A brand new Kia Picanto now costs N5m, please let that sink in – all the way in. The Hyundai ix35 is an SUV, so it will cost you a lot more to get one, the 2016 edition that Reekado Banks won at the Headies last year goes for around N11m. That’s the old price of the Picanto in 11 places!
11 Old Kia Picantos = 1 Brand New Hyundai iX35
And before you think I’m using the racist joke that all Asians look alike, and adding jara to say that their cars must look alike too, I know the difference between a Kia and Hyundai, okay? I’m just trying to point out that it’s not beans to buy a brand new vehicle these days.
Tekno’s garage must be overflowing with them because the artist has registered his displeasure at being nominated for the Headies Next Rated category this year and with that, the guarantee of a Hyundai. But regardless of the prize and/or the prize money, Tekno’s reaction was guided by principle. The “Pana” singer feels he’s outgrown the Headies’ most popular award and also its most controversial category, but if you look closely, he doesn’t have a good point.
Tekno has been the breakout star of 2016, with arguably the biggest record of the year, performances at major concerts and a coveted MTN endorsement. At this stage, and in my opinion, the Next Rated award, 2016 is his to lose. Except MMMG’s campaign in the next few months is as disastrous as Hillary Clinton and the Democrats’ was in the last few months, the singer should be able to energize his fans sufficiently and have them vote for him. However, to say that Tekno has easy opponents is to underestimate Mr. Eazi and YCEE in the same way America underestimated Donald Trump. And to think that all 3 of the front runners, or indeed all 5 of the nominees, don’t belong in the same class as Tekno, is to read your own interpretation to an award show that you did not create.
According to the Headies Secretariat –
Next Rated for example are officially unreleased artistes in the year under review. This means, no matter how good or popular your song may be, how many hit singles or how many good music videos you may have, if you have not recorded and released an official album, you are still eligible to be nominated for that category. In the same vein, you may start your career a year ago, as long as you have released an album, will not the eligible for nomination in the Next Rated Category.
The rules haven’t changed. Tekno was a major part of a group project, The Evolution, with MMMG but he doesn’t have a solo album out. Tekno has been producing hit music for a longer time than everyone else in that class, agreed, but all that hit music doesn’t do anything if you do not have a solo album out.
The Next Rated category that Tekno is turning his nose up at is like a blessing from the industry’s gatekeepers and, while most artists would be grateful to even get acknowledged, it’s well within Tekno’s rights to feel like he’s already passed the gate. Award show categories, like this, that try to capture an artist’s rise are often problematic because there are way too many intangibles – the “year under review” rule isn’t rigidly followed as it is for the song categories because “rises” rarely have clear starting points, artist’s typically build and build. Besides, an artist’s rise is impossible to measure because different people see the rise from different perspectives – an artist can have a popular video in Lagos but walk down the street in Minna and no one will bother him. For another person, popularity might not even be the yardstick to determine who’s next to blow, that person may prefer raw talent. That’s probably the reason why, in order to pick the eventual winner, the Headies made this hotly contested category a voting category, that way, it becomes a thermometer of how the audience feels about an artist because any other metric would be too subjective.
But other than being a rite of passage, the Next Rated category is a pat on the back for an artist, a congrats on how far they’ve come. The hip-hop equivalent of the Headies Next Rated is the XXL Freshman list and that too has its problems. In 2010, Nicki Minaj and Drake both declined to participate in the Freshman list as, just like Tekno, they felt they had already achieved a good degree of success.
(Above) The 2009 class that Drake and Nikki Minaj were omitted from and (below) the 2010 class that they snubbed
They were also pissed that they had not been included the year before and that’s understandable, but an artist’s growth isn’t a linear process, an artist can go from nobody to somebody in less than 12 months, especially these days. So if you use fixed time blocks – 1 year, 6 months, or even 3 months – to try and assess an artist’s growth, you might be too late or too early in timing that very moment, the moment just before their career takes off. That’s the reason why solo album remains the best criteria to determine who and who belongs in the Next Rated category, not popularity.
Now, even though neither of them has a solo project, you have to appreciate the fact that all the artists nominated this year are at different points in their career. Tekno, Mr. Eazi and YCEE are heads and shoulders above Aramide and Humblesmith but if you feel like they don’t belong in this class, who would you have removed from the 2015 list to replace them with? In a strong list that contained Lil Kesh, Kiss Daniel, Korede Bello, Reekado Banks and Cynthia Morgan, Cynthia is probably the weakest link. However, this time last year, Tekno’s wasn’t even the biggest artist on MMMG and bever mind “Pana”, “Duro” was just beginning to climb up the charts. If Tekno had been nominated in 2015 and won ahead of the rest of the guys on that list, he and Ubi Franklin would have needed to employ body guards whenever they were on the mainland.
I understand Tekno’s frustration but perhaps a little humility is needed. His first hit was “Holiday” (featuring Davido), and it was a regional hit in Abuja 3 whole years ago. Being an Abuja resident, I appreciate that the artist has come a long way over a long time but he’s also gone a very long way within a very short time – it’s all about perspective. Rather than seeing the Next Rated nomination as a rite of passage that he’s already passed, he can see it as a pat on the back, a shake of the hand and make space on his dressing table for a new set of keys.