Iyanya Onoyom Mbuk may not be a household name but the name Iyanya certainly is.
He is a popular Nigerian singer and songwriter.
He rose to fame after winning the first season of Project Fame West Africa, and is best known for his hit single “Kukere”.
DopeReporters.com sighted a post by the talented act on his X (formerly Twitter) handle @Iyanya.
The post was titled, just random thoughts. The piece was directed to fellow artistes, especially the up an coming ones in the industry.
This is what he wrote;
I have been in the music industry for well over a decade, some things haven’t changed.
1. If you set a fee for your performance, don’t move pricing for anyone.
2.The closer a person is to you, the less they are willing to accept your value and pay for it.
3.Those Chairmen who will call you just to speak to their Wives or Girl friends, who they have been bragging to about knowing you and that you ate their boy 😂
4.If your fee is 10m make sure you don’t take less than 10m, because a person who knows you are worth 10m and is pricing you for 50-70% will definitely broadcast to others how much he paid you and definitely he/she has already set your price to people.
5.The less money you charge for a gig the more stress it comes with , those who pay well will never stress you, know this and it will never change.
6.Some people hijack a booking and decide they will be the one to call you because they believe you will charge them lower either to use that to gain favour from the original person booking you or to get a cut out of your money. So check this out, your fee is 10m and your guy has a booking for you and they already agreed to pay you 10m, he calls you and goes bro, them no get 10m, abeg do am for 7m Na my people dey do event, boom you agree and he has already made 3m off you and he will still call you for 10% on the 7m. Lol
7.Make sure if you agree a fee with anyone, stand by it and make sure if you agreed 10% for any booking coming to you, let that be paid to the person.
8.If you don’t enjoy performing DJ backing track, demand for live band and please stand by it, except in a club, live music is the best anytime any day.
9. It’s better to go and do a free gig than to take what some people call honorarium.(Except from media houses or someone ready for batter) E.G I’ll do x number of shows and you give me the house, land or Car or maybe shares.
10.The very mean looking artistes are always more respected than the ones who are very calm and are not into trouble. Scarcity fuels demand.
Iyanya released his debut studio album My Story in 2009; it was supported by the singles “No Time” and “Love Truly”. Iyanya co-founded the record label Made Men Music Group with Ubi Franklin in 2011. His second studio album, titled Desire, was released in February 2013. It was supported by the singles “Kukere”, “Ur Waist”, “Flavour”, “Sexy Mama”, and “Jombolo”. He won the Artist of the Year award at The Headies 2013.