Music Marketing and The Alaba Phenomenon - 2008-10-20

The Alaba International market, in Lagos, has a reputation of being the haven of pirates, and that might not be far from the truth. But if you are visiting the market to catch “pirates” duplicating and mass-producing CDs, you might just be wasting your time. Elcee McEdwards, in this piece, uncovers the dynamics of the Alaba phenomenon. 

Everywhere is in a frenzy. But despite that, brisk business is going on. The noise emanating from the several power generators scattered here and there is such that you have to speak on top of your voice to be heard. At the music and movie section of the market, popularly known as the Fancy Section, it is business as usual. As you move from one shop to the other, some errand boys (and ladies too) beckon on you to come into their stall and have a look. Inside the shops, some attendants are counting, packing and taking stock of their CDs while others are attending to the customers who have come to make some purchases. This is all you see. Yet, this is the popular Alaba International Market, notorious for being a haven of CD pirates.

Make no mistakes about it. There is more than meets the eyes here. M2 investigations reveal that people come from all over the country, and from outside, to make bulk purchase of CDs here. What you see at Alaba is just an outlet for an intricate and complex web of traders and business men whose tentacles reach even beyond the African continent.

The funny thing about Alaba is that it represents different things to different stakeholders in the Nigeria's fledging music industry. To some, especially record label owners and more established artistes, it represents a thorn in the flesh that must be removed, an enemy that must be stopped; the reason for their not making as much money as they should. To the upcoming artiste, favour with any of the traders, albeit pirates, in Alaba could just be the beginning of a flourishing career. So, he moves from shop to shop and knocks from door to door, praying that luck smiles on him. A reliable source reveals that some upcoming artistes actually go to the extent of giving one or more of their hit tracks to these pirates, begging for them to be included in compilation CDs. The “wisdom” there is that if the song spreads, the artiste will become popular and will be called up for shows. With some money in his pocket, it is believed that the artiste can now do his own thing.

As things stand now, the pirating of music CDs in Alaba, and indeed the whole of Nigeria, has taken different dimensions. There is the outright duplication of album CDs. There is also the compilation of hit songs and singles from various Nigerian artistes, known in industry circles as compilation CDs. “For as low as N50, you can own a compilation of the hottest jams around at any given time,” says Ifeanyi Ngwoke, a source at the Alaba International Market. One notable feature of these compilation CDs is that they do not bear the name or contact of any company, label or marketer. You just see them everywhere, in different varieties. But they certainly originate from somewhere. Speaking to M2, a popular record label owner, who has an outlet at Alaba, says “Initially, they used to do these CD duplications in Singapore. They now do it in the country. Some of them own CD duplicating machines. We've also had cases of known CD duplicating companies co-operating with these pirates who usually make duplications that run into millions. Once, a CD duplicating company contacted me and told me that someone approached them to make a bulk duplication of one of my works.” Another interesting dimension to the pirating of music CDs is the compilation of whole albums. A source at Alaba, who confided in M2, reveals that due to the rising profile of Nigerian artistes outside the shores of Nigeria, several albums are being compiled in DVDs and sold outside the country, especially in other African countries. “Those kinds are not sold in Nigeria,” he says. For the average trader at Alaba, it is about investing some money and profiting from it. He doesn't care whose ox is gored.

During the era of Charley Boy as president of the performing Musicians Association of Nigeria (PMAN), he, piqued by the goings on in Alaba, decided to take the laws into his hands and waged war against some traders at Alaba. In one incident, he burnt over a million copies of pirated CDs belonging to Obaino of Obaino Music.

Subsequently, he, along with his team, decided to negotiate with some of the pirates, encouraging them to acquire marketing licenses, sign on artistes and kick back some of the returns to the rightful owners of the works they are selling. That yielded some result. But it also occasioned some problems. Names like Ahbu Music, T-Joe Music and Obaino Music became legitimate. But some mushroom shops also began to transform into supposed record labels. All they needed to do was to hook up with a desperate artiste, print a CD cover and write whatever name on it, let's say EMEKA RECORDS, and they get it going. Mediocrity thrived and piracy took different dimensions. Under that arrangement, some desperate artistes gave up their master tapes for as low as N200, 000.

Things seem to be looking up now in various aspects of the music industry. But it is still the boys at Alaba that run the show as far as CD sales and distribution is concerned. The few independent labels around, due to the inability to set up their own distribution networks, are forced to use these same people for the distribution of their works. According to another record label owner, “If you decide not to use them, you are only giving them a leeway to reproduce millions of copies of your work. They will beat you to it because they sell at very ridiculous prices, and they have the network around the country. We don't.”

Since the Alaba boys run the show, they also fix the prices. Another popular record label owner, lamenting the situation, says, “Albums are selling, but the returns are very very low. Right now, we are talking about N40 per CD, which leaves the company and the artiste to share between seven and nine naira, after removing the cost of production. It is our biggest setback. There is so much money that can be made from the sales of works if the labels can decide on, or have control over, the prices of their works.” It was in a bid to create their own distribution network around the country that MO'Hits Records, ran by Michael Enebeli, signed a partnership with Mr Biggs. The partnership sees D' Banj's albums being sold in all Mr. Biggs outlets around the country. Though D' Banj's work can also be bought from Alaba, that move is innovative and is a leaf other labels could borrow.

However, many informed industry stakeholders believe that it is only the entrance or emergence of real recording companies that could stem the tide of the Alaba phenomenon. Corroborating the belief that the absence of real recording companies in Nigeria is essentially the reason why piracy has continued to thrive, Paul Play once said, “I want to see us getting Universal deals. I want to see us getting Interscope deals. That's when we'll know we are in business.” OJB Jezreel agrees with this, saying that the conducive business environment must be created for the likes of EMI, Polygram, Sony BMG etc to come back to Nigeria.

Some others argue against that, pointing to the likes of Kennis Music, Westside Records and Storm Records, which are, in actual sense, only record labels. But a functional recording company, in addition to having functional offices and staffers, recording studio, PROs, studio managers, lawyers and A and R managers for artistes, must have a marketing and distribution division. A record company should also have enough capital base to be able to pick up, at least, five or 10 artistes, and carter for them from the scratch  in terms of accommodation, mobility, packaging and promotion  even long before the release of their albums. It is the record company that bears the cost of every recording, from session fees to production fees, as well as the cost of other logistics. A record company that knows what it is doing will also network and liaise with other record companies around the world.

In other parts of the world, record companies are financially strong. They pick up independent labels to work with, empower them with more funds, and mandate them to scout for, nurture, package and promote new talents. Out there, it is a serious business and is usually not owned by one man. What is unarguable is that in today's Nigeria, we do not have anything that comes close to this.

That notwithstanding, it is generally believed that to stem the tide of the Alaba phenomenon, there must be a coming-together. In this regard, an efficient artiste union is indispensable. The artiste union will see to it that stakeholders run their businesses properly and make sure that sharp practices and mediocrity are done away with. There must also be enforceable laws. Before anything can be orderly, there must be laws in place. PMAN must therefore work with the appropriate arms of government like the Nigerian Copyright Commission (NCC), as well as other agencies like the Music Copyright Society of Nigeria (MCSN), to see that artiste's rights are protected.

After all said and done, it is possible for some of the strong, independent labels to come together, alongside some of the strong Alaba marketers, to form alliances. Such an alliance of labels and marketers could give birth to full-fledged record companies that could attract investments from the corporate world.  That could be a way of setting up functional indigenous record companies in Nigeria, which, in turn, could prove to be one of the ways of addressing the piracy problem.

Indeed, the power of the Alaba Boys cannot be underestimated. Around 3.00am on Sunday, October 5TH, this year, while Face was still launching his album at Planet One, Maryland-Ikeja, a group of journalists drove to the Alade end of Allen Avenue to get some food. While they ate in one of the all-night bukas there, a CD hawker came along. Just trying to amuse themselves, they asked for Originality, Face's new album that was just being launched. Though the CD hawker did not have the full album in stock, he had an alternative  - a compilation CD of 13 hot singles from various artistes. Certainly, Face's Originality was among the tracks on the album. That's the power of the Alaba Boys. You will only ignore it to your own peril!