Apple Music today announced rising Afro-urban contemporary duo Ajebo Hustlers as the first artist to be featured in Nigeria’s local Up Next program, Apple Music’s artist initiative geared towards identifying and showcasing rising talent.

Ajebo Hustlers are rapper George Dandeson (aka Knowledge), and singer Isaiah Precious (aka Piego) whose unique blend of Afrobeat, highlife and street slang was developed growing up in Old GRA, Port Harcourt in Nigeria.

After dropping their first single in 2015, it was only in 2020 that the duo broke onto the scene with “Barawo”, a song that became an unofficial anthem in response to Nigeria’s End SARS protests, attracting the attention of Afrobeat giant, Davido, who they teamed up with to release a smash hit remix.

“All we can say is dreams actually come through, we have been putting in work for sometime now and there’s no better joy than seeing all our hard work become success stories. We really don’t think we have been this excited before! First cover star for first UP NEXT: Nigeria Artist? Wake us up please. We have seen other Up Next Artists from other places and we are super excited to have it now for Nigerian artists. It’s time to take this music to the world.”

Ajebo Hustlers’ latest single “Pronto” featuring Omah Lay is featured on Apple Music’s Afrobeats Hits and Sub-Saharan Africa Honours Black Music playlists.

Ajebo Hustlers will be featured across Apple Music’s Nigeria Up Next playlist https://apple.co/3iUvGoP. The curated Up Next playlist features a dynamic class of new and emerging artists, thoughtfully hand-picked by Apple Music editors from around the world.The playlist is genre agnostic and represents a line-up of artists their global editors are passionate about and eager to expose to a larger audience.

The vast global Up Next roster of past talent includes Grammy-nominated and critically lauded talent like 6lack, Daniel Caesar, H.E.R., Greta Van Fleet, Khalid, Amy Shark, Billie Eilish, Sabrina Claudio, Sigrid, Mr Eazi, Stefflon Don, Bad Bunny, Juice WLRD, Bazzi, Jax Jones, NCT 127, Summer Walker, Tierra Whack, Dean Lewis, Pink Sweat$, Koffee, Megan Thee Stallion, Burna Boy, Clairo, Lunay, Jessie Reyez, Orville Peck, Victoria Monét, Ingrid Andress, Conan Gray, Don Toliver, Rema, BENEE, Holly Humberstone, Natanael Cano, Givēon, beabadoobee, Arlo Parks, Tate McRae and Foushee.