As Made In Lagos clocks 1 year, it becomes the most successful album in the history of African music

It’s no news that African music has been a force to reckon with for decades, music legends likes like Miriam Makeba, Manu Dibango, Hugh Masekela, Fela Kuti and Angelique Kidjo contributed hugely to the global acceptance of African music, their body of works and songs travelled far beyond African music landscape. However, they’ve impacted African music culture and had commercial success in the world most competitive music market “US” before the advent of social media and streaming era, they built the foundation of the spotlight African music is enjoying right now.

In the last decade, we’ve seen the rise of a new generation of African artistes that took it upon themselves to push African music culture to the world, amongst them is Wizkid, a grammy award winning artiste, he has been the face of Afrobeats for a decade. In Addition, he has had a significant impact on the culture more than his contemporaries, he released an album “Made In Lagos” that went ahead to become the most successful African album ever, an album that has been enjoying a commercial success and wide acceptance from music lovers across the world.

3 years after Wizkid announced his fourth studio album, like a butterfly in between thorns, “Made In Lagos” fell right in the hands of critics. Criticism is unavoidable in music but for artistes like Wizkid, the criticism falls like the first rain of the season every time he drops new music. When “Made In Lagos” dropped, there were mixed reactions on social media, the album came as an unexpected package. After the criticism Wizkid’s 3rd studio album “Sounds From The Other-sides” received in 2017, people thought “Made In Lagos” was going to be entirely different not knowing that “Sounds From The Other-side” was actually an introduction to what “Made In Lagos” would sound like. “Made In Lagos”, an album that anyone with ears for good music would fall in love with right from the track 1, it was a love at first listening for many people. Wizkid took his time to sharpen his swords on both edges to cut through both Nigerian and international market.

The album was painstakingly crafted, each tracks painted with liquitex on a Bristol board, a well curated album to serve multiple purpose, put smile on the faces of every listener and be a pace setter for Afrobeats music. “Made In Lagos”, an album recorded in a pattern, with exceptional tracklisting, it is best enjoyed when you listen to the album accordingly, listening to the album feels like reading a story, each track with different message, talking about a perfect album, “Made In Lagos” is definitely more than an album, it’s a masterpiece. The production quality of the album oozes excellence and brilliance, you could hear every instrument and words without hassle, it’s a game changer for Nigerian music production, the producers brought their A game to the table and “Whoisdro” did an excellent job with the mixing and mastering of every track, P2J also did a brilliant job with the production, Wizkid and his team took their time to put every pieces together to make a whole.

Fans have had difficult time picking favorites on the album, every track has its audience, and everybody’s favorite kept on changing day after day, you can’t even point to one track being the Judas amongst the 14 disciples because every track is appealing to a large number of audience. Listening to “Made In Lagos” became an addiction for music lovers, it’s impossible to quench the thirst for the album, you will always end up feeling unsatisfied. Instead of making an album with couple of stand out tracks to carry the album, Wizkid opted for a cohesive album where every track can stand on its own, he dwelled away from the regular path, carved a different pathway for himself and made music that would stand the test of time.

When the lead singles dropped, Wizkid’s intention became foggy, people expected a groovy song to be the lead single, especially a feature with Burna Boy (Ginger) to lead the way, but instead Wizkid dropped a well crafted song “Smile ft HER” and that was the beginning of the new era of Afrobeats music.

From the album line up, you could catch a glimpse of what the album would sound like, when people saw artistes like H.E.R, Ella Mai, Tems, Tay Iwar, Projexx, Terri and Damian Marley in the line up, the picture Wizkid has been painting for 3 years became clearer to people, he avoided tactical collaboration for commercial success and made music with people that would compliment his delivery on every track. Although some people had doubts but people that knew what Wizkid was capable of knew it would be a bad idea to ever doubt him.

Moments after the album dropped, it became a pandemic, the focal point on the album wasn’t static, the tracks with most attention kept on changing, it started with “Smile” and “No Stress” before the album dropped. However, after the release of the album, “Ginger” hijacked the attention and had a fair run of attention, a groovy track with mesmerizing melody and catchy hook, blowing up was a no brainer. “Blessed” couldn’t stand in the corner and watch “Ginger” get all the attention, it opened up its own banquet of attention, while “True Love”, “Sweet One” and “Piece of Me” battled themselves to be the next in line. Amidst all the battles for attention amongst the tracks, “Essence” was in a corner gyrating with its audience, waiting for the right moment to strike.

“Made In Lagos” didn’t need time to settle in the hearts of music lovers, it hit the ground running in Nigeria, becoming the first album to top Apple Music Nigeria chart before its release and it has spent a record 17 weeks (spread across 1 year) at no 1 on the chart. Moreover, the album also spread like wildfire in South Africa, spending months on their chart, with couple of certifications eligibility to its name in the country.

“Made In Lagos” took over the United Kingdom and it felt like the first rain after a long drought. The album peaked at no 1 on UK Apple Music chart despite the fact it dropped same day as Ariana Grande and Sam Smith’s albums, 2 of the biggest artistes in the world, becoming the second Nigerian album to top UK Apple Music chart. In addition, the album debuted at no 16 on UK Official chart in the first week of its release, becoming the second highest charting Nigerian album in UK. It became a topic for discussion in UK, a conversation broke out on Julie Adenuga Top 5 show where Julie and her friends picked their personal top 5 songs on Made In Lagos. Everybody on the show defended their opinions with facts and anybody with ears for good music will definitely agree with everybody’s pick. However, it’s no surprise that “Made In Lagos” did well in UK from the release day, UK has literally been his second home for close to a decade, he has found his way to the heart of black community and people of different races living in UK.

After series of knocking at the door to US market, Wizkid finally came in with “Made In Lagos” as the masterkey to open the door, took his time to forge a sound that would appeal to his home fan base and the ones outside that space, the land is now fertile for every crop of different Afro sounds to grow. This is a cultural reset for Afrobeats music, and Wizkid makes sure he sets the records straight, “it’s not about me, it’s about the Afrobeats culture”. Made In Lagos album peaked at no 5 on US Apple Music and no 3 on US itunes on the first day of release, these milestones are records in Afrobeats history. In addition, it also debuted at no 80 on Billboard 200 album chart, and no 2 on Billboard World Album chart, becoming the second highest peaking album as at last year. It’s quite certain that many albums do reach their peak in the first week of release, but it’s a different story for “Made In Lagos”, its peak was very far ahead of the album. First week sales and streams of an album are proves of how big an artiste is, not really about the quality, what separates good music from regular songs is longevity and replay value. However, reaching new audience and keeping old ones are things only few albums can boast of in this past 12 months.

Months after the release of “Made In Lagos” album, it has seen a huge surge in streams and sales in US, it has risen to a new peak at no 28 on Billboard 200 chart, becoming the highest peaking Afrobeats album on the chart, however it has also reached a new peak at no 1 on billboard World Album chart. Meanwhile, according to Billboard, Made In Lagos has 281.1m on demand streams in US only.

“Made In Lagos” journey started with “Smile” and “No Stress”, they were the frontrunners for the album, the baton was passed to “Ginger” when the album dropped, “Blessed” took charge later on and eventually “Essence” got to hold the baton in its hand. If we could recall, Wizkid said “Tems and I made magic” and that word has proven to be true, “Essence” dominance has been magical, it has grown beyond African music landscape, it’s now a successful Afrobeats crossover song to pop culture, it has transcended Afrobeats culture. Essence build up was as beautiful as the sunset, it picked pace when the video dropped outside Africa, a video that interprets the beauty of the song perfectly. However, it opened the world’s ears to the song, garnering more audience for “Made In Lagos” album day by day. Afrobeats music reach outside Africa has been limited to certain areas, the genre is not new to the world but basically the genre has only been scratching the surface and “Essence” came in to change the game, it broke into the world biggest music market “United States”, gained popularity amongst black folks and eventually spread across different races in the States. Like I said earlier, Afrobeats music isn’t new to the world but there are some certain things that have been eluding the grasp of Afrobeats music, Billboard Hot 100 chart was certainly one of them until “Essence” came in to the picture. Months ago, hands were up in the air, teeth were flashing and faces were blushing, celebration in the air as “Essence” became the first Nigerian song to make an appearance on Billboard Hot 100 chart, the most competitive music chart in the world, it debuted at no 82 on the chart with 3m radio audiences, a collaboration between two Nigerian artistes produced by Nigerian producers broke the hymen to Billboard Hot 100 chart. “Essence” audience grew beyond streams and sales, getting “song of summer” shouts amongst Americans, it’s been the go-to song for American celebrities’ Instagram story videos. The song grew massively to the extent of getting Justin Bieber’s attention, which prompted a remix. At first, people’s emotions were clashing, some people felt the remix was not needed in a way to gatekeep Afrobeats music but eventually Wizkid’s decision to release the remix has proven to be the right one. The remix in conjunction with the original song, took “Essence” from no 44 to a new peak at no 9 position on Billboard Hot 100 chart, and also from top 40 to no 16 on UK Official chart. The rise on chart didn’t happen once, the audience for both version grew the song, rising every week across different charts worldwide to the extent of reaching new peaks on Billboard Hot 100 and UK Official chart, at no 9 and no 16 respectively. “Essence” has spent 16 weeks on Billboard Hot 100 chart, 20 weeks on UK Official chart and also 13 weeks at no 1 on Billboard Digital song sales chart. On the day the remix dropped, according to “chartdata” on twitter, “Essence” became the fastest Nigerian song to sell 500,000 units in US, making it eligible for gold certification and it also became the first Nigerian song to sell 1,000,000 units in US, making it eligible for platinum certification. In addition, “Essence” is now certified Silver in UK, Gold in Canada and New Zealand.

“Essence” remix served as the lead single for the deluxe version of “Made In Lagos”, with 3 additional tracks, which dropped 2 weeks after the remix. However, the deluxe came to add more value, and increase the reach of the album, it came as the icing on the cake for Wizkid fans across the world. The deluxe version increased “Made In Lagos” visibility and pushed the album to a record peak of no 28 on Billboard 200 chart, with 57% increase in units sold in US in a week. However, “Made in Lagos” is now the longest charting Nigerian album on Billboard world album chart, spending 50 weeks on chart, the album has spent 17 weeks on Billboard 200 album chart, while Wizkid became the only Nigerian artiste to simultaneously make an appearance on Billboard Hot 100 and Billboard 200 charts.

Amongst the album that dropped in 2020, “Made In Lagos” is the Uy Scuti amongst other stars, it has garnered over 1billion streams across 6 streaming platforms, now take a stroll back in history, there is literally no Nigerian album that has an edge over Made In Lagos, Superstar album happens to be a glimpse of Wizkid’s artistry, “Made In Lagos” is an exhibition of excellence, it is head and shoulders above every other album, it is the only Nigerian that cuts across commercial success and sonic appeal. Solid body of works ain’t stranger to Nigerian music landscape, from Wizkid’s “SFTOS” , Burna Boy’s “African Giant” to the grammy winning album “Twice As Tall”, Afrobeats has produced albums with qualities enough to compete at the top level in world most competitive music markets. Moreover, in a wolf pack of alphas, Made In Lagos happens to be the alpha of alphas, no other album stands a chance beside it.

According to Billboard and Rollingstone, Wizkid’s “Made In Lagos” and “Essence” featuring Tems are being considered for nominations in “Best Global Album” and “Best Global Performance” categories, with the hope for more nominations in major categories. Furthermore, potential Grammy nominations and potential Grammy wins will only add finishing touches to what Made In Lagos has built.

As we celebrate Made In Lagos 1st year anniversary, it looks like the sun is just rising, the deluxe has added more value and refined the album, it’s far from its climax stage because when the tracks on the deluxe eventually leave Essence shadow, it’s going to be a real pandemic.

With the global acceptance of Made In Lagos album, it’s a no brainer that fans deserve to experience Wizkid live on stage, the Youtube Live Made in Lagos performance left people in awe, the synergy between Wizkid and the live band is something nobody would ever want to miss, everybody wants to see Wizkid perfom live on stage. However, Wizkid announced “Made In Lagos North American and UK Tour”, which kickstarted in a 10,000 capacity venue in New York City, tickets for shows in different cities in US & Canada were sold out in minutes, that explains how much people really want to experience Made In Lagos live performance and also buttresses the point Made In Lagos audiences are not bots, they are humans with ears for good music. Meanwhile, some venues had 2 dates because of high demands, people that missed out on tickets for the first date got the chance to try their luck again, and also those that got tickets for the first date had the chance to see him again. The US tour was attended by top American celebrities from each city Wizkid visits for performances, seeing these people take time out of their busy schedules to see the boy from Surulere perform on stage was so pleasing to the eyes. Furthermore, American celebrities like Rihanna, ASAP Rocky, Saweetie, Kevin Hart, Ty Dollar Sign, Winnie Harlow, Wiz Khalifa etc graced different venues with their appearance. In addition, Wizkid made history in UK, he sold out O2 Arena, a 20,000 capacity venue in London in less than 8 minutes, becoming only the 6th artistes in the world to sell out the busiest music venues in the world. However, the demands were so high that Wizkid had to add 2 more dates to satisfy his UK fans, and tickets were sold out in 2 minutes and 35minutes respectively with over 25,000 people waiting on the queue for tickets, you can tell how much he is loved in UK.

Being the flag bearer of Afrobeats music comes with great responsibilities and Wizkid has risen to the occasion of making Afrobeats music the center of attention across the world. He has put African Music in a big spotlight with Made In Lagos, he has broken the seal to a new level of global acceptance with his the album, forging a pathway for other African artistes. The cultural impact this album is having on African music landscape will live for ages, it’s an ocean of different benefits for generations to come. On the journey to make sure Afrobeats has the world attention, Wizkid ensures the attention is on African sound rather than himself, he has proven himself to be selfless in the quest to level the playing ground for Afrobeats across the globe. Wizkid took his shot at US market with precision this time around after testing the water with “Sounds From The Other Sides” and it’s a success for Afrobeats music, “Made In Lagos” is an album every artiste would be proud to call their own.