By Seyi Babalola
Akon, a Senegalese-American musician, has acknowledged that he had a significant part in the career success of Nigerian worldwide Afrobeats artist Wizkid.
He stated that the Starboy crooner was only a local artist until he signed him to his record label in 2008 and groomed him.
In a recent episode of the Bagfuel Brigade podcast, Akon stated that Afrobeats would not be what it is now if he hadn’t developed several Nigerian musicians and opened up new markets for them in the late 2000s to 2010s.
“In 2008, I spent my time in Nigeria developing what you see today as Afrobeats. And all of them can attest to it,” he said.
“Wizkid was the first [Nigerian] artist we signed officially at that time. And then we went on to sign a group called P-Square, which was the first [Nigerian] group that made it internationally.
“Wizkid was just the local Nigerian star before we touched him and it opened up to a bigger market. I wouldn’t want to take credit for all of it but I can tell you that if we didn’t do what we did, Afrobeats would still have been in the same position it was when we got there [Nigeria in 2008]. That I can tell you 100 per cent.
“I brought the business side of music to Afrobeats because all they [Nigerian artists at that time] knew about was the creative [side of music]. There was no business, no infrastructure, none of it attached to it.”
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