American born, Senegalese singer, rapper, producer, actor and song writer, Aliaume Damala Badara Akon Thiam better known as Akon is one artiste whose works transcends boundaries and barriers. His quick rise in the buzzling American music industry is very fascinating considering the fact that he just came out of prison when he decided to go into music. He rose to prominence with his first single “Locked Up” from his debut album “Trouble” and he went on to become a household name that every artistes wanted to work with him.
Akon’s music career spanned over a decade and his achievements are impressive. With four albums released from 2004 till date, the singer has been able to remain relevant in his music and other spheres of life. As reported by Wikipedia –
“He is the first solo artist to hold both the number one and two spots simultaneously on the Billboard Hot 100 charts twice. Akon has had four songs certified as 3× platinum, three songs certified as 2× platinum, more than ten songs certified as 1× platinum and more than ten songs certified as gold in digital sales. Akon has sung songs in other languages including Tamil, Hindi, and Spanish. He was listed by the Guinness Book of World Records as the #1 selling artist for master ringtones in the world.”
As impressive as his achievements are let’s not forget that most of this records and achievements were within a certain period of his earlier career when everything was still going rosy for the pop singer. There are rumours and hearsays abour the singers career to have dwindled over the years due to his close association with Nigerian artistes. Akon fell in love with Nigerian music and he showed interest in working with Nigerian artistes which led to collaborating with almost any Nigerian artistes that comes his way. His first collaboration with a Nigerian artiste was with Wizkid on a remix of his song. He later went on to sign Nigerian duo P-Square and they did a song together featuring May D titled “Chop My Money“. His recent collaboration was with B-Red for the song “Cucumber“.
Do you believe Akon’s career has declined due to his association with Nigerian artistes? Could it be that he made himself too conventional with Nigerians? I really don’t know what came about this thought but I’ve heard it almost everytime Akon’s music careers topic comes up. I have decided to throw this topic to the floor and let our esteem Naijaloadedites share their opinion on what they think if they believe it’s true or do you think his music career was already dwindling before he began to associate himself with Nigerian artistes and it’s all just a superstitious talk?
Share your thoughts below, we would love to hear from you.
Credit: Naijaloaded
