Let’s talk about Zainab Elizabeth Donli, better known as Lady Donli; the multi hyphenate woman turning Afrobeats and Afropunk inside out. Born in Cleveland, raised in Abuja and Kaduna, and armed with a law degree from the University of Surrey, she didn’t just swap legal briefs for beats, she rewrote the whole rulebook in Lagos’s Alté scene.

Musically, Lady Donli doesn’t follow. She blends. Think alt-jazz, Afrobeat, psychedelic funk, soul, R&B, highlife, even rock, all stirred into a bold sonic gumbo that’s unmistakably hers. On Pan African Rockstar, she samples Davido with rock guitars on “Comme Ci Comme Ça,” fuses trap-ad libs with rock in “The Bad Ones,” and moves from Congolese rumba to electronic funk on “SAID,” all while weaving in political commentary on tracks like “Nothing2Something” and “Industreets”.

Behind the mic, though? She’s the architect. Lady Donli writes, produces (Enjoy Your Life, 2019), executive produces (The Cavemen’s Roots), directs art, scouts talent, her Instagram bio reads like “manager, creative director, exec producer, A&R, accountant” and she dropped that with the kind of exhausted pride only someone who built it themselves could muster.

She even lent her production savvy to Beyoncé, overseeing live music sessions for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever alongside Ludwig Göransson. Oh, and she did it all after law school, because why not?

Lady Donli is more than a genre artist: she’s a movement. Law graduate turned Afropunk pioneer, she’s carving spaces for introspection, culture, and unapologetic joy. That’s Afrobeats redefined.

Photo: The Guardian NG, Lady Donli/Soundcloud