Dupe Otegbola Industrial Way situated at Satellite Town, Lagos is quiet on a Friday afternoon. It is in this somewhat peaceful suburb in the Lagos metropolis that the famous Premier Records is located. The outfit has been in the business of promoting and marketing Nigerian music for ten years.
“The story began,” says Michael Odiong, special project manager, Premier Records Ltd, “over five decades ago when we started full operation as Phillips (West Africa) Records Ltd precisely in 1963 March. We started the business side of music and took it to another level. I must point out that there were several other music marketers before we came on board but they were not that popular due to their business module. We started introducing promoting indigenous music aggressively on radio and television. We also introduced awards for deserving artistes that did very well in sales and creativity wise. Sir Victor Uwaifo won a platinum for selling over 100,000 copies of ‘Joromi in 1960s, this was one of the first major awards in the country as at then. “
Over the years, Premier Records’ promotion module has been very effective which made their artistes leading musicians at the time. Despite being an old company that has survived many generations of Nigerian music, Premier Records is moving on with the times as it has transited to digital platform.
“With all humility,” explains Odiong, “we were the first record label to embrace digital marketing as far back as early 2000. We had seen the potential in it and started the process of buying into it. It took us over three years to start benefitting from digital platforms because it was not as we have it now. So we are at home with the digital platform era. It’s the future of music worldwide.”
More artistes are buying into using digital platform to promote their music. “Right now we have not signed on any artiste because we are trying to make the most of our catalog. We want to encourage the present generation artistes to come in and do works from the catalog. Dr. Olaiya and 2face collabo was big success that points the way people will start reacting to songs without content. We want to do more of this while we take our time in looking for the next big artiste to sign.”
In addition, Premier Records is partnering with Nollywood film makers to use indigenous music as sound tracks for movies. “Partnering with Nollywood has been like a passion for us. Over the last 10 years, we have been doing synchronisation licensing with foreign film companies, we have been selling this idea of using our indigenous music as music scores for movies in Nigeria, it’s been slow but we are gradually succeeding. We have partnered with Diamond pictures and the latest being “October 1” by Kunle Afolayan where two of Dr. Victor Olaiya’s songs were used, these songs where actually done before 1960 and were very popular that period. We hope to do more and encourage Nollywood to look into our catalog and they will find more than enough materials from the 1960s.”
Unlike most label companies, Premier Records has been dutiful in remitting royalty to artistes they signed on. “Ironically, royalty payment has been our strongest point. We stay true and committed to our artistes both dead and alive. We ensure royalties are paid, some artistes complain we pay late, but the truth is we pay when we get both the money and statement so the artiste knows what he is being paid for and how we arrived at the payment. We get offers for foreign licensing and we pay the artistes in whatever currency the payment is made.”
Of course the journey has not been easy for the record company since its inception ten years ago. Odiong says one of their biggest challenges in the last ten years has been piracy. “We have the biggest collection of works pirated in this country. If half of the jobs pirated were sold through us, no record label would stand our financial muscle, but sadly we are the most hit by piracy.”
In addition he explains that promotional obstacles are another major problem. “This is peculiar not just to us but the music industry as a whole, we have about 32 radio stations in Lagos alone, each station has its presenter charging his or her fees to play your music, how many presenters do you want to pay in 32 stations to make your music blow?. It’s a pity even the radio stations don’t even care about good music anymore but who brings the most pay. We are praying that God intervenes for the sake of the up and coming artistes.
“The biggest pirates are no longer in Alaba but on our streets. Those that download via computers, they are our biggest challenge. Even Alaba pirates are complaining (laughing). Everybody is going digital but are buying from the wrong source thereby denying the record label and artistes their income. You go to computer village and you can about 500 songs on a flash for just N500. No money goes to the artistes, tomorrow the artiste is bankrupt and we say they are not doing well when its actually us as a nation that has robbed them of their earnings. We must encourage them by supporting platforms like Spinlet, Iroking, Mymusic.com and the rest.”
In the next ten years, Odiong says Premier Records will work hard to still be relevant and consistent in the industry.
FUNKE OSAE-BROWN
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