Blackface Speaks On Writing Tuface's Hit Song, African Queen

Tuface, Blackface and Faze came into the Nigerian music industry as The Plantashun Boys more than a decade ago, and then after a very successful album, they went their separate ways. This is very typical of groups, and even though they appeared to be a little tension when the split was fresh, they are matured about it now. But, going back to when they first split up, it is funny to know that the song that actually blew Tuface up big time was written by his ex-plantashun boys member, Blackface.



In a recent interview, Blackface spoke on his joint ownership of the rights to the song (African Queen), and how the song came about.

I know the song has generated a whole lot of revenue. Right now, I and Tuface have joint ownership of that song. But from the inception it was not like that. My publisher, BMI had to find a way to work that out. All the funds the song has been generating I’m supposed to have 50 per cent of it, which I’m not getting and I don’t just know what is happening. There is even a situation whereby somebody in Jamaica sang African Queen and some other persons like that of which I was not aware. Nobody told me that he was going to sing my song. So, there are some issues that I and Tuface need to sit down and iron out, but Tuface is difficult to get on the table. So I have decided to do it on my own. Surely, with time we’ll get to the root of the matter because we both have 50 per cent right to the song.

That means Tuface has been cheating you
Yes, because I was not being paid and you know the way it is in Nigeria, the ideology is that because one is not on one particular record label they won’t put his name to a song he wrote just because they don’t want to promote the person. But the fact is that your intellectual property remains you intellectual property, nobody can take that away from you.

But you sang your own version of the song
Yes, I have a reggae version of African Queen, which I’m still going to re-record. I did that because there was a time some people were trying to claim ownership of the song.

Did you ask him to include the song in his album?
Yes, we wrote it together and I gave him permission to do so because when he was recording his album we were still living in the same apartment. I found out that the album was not making any sense, so I told him that the only thing that will allow the album to make sense is to include the song African Queen which we both wrote. But I didn’t say he should take away my own right. That is the rider. For the fact that I wrote a song for you to perform does not mean you should claim it and deprive me of my own right.

Who came up with the idea of the song?
It was actually one Idoma man called Willy Walkman. He told us to do a song for his soap opera and the title of the soap opera was African Queen that we should write a theme song for the soap. We started writing in earnest. Then one day he just came and was like, we are not serious about it that he didn’t want to be our manager again not knowing that we were already doing what he asked us to do. That was how he threw us out. So African Queen was Willy’s idea. (lindaikeji.blogspot.com)