| Look at all of them in this pic, amazing talents with successful story to tell, but what have they done to promote upcoming female singers? (Photo credit: @richupdates) |
The gang met again on Sunday to record the second season of MMS podcast, I almost missed it but the boys were magnanimous enough to move it by one day to accommodate me as I was out of town on the original recording date.
MMS is Dipo Ogun’s Music, Movies and Sports podcast, featuring Ope Cole who is a social commentator and entertainment junkie, Deolu Banks who is a chattered accountant and a salsa lover, the executive house boy himself, Dipo and yours truly.
One of the topics we explored on Sunday inspired this particular episode, we were actually talking about music producers that have released albums of their own, it was a very tough one as none of these highly rated producers in Nigeria have something of note in that regard.
We know of Dr Dre, Ice Cube, Swiss Beat, David Gueta, Timberland and many more music producers abroad with solid body of works, what can we say of Don Jazzy, Sarz, Legendary Beats, Young John et al? Absolutely nothing and to be honest it’s worrying but that’s not why we’re here today.
Wizkid over time has invested in upcoming artistes, LAX, Terri and the infamous boy that was sent out of Babcock recently come to mind. Davido doesn’t need any introduction in that regard with Mayorkun and Peruzzi hot on his lists.
Banky W gave Wizkid a chance, same way he gave Skales and Niyola, we have seen more than enough from Don Jazzy as he promoted Di’ja, Tiwa Savage and now Ayra Starr.
Olamide has produced loads of stars including my homeboy Adekunle Gold, Lil Kesh, Bella Shmurda – who was on CNN earlier today – and a host of others, even Naira Marley that was a product of Olamide’s talent factory already has disciples, one question: mention one female artiste in Nigeria that has produced other talents.
The Nigerian chapter of feminists are fully focused on competing with men and winning online arguments, pushing unnecessary agenda instead of leading from the front by showing love to fellow women and teaching everyone how to reward competence irrespective of gender.
Tiwa Savage is arguably the biggest female artiste in Nigeria, did you hear of how she felt when Mavin was going to sign a female act before she exited the label? No shades intended but what did she contribute to the elevation of other female acts with all the influence she had with the label?
Yemi Alade is the biggest female act in West Africa, if you doubt that as a fact I’ll advise you check stats from other countries, but what has she done to help female acts to rise? Someone asked her recently on twitter and her response is well documented.
I can go on and on, from Simi to Teni, to Niniola and Waje, even Asa with all the European exposure hasn’t considered hosting a talent factory to birth the next set of world beaters, is there a reason behind that or we should face front?
It’s very easy for people to host spaces and sew Twitter threads about how men dominate the Nigerian music industry and the entertainment industry by extension, but what are our successful female artistes doing to help the ones that need support?
For every of the top female artistes we have today, a man discovered and promoted them, what are our female celebrities doing? Shey we should call a spade a spade or we should continue sugarcoating nonsense? There’s so much envy among them, quite unnecessary.
I was involved in the process of trying to get two of the top female shots to have a collaboration sometime in the past and it was indeed easier to get Nigeria’s current president to give a live speech than to pull it off, I’m not capping.
The toxic ones won’t see this as a wake up call but another avenue to show their nonsense traits, it’s really worrying considering how much effort some of them have invested in making sure other female acts don’t rise above them.
My friend Oyindamola wrote about her fears on the trajectory of feminism and the abandonment of the boys that are going to grow to become liabilities and I think you should read it, not totally related to this article but shares another view to things, please read here: https://medium.com/@_honeyricci_/is-masculinity-really-in-danger-cd740d5169b7
I leave it here and hope they prove me wrong this year, it’s not enough to jump online to advocate for equal rights for women, do your part within your sphere of influence to help young girls to grow, lead by example and from the front, that way we’ll win the war together.
Love & Light
