, the ban actually helped promoting their album, entitled ‘Banned In Nigeria’, which became a nation-wide hit. After a while the song was “un-banned” by the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation.
Micheal Aboh and Al-Hassan Ibrahim (the Zule Zoo brothers) have long shelved their music aspirations and moved on to other events that offer them human satisfaction.
Download one of their songs here: