The changing ‘faces’ of Big Ghun

With nothing much to do after completing Senior High School in 2013, rapper and now social media influencer, Big Ghun fell on social media platform Twitter to entertain and help him while away the time.

The platform was his go to place to release tension and have fun while engaging others in the space on trending issues.

However, that idea of just having fun gradually changed when Big Ghun, together with a group of friends formed the Pressure Bois, a movement on Twitter to initiate trends and make the platform more interesting at the time.

That story would later change, thanks to comedian DKB, whose online banter with the Pressure Bois after picking on one of its members, went viral and catapulted the group from near obscurity to prominence.The leap turned out to be the beginning of the different ‘faces’ of Big Ghun, as he kickstarted his showbiz journey.

In a one on one conversation with Graphic Showbiz at the Base Lounge, located at Cantonments in Accra recently, the old student of Manya Krobo Senior High School went down memory lane to about eight years ago when it all began for him.

“From the start, it was just to flex as a ‘boys boys’ fraternity where we take pictures and upload them on our pages. We were all out of secondary school at the time and had lots of time so it was keeping us busy.

“Before we knew it, what started as a means to kill our boredom grew big with our followers increasing. We capitalised on the huge numbers to set the trends on Twitter, which was the only interest at the time.

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“Along the line, people saw business potential in us and in whatever was going on. Big companies started calling us to promote their works. The likes of Ashfoam, GhOne and Media General employed our services at the time.

“The politicians and political parties, including the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC), also contacted us to run promos for them. We were so young but we were making so much money at that time. Though we didn’t have the mindset to make money at the initial stages, it ended up that way,” he stated.

Big Ghun has a fashion collection known as Urban Fusion

It’s been almost a decade and Big Ghun, whose real name is Nicholas Tetteh Nartey, is making headway in the entertainment industry wearing different shoes as a musician, director, producer, social media influencer and entrepreneur.

The graduate of the National Film and Television Institute (NAFTI)’s career in music began in Senior High School when he started recording demos as a member of a rap group called Young Khalibenz.
 
He gave professional music a shot in 2019 and got signed on to Hiplife artiste TiC’s TNR Music the next year. He released a number of songs including Walk Off featuring TiC and Bombastic with Zeal of VVIP fame.

“I was doing music but not professionally until I met TiC through the online marketing that I was doing. He was a client I promoted and through that he got to know that I could also rap and listened to some of my works.
 
“He suggested the change of name from Kobby Stone to Big Ghun to differentiate my brand as a social media influencer from being an artiste. The idea was to kill my past since it would have been confusing for people to identify me as social media marketer and a musician in the next moment.

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“But that change has been both negative and positive. Positive in the sense that I quickly got new followers but I also lost a lot of my previous links and my old followers because I changed everything about me online to Big Ghun,” he said.

With a number of young artistes calling out for attention with a lot of hype, Big Ghun, who is currently promoting his latest song Hwan Boy Nie told Graphic Showbiz that his colleagues should not settle for less.

According to him, music has become competitive globally and as such Ghanaian artistes should do music to appeal to global audiences.

“The penchant to be complacent or feel on top of the world is high when you don’t explore beyond Ghana. Unfortunately, that is the problem of Ghanaian artistes, we are limited to Ghana leaving the many opportunities outside,” he stated.

Projecting his brand as a bourgeois, Big Ghun who’s also known as ‘Small boy sugar daddy’ is the Managing Director of PB Studios Africa Company Limited, a production outfit with specialisation in TV commercials, TV shows, movies, documentaries and animations.

He made his entry into the Ghana film industry when he premiered a television show known as LivingFields Agri Challenge. The first season of the 13-episode show aired on Citi TV between February and June 2020.

Born to Martin Tettey Nartey and Regina Nartey, Big Ghun was raised in Koforidua in the Eastern Region of Ghana and has a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Film Directing from the National Film and Television Institute (NAFTI) where he graduated in 2019.

Known for songs such as Oh Yeah and Steady, the artiste, who is currently working on a new Extended Play, Fame, was honoured at the maiden edition of the Ghana Tertiary Awards in 2018 for his contribution to the music industry as a student.

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He has worked with Radio Univers and Rainbow Radio as a producer as well as being a regular panellist on TV3’s New Day. He later handled a segment on the show called What’s Trending?

In concluding, he encouraged young people to explore the possibilities in the industry. “The industry is big to embrace everyone. You just need to stay true to yourself and find your purpose,” he added.