Pop Music Dominates Nigeria Beat Scene

Uzo Chikere

In the present time, Bottom of Form

Nigerian music can best be described as monotonous; like one eating the same meal every day. Sure Jollof Rice and dodo might be your favourite food, but if you are served this on a daily basis for the next three weeks you are sure to throw up or slap the hand of the person who serves it.

This is how music in Nigeria is. Music has so many genres and sub-genres, but only one thrives in Nigeria at the expense of others- pop music. Pop music in this context is not the kind of music that made Michael Jackson a demi-god or Rihanna the queen of carnal pop.

Pop music within the Nigerian context is a dynamic blend of indigenous Nigerian genres influenced by Western sounds and music trends. So what is done here cannot be placed with the type of music the likes of Simon Cowell have made millions from. Pop music in Nigeria has a heavy dose of our cultural music DNA.

It is good to know that we have our own version of pop music that thrives so well as a matter of fact. There is no diversity in our music on a mainstream level. Everywhere you go, it is a pop song wafting through the juke boxs, some of them good, most of them outright crap.

At some point it gets sickening, hearing the same sound, and similar beats over and over again. Because pop takes on a populist model, it jumps on trends and raves to survive. The downside is you basically keep hearing the same style of music over and over. That is where we are in Nigeria. The outright domination of pop music has made Nigerian music one dimensional, soulless and predictable.

There are other genres of music, but they are too weak to challenge for any spotlight in the mainstream. To be fair, rap has seen an upsurge within recent times but let's not overlook the fact rappers are doing pop songs to be more relevant and financially stable. Reggae, jazz, R&B, dancehall- virtually non existent from a large view.

Yes. Nigerians are an optimistic people who love to live life to the fullest, but doesn't mean they don't appreciate other types of music. You can't tell me that Niyola's 'Toh Bad' wasn't a hit or Eva's 'Deaf' isn't a jam. So we've gotten to the junction where the question must be asked why is pop music so prevalent in Nigeria?

The answer is down to numbers. In our lopsided version of what we call an industry pop music is the only viable genre of music. It is easy to push. A pop artiste hardly needs a fan base to score a commercial hit track. Just get it popping in the clubs and you have a hit.

How do you sell a reggae song or R&B track without proper industry structures that supports touring, helps create solid fan bases, has various performance venues all over the country? It's going to be pretty hard to that without these things and more in place. This is the reason why music entrepreneurs  and artistes shy away from non-pop songs.

It's easy, border line lazy (when compared to other genres) to promote pop in Nigeria. That's why our pop songs have this lazy vibe to the them. Sloppy writing, stale concept and dull lyrics underline the 'quick money' syndrome that is plaguing our industry.

For economic survival artistes jump on the bandwagon. That's life. Survival is paramount. Unfortunately as these artistes jump ship, artistry and creativity suffers. Only a spoonful of acts still do music that doesn't lean towards the pop side of things. Acts like Jesse Jagz, Eva and Banky W are some of these acts.

Until we get the foundation and structure of our industry right, pop music will be the only thing rocking our speakers.