It will be a disservice to put just one name on what Edi Lawani does in the entertainment sector. With a career spanning over three decades, Lawani is one of the prominent event organisers and music promoters in the Nigerian entertainment industry. In this incisive and revealing conversation with eelive.ng he shares his humble beginnings, fame, the ever-changing landscape of showbiz and how the defunct musical group Plantashun Boiz was discovered.
How does one describe what you do in the entertainment sector?
Well, I have been different things over the years. From being a university undergraduate events promoter, organising beauty pageants and musical shows, a journalist, a teacher, an artiste manager and a music administrator with Performing Musicians Association of Nigeria (PMAN). All that put together kind of guided me through to where I play in the industry right now: ‘special event production’.
So right now, if you ask me what I do, I’d probably just say I’m a special event consultant – that makes me a specialist in event production and management. And with event production and management, the experience from the music background, artiste management, journalism, experience in radio, media and TV all come together in helping to create a vision of conceptualizing and creating ideas for events and seeing them through.
So, what exactly does that entail? Do people just come to you to plan their events?
Yes, it can come in two ways. People have an idea that they want to do events and come to us. The first question will be what is the brief, what do you want to do and what do you want to achieve? Others come, and they have had an event for a while but want to do it better or they want to redefine it. So, we engage. If it means starting from the scratch with the brief, you can think it through, come up with the concept, come up with the creative direction, define the necessary tools and resources you need to get that achieved. If the client agrees, we go on to budgeting and preparation, get the show done. After that, we embark on an evaluation: did we achieve what the client wanted? If client is happy, you know you have yourself a new client, you can do it again; if client is not happy, we would have learnt a lesson on how to do it better next time. Luckily, we rarely have cases where clients are dissatisfied.
So, what you do for the client is both creative and technical?
Yes, depending on what they want. We handle both end to end but clients sometimes can be specific and say I have a planner, we have our idea, we have our concept. Sometimes they have an idea but don’t know how to bring it to life; how to achieve the different layers needed for that overall objective. Sometimes somebody could want a bottle to drop down from the sky, but he has no idea as to how to accomplish that and make it believable, so we work through it together. That means we are involved in a lot of research and in most cases, we find a way to achieve what the client wants.
What exactly led you into entertainment?
It started when I was a student of the Bendel State University which is now Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma. It was a new school then as I was in the second set; 82/83 set. I left in 1986. Because it was a new school, the hostel was in one end, classes were scattered all over town. We were having classes in secondary schools because the permanent site was under construction. Social life was very low on campus especially for someone like me who was coming from Lagos to Ekpoma. I had a stint at Lagos State College of Science and Technology for A levels before I got admission into Ekpoma so I had an idea what life on campus was.
The heartbeat was different at Ekpoma and I was a young man with a lot of hot blood, so I just felt like school was boring.
Everyone was talking but not doing anything about it and I always hated being part of a problem without finding solutions. So, I got a few friends together and we started organising Sunday jams. We would go to University of Benin and Auchi Polyethnic to get artistes who would come and mime on stage. After a while, we started putting pageants together. That was how I started. I saw a need; a void and I found a way to fill it. When I graduated, I got involved straightaway with radio. My uncle, Mike Ukanine, worked with Voice of Nigeria and as an undergraduate, I used to go with him and function as a stringer. I used to read news and get involved with their drama in Radio Nigeria on an ad hoc basis. So, I had this exposure and drive which made me know a lot of people in the media, radio and TV.
As a child growing up, was there any inclination towards the media?
Growing up, radio was my biggest companion – short wave radio. I used to listen to a lot of radio stations as far as Gabon, Congo Brazzaville and Cameroun. Those stations played about every kind of music; western music, African music and everything mixed together. I used to have a timetable where I hopped from one station to the other, I would not sleep. And it was only during harmattan you get new stations because the airwaves were kind of freaky at that time. I would listen to a particular song and then wait sometimes for two weeks hoping they will play it again so I could catch the information like the name of the artiste or producer which I didn’t catch the first time. I later formed the habit of going to record shops to listen to music and read up album covers. I used to go about gathering used and old batteries and I had a formula for getting them to work again. I never ran out of batteries for my radio.
My parents did not know this because I was always in my room. I did my chores during the day and listened to radio in the dead of night and I woke up in the morning with red eyes and went to school like that. Fortunately, my school, St’ Paul Anglican Grammar School, Igarra, Akoko-Edo area of Edo state, was just about five minutes’ walk from my house.
So how did you transit from journalism into events?
I got out of university in 1986, did my National Youth Service Corps with the Nigeria Navy in Calabar after which I spent the next two years trying to get into the army. For some reason, I wasn’t lucky enough to get through. So, I got involved with acting as a student of English and Literary Studies at Ekpoma. During this time, some guys were trying to put up what would have been the first privately produced film for TV but again they had challenges. I spent a lot of time doing that with them. After that, I got a job with PUNCH. I worked there for a brief period between 1987 and 1988 and went on to work for Solana Olumhense as a stringer when they set up City Temple. In the event of my hopping around journalism circle and my background interest in music, I went to interview Tony Okoroji of PMAN; he was president then in 1990. And I had quite an interest in music business than making a record. We talked about copyright and royalty and formed a friendship with PMAN. They later made me a member of the organising committee of their Nigeria Music Awards. The committee also included Femi Akintunde Johnson, FAJ and Mayor Akinpelu at different times.
When I had to go for my post-graduate studies at the University of Lagos, I promised PMAN that as part of my own contributions to developing the Nigeria music space, I was going to work for them almost for free for a while. So, when I finished my Post-Graduate Diploma in Mass Communication in UNILAG, I went back there and worked for them for about one and a half years which looked like forever because I was deep into everything that has to do with the organization.
I left PMAN and got an office on the same premises where they had their office and most of the artistes that I used to interface with at PMAN were still coming to me to solve problems, so I became some type of consultant to most of the musicians, from Alex Zitto to Ben Okri to Daniel Wilson and Isaac Black. I did this more like a friend to most of them because they didn’t have permanent managers at this time, so I filled in for them in the interim. I assisted in logistics about their tours, rehearsals and all such. Then after a while, the workload became a lot, so I started charging a consulting fee. I registered consulting services and dedicated Thursdays as free clinic for young artistes who were trying to find their path to getting a producer or making an album. I could call up a producer, make a case on someone’s behalf, hook another person up with a record company. I did that for people like Shotgun, Felix and Moses, Sunny Neji, Edmund Spice. They were the young boys of that time, even Isaac Black was a young artiste. After that phase of free consulting, I started getting involved with managing artistes. I started with Felix and Moses, two young boys trying to make to make an impact. Then June 12 came, and everything went into backslide.
What we did then was because most of the young artistes couldn’t maintain a band, I encouraged the boys to come together and because I was working with different artistes I could guarantee them gigs. They were not going to parties like Shuga Band, but they were there as utility band. When you want to have an award event where you don’t want to bring so many bands, they could be there and go through the music of twenty artistes in one night. So, when I had a concert, they could be there and play for five artistes in one night. All of that was finding a solution to problems that young artistes faced. Felix Duke who later became a solo artiste, used to be a drummer in one of those bands.
I set up my office for artiste management but I wasn’t making money. However, there was an advantage in the fact that I remained close to PMAN because it was easy for people to reach me. Each time I took my artistes to events, I would also check out costumes, sound quality and all of that. People started seeing a difference in the artistes that I was managing, who were at that time at the bottom of the chain because the Kimonos and Mike Okris and co were bigger than them. I understood that the only way for them to catch up was to be very good at what they did. So whenever we had shows, people saw that and the artistes I worked with were much more good performers in terms of timing and choreography because we put a lot of time into rehearsing. Although, I wasn’t making money, I was making a point such that other artistes and even artiste managers started calling me to help with properly packaging their shows. I got involved with the sound, the light and planning. From doing it only for my artistes within a show, some promoters started asking me to take over the entire show. Sometimes when my artistes were not even involved in a show, I was called by promoters to help with stage management which was about making sure everything moved on smoothly from one artiste to the other. I started doing paper documentation which was never done at the time, that is, timing, proper sound checks. It was like breaking new grounds and then it just got bigger and bigger. I kept getting invitations to be stage manager or coordinator of shows. They did not call it producer then and what it usually entailed was that it had a sponsor who would have put money down and hired equipment but there must be an interface between the sponsor, the promoter, the agency, and the artiste to deliver the show. They needed someone to do the dirty part of the job. From being called stage manager, the industry started to realise that there was something called producer, and then director, technical director. It got better gradually. It took a bit of staying power within which rather than chasing titles, I was more concerned about getting the job done, and I say as long as the job is done, I don’t care what you call it.
What is the first big show in terms of size that you organised?
In most cases big shows and budget are not the same; they don’t exactly correlate. I had the opportunity to have been part of the legendary concert of Pa Ajilo. He used to be a stage manager and I had the opportunity to work with him as assistant stage manager on a couple of concerts. And when new promoters were springing up, they will entrust me to do their gigs. So I did Coca Cola, Jeans Carnival, Lekki Sunsplash was very big but I wasn’t the top man, I did a number of Star Mega Jam as stage manager; I probably did 80% of Star Mega Jam. I went on the road with Rothmans Groove as show coordinator and stage manager nationwide. Those were big, they were not early days, but they were big. It was on one of those occasions that we discovered The Plantashun Boiz.
Tell us about that
Because my office had become a Mecca of sorts for young artistes; a place where they had somebody who listened to them. Young artistes on the street who had nowhere to go will come and hang around at PMAN all day either looking for somebody to give them money or listen to their demos in cassette form. There were some that I would give money for a demo, some that I rented studios for and then my free Thursday clinic where I counselled. So one day, Willie Walkman with whom I used to work and is from Benue state came to my office and said there were two boys who wanted to see me. I saw them, and they sang. I noticed they had potential and coordination. They sang an acappella and had good voice. So, I promised to look out for opportunities and let them know.
Some months later, I was hired as artistic director/stage coordinator for the Rothmans Groove tour nationwide. Remedies had just made their first single and had been signed to go on the concert; 30 shows around the country which was big, but they needed younger artistes as opening acts. So, I suggested to the client that we can spread this opportunity to many more artistes and luckily, the client agreed. I gave them a budget that would allow us to have two or three smaller artistes open the gigs. I did two auditions where the client and agency were represented at Ozone and we were able to choose the lead act to open the shows. I remembered these two guys that were brought to me and started looking for them because they didn’t have a demo but I wanted the team to hear their voices. I went to Willie to ask for them but he had no idea how to reach them. Those days there were no mobile phones, but we learnt that they lived in Festac. I gave somebody money to go and look for them. They found them after three days and I brought them to the audition and they did very well and were signed on as the sub-head headline acts to The Remedies.
By the time we took them nationwide and the show was over, I took them under my wings. They were able to go to the studio to start making their record from the money they made from the tour. Imagine how they got their break, going on a nationwide tour without a record. I was their unofficial manager for a bit because we never had a contract with them. My method was just to help in whatever way I could and let the artiste go. I always tell them once they make their record, my interest is in the person who wants to make their next record. So, in the process of making their record, they went out one day, came back and they said they saw a boy and they liked and wanted him to join their group – that was Faze. So I said you are 2face, Blackface, but what are we going to call the new boy? So they said Faze. And that was it. My path crossed that of so many artistes people like Daddy Showkey and co but we did what we needed to do and just moved on to other things.
Was there any time you felt like taking the front role?
Never. I think sometimes we are wired to become what we might not be immediately conscious of. As a child growing up, my first interest of vocation was to become a Catholic priest and what I admired about Catholic priests was the fact that they didn’t get married, they didn’t own properties in the ideal situation. As a matter of fact, when you die, you can’t even be buried in your family house. It’s like you are gone, you are property of the church. So, there is this selflessness about it that I saw and that really interested me.
Afterwards, I wanted to be a soldier. And soldier from the point of view that I was reading all these books, revolutionaries at that time, Castro and those kinds of people. I had a Marxist mindset at that time. I wanted to be a soldier, so you can fight for your country not necessarily so that you can become anything; it was not a career. I channeled all of that into entertainment business. It was not about making money or being popular for me.
How lucrative has the business been?
Well, it can be more lucrative, but it hasn’t been bad compared to what it used to be. People now understand the value of what we do. It is not necessarily that you do little and get so much money, but we at least get by.
I will rather get paid a little more or no money at all, do a good show and leave it on record that I did a good show, than get a lot of money and not be satisfied that I have done a good show. If I had set up a record label, half of the stars in Nigeria would have been on my record label or my management stable but I never looked at it from that point. I wanted to see how we could give upcoming talent, the underdog a voice and bring them up. And by the time they get to when they can make money, I let go of them and look for the next set of prospects.
And it doesn’t matter that a lot of these artistes are now making money?
I’m happy. I am that kind of person who does things without thinking of the benefit derivable. I think we should go into things with the mindset of adding value, making a change or adding value to what is going on, you can get by financially and opportunities can come and then you can grow steadily. I know people who have been given big money to do projects, but they did not do more than that one project.
So, having the confidence of people is important than making money?
It is more important, and you see when I approach an event, I never say ‘oh we did this last year’ and continue to dwell on it. Once done with an event, that one is gone, it is like it never happened. This is why when I do an event, I hardly put them on social media. If you go on my social media page it’s as if I’m non-existent. I have done the show, it is gone, my own is what’s the next challenge. I don’t want to sit down and look at Facebook and say oh I pulled this off. No! What is the next challenge for me to achieve? That you stretch and challenge yourself, you are constantly in the fear of failure, because, in this business, you can do everything right and something still goes wrong. There is also a lot of gut factor, so you can’t just move around feeling like you are superstar. You must be humble, willing to learn and collaborate, listen to people’s opinion, never assume you know it all. You should also always be willing to teach people and share experiences. So teach, share knowledge, encourage people to be educated, develop yourself continuously.
What advice do you have for young people coming into this business?
Recently, I started something called Summer Tech School which is an informal tech school. Our motto is “think, learn, do, teach and share.” Now what I do is that I go to a location where people are disadvantaged, it’s outside Lagos for now. I started from Calabar, get people who are not interested in becoming musicians, people who do behind the scene work- the technician, the carpenter, try to get people to understand that beyond those who become superstars, there is an engine room.
So, we let them understand the ethics and professional code, and I say to them that there is a lot of benefit in working behind the scenes. Being in the limelight could be very fleeting for instance. Thirty years ago when I joined the industry, we had people like Mike Okri, Alex Zitto and the rest. How many of them still have the currency now? They are alive and doing well, but there have been different raves for several of the moments that have passed between then and now. So, as a behind the scenes person, you have a long lifespan; you don’t reign, you don’t fade.
How do you update yourself?
I never stopped studying, research, experiment. When I go to an event, I go for a meeting and somebody is saying something, I start sketching. Maybe a stage, or maybe before you finish expressing your thought, I will kind of finish it. I try to understand what is going on in other parts of the world; how can we make our environment better, what has worked, what doesn’t work and all. You cannot stay away from studying, interacting, looking at what other people are doing. If you see a problem in an event that is not yours, you try to solve that problem, you don’t wait until it happens to you. To be abreast is important.
Is any of your children interested in what you are doing?
Three of my kids are in university. My son is producing music although it has nothing to do with whether I encourage him or not, I won’t even take undue credit for that. The only thing I did when I noticed he has that flair was to give him a laptop to work with. In addition, when my kids were growing up, I exposed them to music education early. They had a piano teacher, they all learned how to play the violin, keyboard, my son added a guitar. I bought him a drum set when he was four years old, the same way I bought him a boxing gloves, so I kind of exposed them to the limit of whatever they wanted. They watched tons and tons of movies. I encouraged them to read books. At a point my son was enjoying soccer. I sent him to Arsenal training school during summer to go and be with other children from all over the world. I kind of gave them the platform to see the limits from zero to infinity and then they will now look at their own strength, form an opinion on what they want to be, opportunities available and where they best fit in.
Then my son started showing interest in producing music, fiddling with my laptop till I left it for him. I later bought him a Mac when he was like 13 or 14. Between then, he completed secondary school and when he went into the university, I bought him a studio. So instead of running around during that period when he was 14, 15, 16 years old, he was in the studio. Now, he produces his own music, he produces for other people, he sells them on online. I have nothing to do with that.
My daughter; the one who is the quieter that I thought probably wants to be a teacher is the one who has ended up now in performing art and the third one is into some medical study. If any of them takes after me, I would not be surprised because they have those possibilities. When my son is around, he joins the sound crew working. I really don’t know where they are going to end up. I respect the fact that they have their own calling, dreams, sentiment. But again, apart from my biological children, I have succeeded in grooming and encouraging many people that I consider them my professional children.