Nigerian singer, Divine Ikubor, popularly known as Rema, on Thursday clarified the motive for his rebranding in the build-up to the release of his sophomore album, ‘HEIS,’ last year.

Speaking on the one year anniversary of his sophomore album, Rema clarified that his rebranding, including smoking, was just an expression of art and not a betrayal of his personality as many presumed.

He explained that the controversial album cover was inspired by Japanese anime series Naruto character, Itachi Uchiha.

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On his X handle, he wrote, “HEIS, the Anniversary.

“I expressed a lot of surface-level reasons why I released this project over a course of interviews when it came out but, here are a few “SYMBOLIC” details that wrap around the ENERGY of the project I kept for myself but now, I’d like to share.

“Consider this an Author’s note;

“The cover was inspired by Itachi in Naruto. The Truth masked as illusion, Love buried under what y’all thought was betrayal ( change of sound, smoking , looks, aesthetics & choice of color ).”