When was ‘Essence’ released? Kanye West calls Wizkid’s track ‘best song in the history of music’

American rapper Kanye West heaped praise onto Nigerian singer Wizkid's song, Essence, and dubbed it the "best song in the history of music."

On September 4, the 45-year-old rapper took to his Instagram to share a screenshot of the 32-year-old singer's song and complimented it. Several followers of Kanye West as well as fans of the song hailed the rapper's words in the post's comment section.

As fans flooded the comments section with fire emojis, the artist, Freak P and Nigerian music producer Kelvin Boj also commented on the post. Boj said:

"Afrobeats to the world and we just getting started."

Naomi Campbell also commented on Kanye West's post with several red hearts and fire emojis and wrote:

"YES !!!! THANK YOU AT @kanyewest @wizkidayo @tems."

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Kanye West's praised Essence, which was recorded during the lockdown period

Essence, which is sung by Wizkid and Tems, came out on October 30, 2020. It had been in production throughout the lockdown amidst the coronavirus pandemic.

While speaking to Rolling Stone in August 2021 Wizkid recalled working on his album. He said that his manager Jada Pollock and production manager Mutay Oniko came up with the sound of the music.

The singer, whose real name is Ayodeji Ibrahim Balogun, said:

"I remember that day. I had like six producers in the room. I was recording the last song on the album, and, yeah, Tems came in the room, we made [“Essence”] together. It was just easy, man. She’s got an amazing voice. Everything is special about Tems. Everything."

In 2021, another version of Essence was released which featured Justin Bieber. In the same interview, Tay James, Bieber's personal A&R and a DJ, revealed how quickly the collaborated-music process took place.

Tay said:

"[Bieber] heard it on a Thursday, and by Monday it was cut. When we got back to the studio on Monday, me and Josh [Gudwin, Bieber’s engineer] got the instrumental from Wizkid’s people, and Bieber wrote his verse and cut it right then and there.

James added:

It was just nice how it came together; when you hear something, and then you just see it connects with somebody. It inspired him to write the song himself. He went in there and knocked it out in a day. Less than a couple of hours, it was done."

Essence happens to be a song from Wizkid's fourth studio album, Made In Lagos. The song has been a hit across several music platforms, with 322 million streams being recorded on Apple Music.

Wizkid's album became the first African album to take place on the US Spotify Global Album Chart. Essence got a Grammy nomination in the Best Global Song category in 2022 Grammy Awards, and the album received a World Album Category nomination

Meanwhile, Kanye West has been making headlines once again for posting controversial text screenshots from his private life, on his Instagram handle.