At 44, legendary Kenyan hip-hop artiste Julius Owino, better known by his stage name Juliani, has lived through enough twists and turns to believe that very little can still catch him off-guard. Not even the ideas he once held tightly. Not the unseen energies. Not the countless theories about life. Not even certainty itself.
"Nowadays I am trying to believe less in everything. I try as much as I can to be blank. Every morning when I wake up, I don't want to overthink or stress about life. I just want to be blank. Whatever needs to be done that day, I'll do it, but I no longer want to exhaust my mind worrying about everything. That's the blankness I'm talking about."
It is a philosophy that feels unmistakably Juliani. Long known for weaving deep reflection into his socially and politically conscious lyrics and activism, the rapper now seems even more philosophical in conversation than he is in his music. “The world is always in a hurry. There’s always something that needs to be done. For example, I feel like people always want to put pressure on you in the morning, so, I like to spend time with myself first and set my own intentions for the day before I deal with the world’s problems. My mornings typically aren’t very uneventful. I don’t eat breakfast, and I try not to pick up my phone for as long as I can," he says.
His lifestyle has also not changed. He still prefers simple dressing. Not the flashy clad some of his peers love to rock. The plain T-shirts without logos or designer labels, paired with equally understated outfits, remain his thing.
There is nothing flashy about the man, despite carrying fame on his shoulders for more than two decades.
Though the father of two rarely speaks about it himself, insiders within Kenya's music industry have long regarded Juliani as one of the country's wealthy artistes, a reputation built not on extravagant displays of success, but on quiet discipline, deliberate choices, and a life lived far from the spotlight's excesses.
Born and raised in Dandora, a low-income Nairobi suburb, Juliani often cites his upbringing as inspiration for his music, which focuses on themes of social, spiritual, and political emancipation.
From where he sits, everything explains everything else. “Everyone has a reason they do the things they do. Even Judas had a reason for betraying Jesus—alitaka kuomoka(he wanted to get rich). But we give thanks for Judas, still. Jesus would have never been able to fulfil his destiny had it not been for Judas.”
This is why he goes deep in his music, as he tries to capture and explain every moment whenever he is creating new music. “The thing about my music is that when I put out work, it has to be impactful. It’s more than music for me. The way I write an album is, in a sense, to package the experiences I have gone through in a certain timespan. When I release an album, I’m in a certain state of mind, and I need to feel authentically present in that moment.”
But not every body of work he released has been great, and Juliani is quick to point this out, drawing comparison to life itself, where sometimes things don't just work as one intended. But even in those moments he doesn't count that as a loss. “It’s a simple mentality. Not everything I do works out, and I am always aware of that. But even if it doesn't work out, I can understand processes better, and understand people better. I have the privilege of being able to sit, think, and create more than most people. The least I can do is share my ideas with the world.”
Today, Juliani’s take on the state of the Kenyan music industry is rather an interesting one. Perhaps it's one of the few things that has changed from many years back, when he taunted fellow rappers into a lyrical battle to prove who was Kenyan’s finest MC. “I don’t see a music industry, and even if there is one, I don’t see myself as part of it. People are always trying to do what the rest of the world is running away from. There’s a danger in thinking within the confines of an industry, because it leads to a lot of repetitiveness. You feel that you need to be a certain way to be part of the industry. People then forget that there’s so much else that can be done if they only think beyond themselves and their immediate surroundings,” he says.
Juliani maintains Kenyan musicians need to go deeper for their songs to be impactful, more so in championing social injustice. “There is a need for Kenyan musicians to go deeper if they really want to create impact. They have to think beyond just the commercial aspect and think about society. Right now, citizens are questioning the political leadership, the Church's role, and everything else that feels like social injustice. Kenyans are at a point now where they want to go deeper, and there aren't musicians who want to take them there through deep bars and lyrics that can be reflective of their views. A song is a very powerful tool if you can catch the emotions of many and amplify them. We need to go deeper, and artistes need to be the first ones to set the pace. I tell people every time our street slang—the sheng—that we are so proud of, was heavily influenced by Kalamashaka back in the '90s.
They set the trend, and now corporates use that in their adverts.” But, even then Juliani knows not many of his peers will hear him out because, whereas music is business to them, to him it's more than just that. It's an advocacy tool that he believes can champion a better life for society, and that to him is what matters most.
Growing up in the crime-infested Dandora, Juliani says he never believed he would live past his 25th birthday because, as life would have it for most of his agemates in the neighbourhood, many ended up in criminal gangs and were shot dead while others got into drug abuse and got stuck. “I can tell that I have accomplished more in this life than I ever thought I could achieve. Growing up in Dandora, I never thought I would live past the age of 25. Now, I am years past expiry, and still going for more, because that’s what God has decided. I want to be the most fulfilled version of myself when my time comes,” he says.
Juliani believes he has grown both vertically and horizontally, something he calls "cross-growth." “Understanding your growth helps a lot. It builds your level of confidence and the guts to always trust yourself. I have internalized my own worth, so that it drives my self-confidence. The thing is, you will never be qualified or competent enough if you measure yourself by other people’s standards. If you constantly try to fit in everyone else’s space, you’ll obviously feel less-than, because you’ll be judging yourself based on what other people are doing. I can say, however, the only time I experienced something close to that of feeling lesser was when I joined Ukoo Flani Maumau.”
To understand Juliani’s journey you have first to understand Ukooflani Mau Mau, one of the earliest hip-hop collectives in East Africa, formed in the late 1990s by merging Nairobi's Mau Mau movement (with roots in Dandora) with Ukoo Flani crew from Mombasa. Known as the pioneers of conscious Kenyan rap, they legitimised Swahili and Sheng as powerful languages for social justice and youth empowerment.
Juliani would begin his journey to stardom when he joined the collective while still a teenager, finding himself surrounded by some of the most prolific hip-hop artistes of the time in Dandora — the likes of Kalamashaka, Mashifta and Wenyeji—who were all part of the Ukooflani collective.
Juliani recalls sitting in rooms where these hip-hop greats who came before him would face off in heavy-hitting lyrical bar contests, and in many scenarios there was never one straight cut winner. Those moments are what Juliani remembers as the first time he ever felt intimidated, if not lesser than everybody else. “I don’t know how I even picked up a pen to start writing. Everyone else’s flow at the time seemed complicated and deep. I was young and also going through an identity crisis, trying to find my persona. I started writing the best way I knew how, with punchlines. It’s what I did best,” he says.
That belief and his distinctiveness, instead of wanting to be like every other member in the collective, is what made Juliani stand out and ultimately led him into the movement. “The goal is never to be the king of the world, but to be the king of your own small world, and use that power to negotiate with the rest of the world something I don't through my foundation.”
Perhaps one notable observation that never went unnoticed and had many talking about was how Juliani ended up fostering a close friendship bond with the late Safaricom CEO, Bob Collymore. “He is the man who ever gave me the best advice that I carry to this day. Bob used to say to me, ‘You should always ask why. Ask yourself why you are doing what you are doing. Once you know your why, you will know your true north’. Even when he refused to let me see him while on his deathbed in his last days, it hurt, but I later understood why.”
According to Juliani or Bob, “Everyone has a why.” “Once you understand someone’s why, it helps in conflict resolution, because you’re able to be empathetic to where they are coming from. You’re also able to know where to place them. Everyone has a reason for doing the things they do. Even Judas had a reason for betraying Jesus. Also, remember that people’s why can change,” the artiste says.
Reflecting on fatherhood, he reckons it has changed his perception about life even more. “Being a father affected me more in the grand scheme as a person, rather than just as an artiste. With my children, I am challenged to think beyond my existence. I am more at peace with my current circumstances, as long as I know that my future generation will have everything they need to get ahead in life.”
