Burna Boy received a BPI silver certification after surpassing 200 000 units in sales with his hit single ‘City Boy’. The song, taken from his seventh album I Told Them, adds to previous BPI certifications, including platinum plaques for ‘Last Last’ and ‘Ye’, gold plaques for ‘On The Low’ and ‘For My Hand’ featuring Ed Sheeran, and silver plaques for ‘Real Life’ featuring Stormzy, ‘Anybody’ and ‘Gbona’.
‘City Boy’, one of the projects that powered Burna Boy to four Grammy nods ahead of the main event on 5 February, peaked at No 14 on the UK Singles Chart and No 1 on the UK Afrobeats Chart.
On his part, Davido also earned silver certification for ‘Unavailable’ featuring South African act Musa Keys after crossing 200,000 units in sales. Taken off his latest album Timeless, the record quickly accrued viral and commercial success, charting on both the UK Singles Chart and the UK Afrobeats Chart.
Like ‘City Boy’, ‘Unavailable’ has been shortlisted in the newly introduced Best African Song Performance at the upcoming Grammys.
Burna Boy and Davido are among artists credited with spearheading the global explosion of the Afrobeats genre which, according to Spotify, has increased by 550% since 2017 and was streamed more than 13 billion times on the digital streaming platform last year. The pair is also behind regular international tours, with the UK as a fixture. Last year, Burna Boy captured global headlines for hosting a concert at the London Stadium, while Davido returns to the O2 Arena, also in London, later this month.