These two stars are masters of hit single ‘follow-ups’

It’s common industry knowledge that getting success in music is the easy part. The harder part is keeping and maintaining that success.

The Nigerian music industry is one of the hardest industries to keep success. Everything and everyone is looking to make an artist fail. If you can overcome the hurdle of accessing finances, you will have to deal with numerous agents, middlemen, and brokers, who would work hard at taking the money from you, before you get to a studio. Promotion is another great hurdle.

But as soon as one of the songs become a hit, that’s when the artist is faced with one of the most important decisions of their career; following up the hit with another hit.

Many artists fail at this, and that’s why the history of Nigerian music has more one hit wonders than stars. In recent years, we have had Slide make a claim with ‘Banana’, but it never amounted to anything else other than a club single. Also, just less than a year ago, Humblesmith was the new prince of Eastern music. His single ‘Osinachi’, was the faith-based aspirational soundtrack. Where is he now?

You can find these happen to our pop stars. When they come out of a dry spell with a super hit record, or crown a great run with a big record, the challenge lies in following it up. It’s very crucial that they get a great follow-up to help keep up the momentum.

Tekno has failed to provide another record with the same potency, melodic perfection, and appreciation like ‘Pana’. Instead, he has chosen to maintain momentum by a rapid fire releases. Since ‘Pana’ came through last year, we have also had ‘Diana’, ‘Rara’, ‘Yawa’ and ‘Be’. These songs have grown to become mid-level hit songs. But none can ascend ‘Pana’s throne or even attempt to usurp its dominance as the biggest song of Tekno’s career.

Tekno still maintained the same formula for ‘Pana’ on ‘Diana’. Working with the template of mid-tempo highlife hit, which is thematically designed to praise and seek love from a woman. It became a hit, but not in the mold of its predecessor.

For Runtown, ‘Mad over you’ came at a time when the singer desperately needed a win in his career. For much of 2016, his core focus was on navigating a suffocating label contract, and staying alive with a boss who allegedly pulled a gun on him. He finally rounded off the year on a high note. ‘Mad over you’ has proven to be bigger than anything and everything he has ever put forward as music.

The success of “Mad Over You” has made Runtown one of the hottest musicians in Nigeria, with the video racking up a whooping 30 million Youtube views, and streamed millions of times across all digital stores. Runtown himself has seen his stock rise, touring numerous cities in the US, and Nigeria.

To follow that up, he has released ‘For life’. With production from the rising Krizbeatz (who has already scored Tekno’s ‘Pana’, ‘Rara’, and a few others), Runtown keeps things close to the template that has been responsible for the switch in the Nigerian pop sound. It’s mid-tempo Highlife, only designed with elements that are consistent with core African melodies.

The theme is the same; Runtown professes his love for a woman in basic lyrics. He offers his soul, with admirable abandon, creating an emotional pull that is sure to resonate with his gigantic female fan base.

For Runtown and Tekno, there is a consistency in the way they chose to follow up the biggest songs of their career; it’s simply to take the most potent elements of it, remodel it and create a new record that still has enough to make people recognize the old one in the new record. But in a way that inspires acceptance.

It isn’t a brave technique to follow. But experience has shown that it is a safe business practice to follow. Artists generally have a little window to replicate the same creative pattern on their singles. Great commercial artists utilize that window, and cash out.

In a way, it feels like an extension of the old successful record. Only this time, it’s different.