Genesis Owusu

Kofi Owusu-Ansah (born 1998), known by his stage name Genesis Owusu, is a Ghanaian-Australian rapper and singer from Canberra. He is the younger brother of fellow hip hop rapper, Kojo Owusu-Ansah p.k.a. Citizen Kay. Owusu's debut studio album, Smiling with No Teeth (March 2021), reached the ARIA Albums Chart top 30. At the 2021 ARIA Music Awards he won four trophies for Album of the Year, Best Hip Hop Release, Best Independent Release and Best Cover Art (latter shared with Bailey Howard).

Genesis Owusu was born Kofi Owusu-Ansah in 1998 in Koforidua, Ghana. His older brother, Kojo (born ca. 1994), is also a rapper who performs as Citizen Kay. The family migrated to Canberra, Australia in 2000.

He was dubbed "Genesis" by Kojo in primary school, who told his friends that his younger brother is Kofi: "his friends were like 'oh, what's your brother's name?' and he said 'Coffee' and they just didn't believe him, for whatever reason. So he just apparently made Genesis up on the spot, and since then it's just stuck." Owusu completed a Bachelor of Journalism at the University of Canberra in 2018.

Musician Citizen Kay is Owusu's older brother, and he decided to feature his younger brother, among other relatives, on "Family Ties", a track on his album With the People (October 2015). Kay explained that "Family Ties"

The pair then performed and recorded as the Ansah Brothers and in 2015 released an extended play (EP), Polaroid. Fellow Canberra rapper Kirklandd took notice and wanted the younger Owusu on his track "We On", which was first issued as a single in August 2016 and then appeared on Kirklandd's September 2016 four-track EP, The Visions Minitape.

From these experiences, Owusu gained confidence, connections, and fans enough to encourage him to try a solo career. In June 2017, he released his seven-track debut EP, Cardrive. BMA Magazine's Matt Parnell wrote that

The single "Sideways", released in September, includes lyrics in Twi, a dialect of Akan. It received national exposure on youth radio Triple J. Owusu toured Australia's east coast to promote it. Of "Sideways", i-D's Isabelle Hellyer wrote

The singer rejected the archetypical objectification of women by hip hop artists with his second single, "Awomen Amen" (2018), and explained, "As a rapper, I never used to hear those kinds of messages... it was something that always bothered me." He released a double A-sided single, "WUTD"/"Vultures" early in 2019, which Caitlin Medcalf of Purple Sneakers reviewed, "[WUTD is] a smooth, RnB track I guarantee will never get out of your head and, 'Vultures', a wavy rap journey... [his] vocals match the mood with a drawling vocal melody and a light flow that never once feels sharp, but simply goes with the flow." On 3 July 2019 Owusu performed as an opening act at 5 Seconds of Summer's sold-out benefit concert in Sydney. "WUTD" was featured on an ad for Bose noise-cancelling headphones in October 2019.