by Demola Rewaju

The other half of the problem was that his beats always seem to sound so much alike with the heavy reggaeton sequence.

It’s hard to imagine that Nigeria’s one time favourite music star, Terry G seems to be struggling to maintain relevance in an industry that has evolved several times in the past decade.

Terry G is an immense talent on the beat and an artiste with a knack for knowing what the audience want to listen to. He started out as a backup singer to ex Plantashun Boi, Faze and was on course to sign a music deal with his label INDEPENDENT, but somehow skipped that and released his debut album titled “Free Me” with Bluemoon entertainment.

Before then, I’d seen him in a video with some aspiring female acts and it wasn’t such a bad video. His first album had good songs but I guess people weren’t really ready to listen to Terry G’s good songs so, he switched. And what a switch it was…

Having produced Ay.Com’s hit song ‘Pass Me Your Love’ which became a major hit, every aspiring artiste flocked to Terry G’s studio in Iju-Fagba area. It was quite easy really: if he could make a hit out of an artiste with average talent, what couldn’t he do with one that’s talented?

He and Timaya brought 2Shotz back into limelight for one brief shiny moment with the song ‘In Case You Never Know’ and from then on, both he and Timaya seemed to enjoy a relationship that has lasted for a while. At a point in fact, the Alaba marketers wouldn’t push your album if it didn’t have a track featuring Timaya or one produced by Terry G. Terry G suddenly became the go-to guy for music production.

And that was part of the problem. Terry G’s popular hit ‘Free Madness’ was a song with a beat allegedly produced for some aspiring artistes and in all the story that followed, Terry G’s profile rose and he became a force to reckon with in the music industry.

The other half of the problem was that his beats always seem to sound so much alike with the heavy reggaeton sequence. Actually, that’s not a problem because many international producers usually have beats that sound alike in some way: Dr Dre, Timbaland and Pharrell Williams of Neptunes being the first that come to mind…

But this is Nigeria and our people get bored very easily. Terry G struggled with the House of Ginjah album ‘Ginjah Your Swagga’ and his own ‘Terry Gzus’. The problem is that madness has a personal limit and there’s always someone with more madness (except you’re Charly Boy) but Terry G did capture our attention for a while.

Well now he’s back. Releasing hits from an album to be called ‘Lucifa’ which he says somehow means ‘Look, see far’. The video for ‘See Groove 2′ is out and is already being criticised for having too many foreign girls but I don’t see how that is much of an issue. For me, the song sounds too much like Timaya’s ‘Shake Your Bum Bum’. Maybe they’re both related after all…

Yet I’m certain that Benue state born Akpako master has a place in the industry that is assured no matter what happens. He seems to be a talented singer and producer with an ear for what the crowd wants. He’s had his moment of madness, it’s now time to move into the moment of talent. Whether he makes that move is what’s left to be seen.

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Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.