Shoday Recounts Selling Noodles, Borrowing iPhones Before Music Success

Ace Nigerian singer Shoday has revealed the struggles he faced before finding success in music, revealing that he relied on borrowed iPhones to create social media content and later sold noodles and performed comedy to save enough money to buy his own device.

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The 26-year-old, whose real name is Shodade Segun, shared his experience during a guest appearance on the OkayAfrica podcast.

He said he realised early that producing quality videos was important for gaining visibility on social media and believed iPhones gave creators an advantage at the time.

“As at that time, there were a couple of my friends that were into fraud. So, they had iPhones. If you’re doing skits or content at that time and you’re not using an iPhone, you’re using Android, there’s a way Android used to lag behind when you’re editing. The video won’t come out nice,” he said.

“From the onset, I kind of understood the algorithm. A quality video can easily fly more than just making a random video and expecting it to blow.”

Shoday said he frequently borrowed phones from friends until he decided he needed to own one himself.

“Most times, I would go to their place and borrow their phone. It got to one point that I wasn’t comfortable with it again. I needed to get my own phone,” he said.

“Then I started hustling. I started doing comedy. I would do performances at night.”

During the day, he worked as a noodles salesperson, moving from one street to another to persuade customers to buy the product.

“In the afternoon, I used to engage in one job, which was a noodles job. We would be like 10 people inside a truck, then they would split us into different streets,” he said.

“You’ll now be convincing people to buy it. The noodles might not even be sweet to you, but you’ll convince them to buy it. It’s not Indomie; it’s noodles. You know Nigerians, every noodle is Indomie.”

Shoday, who studied Building Technology at Yaba College of Technology before pursuing music full time, first gained attention as a content creator before breaking into the music industry with songs such as ‘Caution’ and ‘Dey 4 You’. In 2026, he scored his first number one song on the Official Nigeria Top 100 with Paparazzi’, a collaboration with FOLA, further establishing himself as one of the country’s emerging Afrobeats acts.