"When you see an African artiste doing a sound that you can't relate to, just know it's because of foreign record labels."
"We African artistes go through alot with these big American record labels or distribution companies.
But you have to work with them because if you don't, you won't be recognized globally. I am speaking out of experience because I also have a distribution deal with Warner Music Group.
I have a song which became a very big hît titled "Komasava". When I submitted that song to my distributor which is Warner Music, they didn't want it, they told me it was trãsh because the sound wasn't what they think the Western market will want. So I couldn't release the song because by then, we had an agreement that I can't release any song unless they approve it.
I believed in that song, so when they rejected it, I went and kept that song because I knew it was a good song and had the African cultural sound in it. So I just waited with the song and when we were renewing my contract, I now had the right to choose the songs I want to release. And immediately I dropped that song, it became a big hît.
When you work with these big American record labels and you're not careful, they can change you completely just so the music can sell more records. They haven't really completely accepted our African sound yet and that's why most artiste are doing afro-fusion.
But we the artiste of this era are doing everything possible to make sure that artiste of the next generation won't have to sound like American artiste to sell records."
