3. Community and Culture at Amapiano District

Building a Community Around Sound: The Lagos Spirit of Amapiano District

How do you choose your performers?

Like, oh, how do you choose DJs? How do you choose that drum guy, that wheezy drum guy?

Whatever you do, please sign contracts with that guy, please.

So how do you say fresh and different from different?

AY: So you asked me how do we choose DJs and performers.

I never answered that question. Yeah, it’s true. You never answered it. How do you guys choose them? So this can be tricky, right? So we used to. You know, I mentioned that we’ve run through a lot of local talents in Lagos, right? We also did the same in Abuja when we went to Abuja.

So we used to do like auditions, right?

Are you serious?

Yeah. You have to send us to SoundCloud. You want to play at Amapiano District. It’s a free platform. Like it’s a platform for talent, right? We want to put you on there.

How do you think we discovered Dope Cesar? Dope Cesar blew up on Amapiano District stage. That’s the biggest DJ in Nigeria right now, if not Africa. She blew up in Amapiano District.

So yeah, we audition. We send our SoundCloud. We have a team, we listen to it and hear a sound out. I also am very, very particular about talent. I’m not a talent manager, but I’m so particular about talent.

Nobody spots talent up to me. It’s because, for example, Active Boy. That’s my good work. I can go on and on and on and on when it comes to talent. There’s a guy I went to school from Ibadan. His name is Collins. Collins of Hype is the next best thing. The guy works with us at Volt right now.

Then I used to pay for a train for him to come to Lagos every Thursday because I knew that he has talent. So I’m very, very particular about spotting talent.

So we already know the performance. We know the kind of vibe we want to give you people.Everybody offers something different.

Any stage in the party, I want you to sweat, right? So we’ll bring best. Best is the best guy and get to dance. You don’t know how to dance. Just stay in the mosh pit. Let’s best teach you. Do like this, Do like that. Put your head. It will teach you how to dance, right? You guys will do around the circle.

So we are giving you an activity to make you have fun than opposed to come to a party and just looking. We are creating an environment where there’s something radical that would probably make you meet someone, have a conversation with someone, or you dance. Do you understand?

Yeah, please do let me know quickly. All right, all right, all right, all right. Then once you’ve done all of that activity, once you believe that you don’t sweat small, there’s a little bit of dopamine in your system.

We now increase the volume. We now introduce three combinations, We introduce Nino, we introduce Active Boy, and we introduce a drummer. Now that combination, it evokes the spirit of high rich energy. We now already give you red lights. So it’s more of, as much as a party, there’s a lot of psychology that goes into it, So you are hearing of sound. You are seeing lights that are red, that is bringing a rich and don’t forget, we’ve already brought out your dopamine site because we made you sweat.

And now there’s Active Boy that is telling you things that you did not know that someone on the mic wanted to tell you. Oh, I just want to dance, my problem will go. You don’t understand. Shake your body. Move your body.

All of those things. By the time we introduce this thing, at the right time, you don’t have a choice. You’re going to have a good time. Then the other life that we introduce are truly like things that we can do. You just got to do that thing. If we realise that you are good at making people dance to heavy drum music, we’re going to put you at somewhere in the peak hours.

Realise that there’s someone that’s saying she’s going to work for Beat FM. She likes funk music, so she merges Funk with Amapiano. That was probably one of the best that my piano set I’ve ever seen. So it’s dependent on what you are good at. Once we know what you are good at, we plug you in.

But you have to be good. If you’re not good, you can’t play at my piano show. It’s not possible.

We had a district party in Abuja, So taking it to Abuja was very easy.

The only challenge we had on the culture perspective was I was told that nobody in ABJ does ravers and tables. The Chinese, the Indian, the Lebanese guys told me that AY, still is not going to work. You cannot put ravers and put tables beside them because it is not normal in ABJ, If you are doing a table thing, call it a table thing. If you are doing a rave thing, call it a rave. And we pulled it off, right? For the first time, they are seeing people that want to rave and the ballers that want their table and bottles.

 So what keeps your audience coming back? How do you keep the experience fresh?

We engineer emotions. I always want to know what’s happening on the dance floor or at the party every hour, from 8 to 9, 9 to 10, 10 to 11, and 11 to 12. By 12, if you’re not tipsy, it probably means you didn’t drink alcohol, and that means you should be on your way. That’s the most honest way I can put it.

I’m very good at assessing my audience, I’m not joking. I keep the experience fresh by introducing hemes. Every edition has its own theme.

For example, when we had Jungle Fever, we created a full jungle vibe. When we did Piano Therapy, the DJs and performers wore lab coats with stethoscopes, and we even had nurses around.

We keep it fresh because our audience never fully knows what to expect. We give them a hint of what’s coming, but we still surprise them. For Piano Blackout, everyone wore black. For the Barbie Edition, all the girls dressed in pink.

This year, we’ve added more creativity, more concepts, it’s no longer a one-person show. The last edition was Piano Origins, which had a deep, dark theme. And when we did No Love in Lagos for Valentine’s last year, it was open to people who didn’t have a Valentine, so they could still come out and enjoy themselves.

I think what keeps people coming back every edition is grace and love. We always create with love. When people spend their money, they know they’re getting quality. We give that back to them every time.

This is an Interview to understand Amapaino District, this is part 3, click here for part 4 and here for part 2

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