I have been away for a quick travel. I just returned. During my time away, I saw an email from Saeon’s camp announcing her re-brand, promo-pics etc. I thought, “great! I can’t wait to share. She has a great voice and I am looking forward to seeing her get back on track.” I get back and before I can even take my time to review the email in more depth to get her new direction, I see my news feed flooded with stories of her upset at an artist who she says she allegedly paid 1.5million Naira to collaborate with, but the artist failed to retweet the announcement/ information of her video when she tweeted it.
Everyone speculates that artist is Wizkid. Saeon trying to dance around the identity of the artist now says, the artist knows who he is. Let’s see, Saeon, who could it possibly be besides Wizkid? You are a new artist. You have very limited tracks that we can count on our fingers, and very limited collaborations. The only big name artist on your CV who would command such a fee or higher is Wizkid. With simple logical deduction, I think it is safe to say people are guessing, and correctly at that, that your statements were aimed at Wizkid.
Artists, unless you have an agreement to take on promoting your work, please do not behave in this manner. You paid for a collaboration, nothing more. The artist gave you the work product. It would have been nice if they shared with their fan base. They didn’t. Don’t be angry or bitter about their failure to promote your work or “that they are looking at you like they have never heard of you,” to grab a line from ‘Boogie Down.’
The fix is easy. Next time, make such a demand in your agreement. DO NOT get on twitter or social media or what have you and call a fellow artist out. It is unnecessary, unprofessional and frankly harassment.
By the way, many of our artists collaborate and pay an arm and a leg for American artists to collaborate with them on songs. Those artists when the finished product is out, many times, DO NOT share the video on their platforms. What do our artists do? They are just so happy that they got a collaboration, they do not display this kind of behavior on social media. I don’t think it should be any different just because your collaboration is with fellow Nigerian artists. Get it in writing, otherwise be angry in your home, bedroom or studio by yourself. The world does not need to hear or see your angry tweets.
As to Saeon, I passed on her music/work a long time ago. She has the talent but continues to be unprofessional in her industry and fan dealings, which for me, is a turn off. Talent is not enough.
I’ll give it one more try, but after that, I really don’t have the time nor interest to lend my platform to artists, at no cost to them, who fail to take their brands seriously.
-Uduak
