EMPIRE Is Investing Early In African Music And Culture

Global’s gone music. Music’s always been global, but our social and technical infrastructure has met the open minds of a new generation. And artistry has won out, regardless of culture and country. Artists from East Asia are charting in Chile. Spanish music is topping English charts.

And “in the age of TikTok and Triller, we’re seeing 12, 13-year-old white girls in Yorkshire dancing to Afrobeats. There was always a love for it,” said Jonathan Jules, senior director of international marketing with EMPIRE.

“An African artist of ours topped charts in India,” Jules said. “It was charting in 51 countries around the world, and what was happening in India was driven by Reels cause obviously TikTok has not been in that market.”

Instagram Reels is Meta’s market-innovation to compete with TikTok and a near carbon copy of their competitor’s product. India banned TikTok in 2020 and cited national security concerns.

EMPIRE is an American music company famous for their work with artists such as XXXTentacion, T-Pain, Kendrick Lamar, and Cardi B. And they are spending and spreading massive resources on African musicians expecting proportional returns. Building on the success of Nigerian artists like Fireboy DML and Olamide, EMPIRE is announcing the launch of EMPIRE Africa.

EMPIRE closed out 2021 with the highest distribution numbers in Nigeria, according to TurnTable, a Nigerian Billboard equivalent.

Music has made its way over the bridges of globalization. But from between the landmasses, it’s clear that systemic toxic runoff from centuries of imperialism and power imbalance have left the grass markedly greener on the “developed” side. Some might call it turf.

“Don't forget the rate of streaming music in the States is not the rate of streaming music in Nigeria,” said Kareem Mobolaji, regional head of West Africa with EMPIRE. “If 10 people are streaming you in the U.S., that’s equivalent to having 60 people streaming you in Nigeria.”

At the onset of his work in Africa, Nima Etminan, chief operating officer at EMPIRE, was struck by local artists’, “YouTube numbers.” Despite success online, he told me, “there wasn’t much revenue coming in yet because a lot of those territories weren’t monetized properly.”

You might think that being compensation-backwards would indicate that the Continent’s technical capabilities are behind those of its peers. Yet African societies are at a level of adoption of Web3 technology that would make tech-evangelists in the states salivate or change trousers.

Large American music companies not already operating in the region are late. “And they're late to a space that is very, very, very tech forward,” Titilope Adesanya, project manager at EMPIRE, relayed to me. “Here on the continent a lot of people use cryptocurrency. They have so many digital wallets.”

Tina Davis is a legend in the music industry. She was VP of artists and repertoire (A&R) for Def Jam at its height and manager of Chris Brown in the storms of his. Now, she’s in charge of A&R for EMPIRE, and she says that young artists from Africa and America are looking to capitalize on Web3, NFTs, and cryptocurrencies.

“What is it and how can I make money?” Tina Davis laughed. “Those are the first two questions they ask me.” She estimates the market is saturated and artists are keenly aware. NFTs and popstar-branded cryptocurrencies already exist in abundance. Artists are asking themselves and Tina how they can make their entrance into the space special – the million-dollar question.

If artists can learn anything from EMPIRE, they might be able to take a lesson in groundwork. EMPIRE is only announcing EMPIRE Africa’s launch now, but their work on the continent started years ago.

“When I first started here, we had artists, but we didn't have employees in Africa. Mobalaji was managing and bringing in a lot of talent that he had through his own label with the artist Olamide,” Tina Davis told me. “We ended up hiring a lot of people, but we started with just two guys. They signed everything that was hot in the area. Great ears.” Those two guys were Ezegozie Eze, who is VP of market development with EMPIRE now and Mobolaji.

“We’re going to South by Southwest this year,” Mobolaji told me proudly. “We’ll be moving like 10 artists out of Africa to go perform on that stage, and it’s costing us. No one’s paying for us to do it.” For 8 of 10, it will be their first time in America. “The world is in the words of mouth. You have to be able to move people of culture to a different stage, to experience it.”

It is also an investment, an investment that makes the world of music a smaller place and raises the profile of Afrobeats in America, where attention sells for a pricier pound.

EMPIRE is not the only early money in Africa. There’s “been a really heavy investment from China in this space,” Jules told me. “They were one of the first to bring in quite low entry, affordable smartphones. They were very smart about having apps like Boomplay [a Chinese-owned music streaming service] preloaded” on the phones.

“To generate revenue, livelihood and culture in Africa, bring that back to the US, and pay salaries off of it, man, I don’t take that lightly. I’m getting goosebumps talking about it.” Ghazi, founder of EMPIRE, told me over dinner.

Music, fueled by technical and social advancement, has become a global investment opportunity. Early entrants into the market are working for paydays which could change the landscape of African and American artistry. And if they succeed in continuously exporting Afrobeats, anyone with headphones and a connection to the internet will benefit.