Nigerian rapper,
In a 5-part story obtained the media, the rapper shared emotional details about what happened in his career since he got signed to Chocolate City.
The rapper was signed by M.I Abaga to Loopy Music in 2013, but made a splash during the 2015 merger of the record label with Chocolate City as one of the artistes who were officially signed. He went on to release a number of singles under the record label, including featuring on their 2015 compilation album, ‘The Indestructible Choc Boi Nation’.
A couple of weeks ago it was revealed that Milli, was no longer with the record label, and it was confirmed by the label that the release was amicable.
In the story, the rapper revealed that his time at Loop was filled with a refusal to allow him release music, a concerted effort to hold him back, and revelations about why he has been unable to release new music.
Milli admitted that his relationship with Chocolate City was never one that favored him, instead his expertise was used to release music for M.I Abaga and the Chocolate City label.
“It’s been a long journey – one year in 2014 with M.I. writing and co-producing the Chairman album, and another year in 2015 being signed with Loopy and Choc City, writing and co-producing the TICBN album, and working on individual Choc City artist projects,” the rapper said.
In an emotional revelation he emphatically stated that label CEO M.I Abaga was responsible for many of his troubles, including withholding his collaboration with Wizkid, and also making him change his style of artistry to ‘fit in’.
“I know some of y’all have been asking about the Wizkid feature and if it that was even true. Well, it did exist, and still exists. I did have a song with Wiz, which was also supposed to have M.I on it, but unfortunately he took it from me.
“M.I gave me a choice – if I wanted to put out Unlooking, I would have to give up the Wizkid feature. I guess nobody in their right mind would give up a feature with Wiz, but I did believe in Unlooking, and everybody around me wanted me to release it. Also, I didn’t want my first release to be a feature, and I knew I could always find him again, so I gave up the Wizkid track and prepared the release of Unlooking.
“I created Unlooking in a really unique way. When I first wrote it, the verses were different, not Pidgin, but M.I asked me to rewrite the song, and had me change it from English into Pidgin, to be more “street”… so I did, even though I never enjoyed remaking the song. But I wanted to make him happy so I would get all the support I needed by the time Unlooking was coming out. Unfortunately, after so much time rewriting it, when I finally dropped the song, he didn’t support me and Unlooking wasn’t pushed.”
He also made claims that M.I failed to support his single ‘Unlooking’, and sadly supported other artistes with similar elements of his art. Stating that although he popularized ‘Dabbing’ within industry circles, M.I Abaga showed him minimum support, but showered it on Olamide’s ‘Oya dab’.
“He didn’t put much effort into promoting it, I could tell, and after Unlooking, all these new dab songs started coming out and the move that I had started was jacked from me… I saw M.I supporting Olamide’s dab and it really hurt me.
I thought M.I was ashamed of me. He was telling people that Unlooking was just 60% of what it could have been, and that the only reason people liked it was because it was in Pidgin. There was no budget for promotion, so I had to hustle by myself, but I am just one person and I can’t win if my own people don’t believe in me…” Milli said.
Tired of the lack of activity on his career, Mill found sponsors who would partner with Chocolate City to push his record, and help create an imprint under Chocolate City, but that was rebuffed by M.I. That was when he had to leave the record label.
“In December last year, I met some cool and serious people that not only believe in me and my music, but they also want to see me shine. My new team wanted to work with Choc City but Choc City didn’t want that.
“All this while, all CC artists were told to build their own teams. And here I was, with a dope team that wanted nothing from the label but the opportunity to invest in me, and work on my promo and branding together with the label, and CC said no. They said “Either all us or nothing”.
“So what choice did I have? Sit and wait some more, or work with people who actually believe in me? I didn’t want to leave the label, but they didn’t really leave me a choice… So as much as it pained me to leave my fam behind, we started the release process in January…”
Milli is set to unveil his new record label, “Up Next”, where he will seek to restart his career, and take full artistic control of his music.
“But I’ve got my own label now, Up Next, a dope team, and I’ve got you guys, and that’s all I need. But I can’t lie, it’s gonna be tough. I already know that he and his people have been talking to the media, and I don’t know how that will affect what the blogs will write, and how much radio and TV airplay I will get for my music… Maybe they will shut me out, he has people everywhere, so it’s possible for him to do things his way… Some of the social media influencers even told me they don’t want to promote my new projects, for fear of upsetting M.I or Choc City…’