To judge Ghanaian pop solely by its capacity to ignite dance is to misunderstand its deeper economy. It encourages a shallow archive where, years later, artists who scored hits with limp lyricism, or subjected us to the persistent horrors of their permanent horniness, however effective it proved on kakalika tempo, return to demand reverence as cultural elders. 

Thank the gods that Black Sherif, an actual form-expanding singer and looming force since his teenage years, seems unafflicted by that particular condition. Still, discourse around his recent releases has turned sceptical in places, framed by claims that the combustible passion of his early breakout, which saw him rework hip-hop intensity through a highlife-inflected lens on 'First Sermon' and 'Second Sermon', has faded. 

But that reading reveals how Ghanaian pop is often heard in compressed form. It also overlooks the point that the 24-year-old, already a two-time winner of Ghana's most coveted music prize (the youngest to do so) and a Mugabe of music charts in these parts, has never really abandoned his fluid, familiar frame. 

Whatever his sonic shifts or reconfigured expressions have been over the years, Black Sherif has remained in constant dialogue with highlife and its spirit, which anchors his sound. His sophomore album, Iron Boy, makes this lineage explicit, beginning with its titular tribute to Amakye Dede and extending through strings, vocal choices, and a scribal awareness of tradition.

'Popstar', which ushered in his latest burst, reveals these elements on attentive listening, as does the entrancing 'SWAGGA', which deliberately resists being flattened into dancefloor function. To follow this incarnation of Black Sherif, one must listen with the head as much as the feet. This is work that insists on being followed over time, where meaning accrues through return listening rather than first-contact impact. His core fans already do, after all, his music is structured for duration. So will anyone be willing to listen closely? 

This new Black Sherif is adjusting to the terms of his own relevance. There is less of the raw street voltage that marked his earlier emergence, but he remains firmly within the emotional register that made him essential in the first place - reflective, heavy, and unflinchingly honest. The music may have shed the unvarnished edge of five years ago, yet it still holds its place as a soundtrack for introspection and, in its own way, an antidote to depression. 

Also, if, for some reason, you need reminding, "we be the geniuses / please, please, I'm serious," he offers on 'SWAGGA'. Other lines from the track feel like fragments of a cypher for this current moment: 

A prophecy unfolding
A closet full of self-belief
Built on the self-doubt of earlier days

His latest surprise drop, 'Find A Way', co-produced with regular collaborators Joker Nharnah and Samsney and structured around return motifs, is a bright, assured, forward-moving horn-led affirmation…something like a post-match anthem, and released just in time for this year's FIFA World Cup. In its own way, the track distils its author's artistic journey as a loop that returns to the promise of always "finding a way home." 

It is the old story of art, and of those we call geniuses.