Sarkodie has confirmed producer Hammer’s account of the phone call that brought him into the studio as a young rapper from Tema. Writing in a post on X on Friday, 6 November, the rapper said the first call from Hammer “changed everything”, and that he had no idea how he would get from Tema to Accra, but “not going was never an option.”
His post quoted a clip from the latest episode of the Konnected Minds Podcast, in which host Derrick Abaitey sits down with Hammer, the producer and founder of The Last Two whose credits include work with Obrafour, Tinny, Kwaw Kese and Edem. Sarkodie closed his reply with a simple line: “And the rest, as they say, is history.”
How Hammer tells it
In the interview, Hammer explains that he first heard Sarkodie rapping on Adom FM and was struck by his wordplay. “Sark is the only one that I called,” he says, as reported by GhanaWeb. “He’s a full package. He just needed somebody like a coach.”
Hammer recalls phoning in to the show and letting slip that he might work with the young rapper. When the presenter asked whether he was a sound engineer, he identified himself, and, in his words, “It was pandemonium.” He says he quietly hung up, called Sarkodie later, and the rapper came to the studio.
Sarkodie’s post, which GhanaWeb and News Ghana also picked up, lines up with that version of events and puts the start of one of Ghanaian rap’s biggest careers down to a single phone call.
Bread, not hits
The wider conversation, titled “Why I Built My House From Selling Bread, Not Hit Records”, goes beyond Sarkodie. Hammer tells Abaitey that his money came from business rather than music. “Music didn’t get me there. It was bread that got me there,” he says, according to GhanaWeb.
For Sarkodie, the confirmation arrives during a busy stretch as he heads towards his Rapperholic UK show at London’s O2 Arena. His public nod to Hammer gives fans a rare first-hand look at where his story began.
Did you know Hammer gave Sarkodie his first big studio break? Tell us your favourite early Sarkodie track in the comments.
