It was a day of joy; I was convinced but still a bit worried. it was meant to be one of those days to catch up with friends during the day for a quick visit to the beach and at night head up to the club to have a controllable rate of alcohol flowing through my system for the rest of the night, as I dance a hell out of myself but still, I was locked up in the closet of my room.
The 1st of October, 2010 was that day. Despite the fact that the 50th celebration of Nigeria’s independence was suddenly cut short by several factors that indicate the country is not truly independent. Factors like the bomb blast scenario that killed a number of Nigerians at the country’s state capital and caused tears and sorrow in the homes of the deceased, I was also disturbed in my room. As this situation warrants the country to sit down, re-evaluate and plan ahead, so was I in my room, accessing and finding answers, solutions to some of the problems eating up the music industry like virus without cure.

It’s becoming more and more obvious that some structural problems in the music industry such as piracy, copyright ownership are receiving better attention day in, day out but the managerial and business angle of Nigerian artistes are getting worse and beyond measures. Depending on where one encounters the problem within these two loop holes, one can not ignore the fact that Nigerian artistes are short of expectation and not maximising their full potential due to their personal and managerial handicap. The life span of artistes of today are becoming less than three quarter of a year. Their popularity and ability to survive is becoming more like a mirage. The audience are losing faith in their one time hero while the media are tired of chasing them for stories and due to this, their popularity fades away.

With my little experience with most Nigerian artistes regarding Bubbles magazine, I can give reasons why some are not living up to expectations. I am proud to say that most of the artistes that made it to our cover relatively got their major breakthrough as locally made international artiste after the cover publication. Not only that some of them got their first magazine cover story with Bubbles but their first breakthrough as artistes  known across the geographical precinct of the country. It is sad to know that after the support we and several others gave them that contributed to their success; most of these artistes don’t even remember your name or that of your organisation thereafter. These one time hustlers begging for your numbers and little write ups here and there suddenly become demy gods to the point that they don’t pick up your calls any more.

If I decide to agree with the fact that they are forming busy, it will be hard for me to understand the reasons why their so called artiste managers have failed in their duties and further dampen the image of the artistes.  It is in this country of ours that artiste managers behave like the artistes. The managers have also stopped picking and returning calls; they have failed in human and personal relations. The artiste managers don’t understand the rudiments of doing business and by so doing they have missed out in several business and publicity opportunities. One dares call some managers to help organise interview time with the artiste, they will give all the reasons why Obama is the most powerful man in the world. Journalists, public relations, advertising agencies and show promoters have almost stopped doing business with most artistes except that they can’t do without it. Today like never before, I have come across a number of artistes that once behaved like the world can’t do without them, now finding it hard to survive. The Nigerian artistes and their managers need to wake up to the reality that good working relationship matters and goes a long way; no matter how small a business transaction is, it should be treated like every business; someday, every kobo will surely count.…artistes should stop burning bridges.