Own Africavision Song Contest 12: Confirmations

Mutiat Yewande Isola, professionally known as Wande, is a Nigerian American Christian hip hop artist, actress and former journalist and A&R administrator from Austin, Texas, United States. She signed to the Christian hip hop label Reach Records in 2019, where she had worked as an A&R administrator. Prior to that, as an independent artist, from 2013 through 2018 she released multiple singles and made numerous featured appearances on various songs, as well as worked as a music journalist. She is the first woman signed to Reach. Her debut extended play (EP), Exit, was released on April 24, 2020, followed by a mini-EP The Decision on December 4, 2020.

Wande was born in Nigeria but raised in Round Rock and then Austin, Texas, United States.[3][2] In addition to English, she is fluent in Yoruba.[3] Most of her family was Muslim, except for her mother, who was Christian.[2][4] At first she was not allowed to go to church, and then started having to get up at 5 A.M. to read the Bible and go with her mother to work so that she could get picked up to go to church.[5] Wande said in April 2020 that she used to joke "that I'd go to Mosque and church".[4] Her curiosity about God led her to search on the internet for Christian rap, and the first result to come up was the 2006 song "Prayin' for You" by Lecrae.[4] In sixth grade, she started playing the flute and studied music through junior high school.[4] She converted to Christianity in seventh grade while interning at a camp in 2009 in Columbus, Texas, a decision for which she encountered opposition from within her family.[2][4][6] While at the camp, she also saw a performance by the Christian hip hop collective 116 Clique, which at that time consisted of Lecrae, Trip Lee, Tedashii, and Sho Baraka.[4]