By Itohan Abara-Laserian
Nigerian Disc Jockey, Jimi Sadare, known as DJ Jimbo, says the success of an artiste’s work lies solely in the hands of a DJ.
DJ Jimbo made the assertion during an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Lagos, upon his return to Nigeria after a European tour.
According to him, it is about time artistes in Nigeria and globally begin to recognise the contributions of DJs in their journey to stardom and turning any music to hits.
Dj Jimbo, who is also a fashion icon and content maven, said: “Every true artiste knows that the success of his material or song lies in the hands of a DJ.
“A DJ, be it at a radio or club, already has followers listening in or attending shows, concerts, festivals among others.
“His playing an artiste’s material automatically connects to the audience and if it is good enough, backed by popular DJ’s rotation, can turn the music into a hit for the artiste, that’s direct marketing.”
He, however, expressed his displeasure with DJs not properly recognised in an artiste’s quest to stardom and global acceptance.
“Out there, I don’t think DJs are getting the proper recognition in the journey to stardom of an artiste.
“A lot of artistes’ careers have been stifled because they did not have the means, wherewithal or knowledge as to get their music delivered to the street’s ears.
“With a DJ in the picture, half of the artiste’s job is done and as such,they need to be celebrated and compensated more.
“Using myself as an example, I bought an old album of an Ivorien Music Group over the weekend, in Paris.
“On listening to it, it brought back memories and I am going to share one of the hit tracks on my radio programme, which I have run for the last seven years, on Inspiration Family Radio,” he said.
Speaking on how he had fared, DJ Jimbo said that as DJ with over 30 genres of music in his portfolio and the fact that his listeners, crowd, guests or audience are paramount in his delivery, good beats are the most important part of a song.
“Two weeks ago, I was invited as a guest DJ, to entertain a diverse crowd of people, at a Lounge in Amsterdam.
“At some point while playing a Soulful House track,I decided to mix it with a Ghanian Afro Life track, which I knew the audience had never heard of, that fusion completely brought the house down.
“A professional DJ must have deep knowledge of music from basically every country of the world. With this music, he can arrange a top playlist to suit the crowd’s mood and carry the audience along,” he said.
According to DJ Jimbo, the rise of technology, specifically, Artificial Intelligence (AI) which basically is a computer that requires human intelligence such as speech recognition, visual perception and translation between languages, cannot take the place of a DJ.
He said that a DJ determines what to dish his crowd by physically seeing, assessing and feeling their energy.
“The brain’s ability to make use of what the eyes see, which is visual perception can not be handled by AI,” he said.
According to him, the presence of a DJ, his timely hype,dress sense, time to end the programme or acknowledge celebrities, can only be achieved by him.
He said he had an ‘electrifying’ European tour where he visited Paris, France, and engaged in rendezvous with esteemed producers, legendary DJs and fervent entertainment aficionados.
He said from France, he arrived Amsterdam, Holland, where he dialogued with top sculptor, Nelson Carrilho, who has numerous landmark pieces all over Europe, prominent promoters, lounge proprietors, and pioneering producers among others. (NAN)
Edited by Folasade Adeniran