If there’s someone who has been consistent in winning for a while now, it has to be him.
After Teargas separated, him and his two friends pursued solo careers.
His not only survived but thrived.
Ntokozo Mdluli, affectionately known as K.O, has risen above all odds in his music career.
When that got into full swing, he diversified his craft and passions by tapping into fashion with his Skhanda World brand.
Now with several international music award nominations coming his way and the summer range of his clothing brand out in retail stores, K.O has one more thing to cross off his winning list.
For a person who’s maintained a private life throughout his career, many did not see it coming.
K.O will be letting the world into his life in a new BET reality show called Inside Life with K.O which he calls a “sneak peek or portal into my life”.
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“The reason why I have been so private around my personal life is that the people that I look up to have played their cards close to their chest.”
Referring to Jay Z, he says that very little is known about him. If anything, only his wife, kids and some friends are known but no one really knows his siblings or how he lives life on a day-to-day basis.
“That mystic has made him who he’s become but I think it would probably go a long way for people to learn a bit more about the human being; right now, all we know is this icon. So, I’m just trying to avoid a situation where the window ends up closing for people to know the real me outside of just the talent,” he says.
The award-winning musician hopes to appeal as an investment to not only his supporters but the rest of the world with this show. For him, oversharing on social media without the prospects of monetising on it wasn’t what he wanted to go for.
With everything in his life falling into place as it is, there couldn’t have been a better time to open the door to the life of Ntokozo Mdluli.
Last year when he dropped his SR3 album and the hit song Sete, his impact shifted levels up. To everything else that followed, he says, “they exceeded my own expectations”.
Speaking to Drum at his recent fashion show, he admits that so many things have been happening in his life which he’s grateful for.
“There are so many things that are happening in my life right now and I’m grateful but extremely busy at the same time and they’re all just happening in one go. I feel like I need a stunt double to be present for some of these other commitments. Even now I’m about to open my own store, it’s launching in a month, and I need to physically be there to see that through.”
At the time, he was also traveling to Atlanta for the BET Hip-Hop awards and preparing to not only drop his song, Thatha, but the music video to it in a couple of days’ time.
“For the first time in my life, I’ve kept my cards close to my chest because I just wanted to sustain my content and now, I’m at a point where I can share that with the world. I’m happy and comfortable now in succeeding and tripping and falling in front of the public because I’ve done so much now that even if I stumble and fall, it takes nothing away from my legacy.
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“I’m just letting people learn a little bit more about the man, the human being that I am outside of being the talent that I am. Also, people will get to appreciate the human side of me and what I strive to do for others more than I do for others. They’re going to learn so much about me and the people around me who I really appreciate for the different roles that they’ve played in helping me get to this point,” the Soweto-born musician tells Drum.
He adds that the family-oriented man in him comes out often in the show and even though he would’ve loved all his close people to be a part of the show, it wasn’t all possible.
“Unfortunately, my siblings have things that are going on in their own lives, for instance my brother is a chartered accountant and I literally battled to put him in front of the camera, and I had to respect why he wasn’t keen to do it because he deals with a lot of government clients.”
Even so, everyone will get to see how his relationship with his parents, siblings and friends from 18 October 2023 when the first episode of the show airs.
