Otile Brown’s journey from laptop thief to continental star

There’s no doubt that Jacob Otieno Obunga, alias Otile Brown, is among the the most sought after artists not only in Kenya but the East African region as well.

In no time, the Alivyonipenda hitmaker will be giving Wafasi artists a run for their money. Maybe he won’t but what I’m sure of is that he is a force to reckon with.

But he didn’t start from the top. Before he became a household name, Otile Brown was just a kawaida artist who would visit radio stations with his songs on a compact disk and beg for airplay.

Of course, just like most upcoming artists he would be told to drop the cd in some box at the reception (most media houses have them) and that would be the end of that story. Zero airplay.

That was long before he met and Vera Sirika – a relationship that would propel his music career to greater heights.

There’s no denying the fact that he is a talented singer. However, Otile needed people to notice him and he knew to well that dating a controversial socialite would get him there so he did the needful.

I met Otile Brown when he was still signed under Dreamland Music. At the time, he had just released a collabo with King Kaka. I introduced myself as a journalist from this big media house and we ended up exchanging contacts since I had asked if I could interview him someday.

He came to our offices almost three weeks later and we did the interview. Truth is, it was not that interesting so it did not get much traction. People love controversy and that interview was anything but that. It was on the borderline of boring.

After sometime, I’m not sure how long it was, I heard that he had left his stable after falling out with Dr Eddie so I reached out to him to get his side of the story but he didn’t want to talk about it so I let him be.

Some months down the line, someone alleged that he had stolen a laptop. So, I called him to shed light on the matter but instead he bashed me for only seeking when there’s a bad story about him. He also accused me of not picking his calls and a bunch of other things.

Listen to the audio below.

In March 2018, reports emerged that Otile was dating Vera Sirika and I thought to myself, “this man has finally figured it out.” I tried calling him around November after he had ended things with the socialite and his manager Noriega informed me that Otile was no longer doing interviews. I don’t think he has done any in the last two years.

His relationship with the curvy socialite ensured he would be on people’s minds for a long time to come and that’s what I call a win. These days, when Otile releases a song it will definitely go viral however good or bad it is.