Tems | Before They Were Famous | Rising Star of Afrobeats

Before becoming a part of the next wave of Afrobeat hitmakers, the
artist known as Tems was born Temilade Openiyi on June 11th, 1995
in Lagos, Nigeria. With her father being British Nigerian, Tems and
her family moved to London when she was still just a baby. Still,
they’d return to Nigeria some four years later where her parents
got divorced shortly thereafter. From that point forward, Tems was
raised alongside her brother, Tunji, by their mother in the
neighborhood in a tiny one-bedroom apartment. On Sunday everyone
would attend the same local church and everyone in their community
always seemed to know everyone else. With Lagos being such a big
city and Tems having a quiet demeanor, she often felt alone in the
midst of the sprawling capital and so she began writing poetry as a
means to deal with her complicated emotions