The hip hop community are at times a little
too hard on the Zim Hip Hop Awards organisers. It is a young event, still
growing and the organisers seem to have a lot to learn. It is not all their
fault, they organise an event with little corporate support despite its great
marketing and revenue making potential.
The awards are a symbol. People may run
them down all they want but we all know that as long as you are an artist, no
matter what you say about them, you WANT TO BE A PART OF THEM. Everyone wants acknowledgement
and that’s the exact opportunity that the awards offer. Very few hip hop
artists have had the great pleasure of a ZIMA or NAMA nomination, ZHHA is a
platform for all the hip hop artists in the country (and we have lots of them).
It’s a goal for artists, the measuring stick of their success.
We know it’s a young event and the
organisers do not have much experience so why do we blame them so much. The
ZIMAs/NAMAs are always just as bad if not worse. Squabbles about nominations,
winners, timekeeping, and the overall event itself. They obviously need time so
that they can learn the ropes on how to hold these awards in a manner as close
to perfect as possible. They need to be given this time. By us.
At the same time, the organisers need to
understand one thing. Just because the awards are in December, it doesn’t mean
work has to start in October. It can start as early as March; they need to have
a proper set up that allows for the recording of information during the year.
Artists should not have to send in their work for nominee consideration!! The
ZHHA organisers should be on top of their game, they should have records on
notable and other moves made in the industry during the course of THEIR WORKING
YEAR. If they
consider work up until 25th of October, they should
already (yes right now) be looking at the music that has come out since then. At
the end of the day that is where the nominees for the ZHHA 2014 are going to
come from.
A question for people in the industry: Have
the Awards been getting better since their inception in 2011 (the great
Blackbird beef year)? Have the organisers gained even the tiniest shred of
credibility since then? We certainly do not think so. (Oh, was that two
questions? Hahaha and another one right there)
At one end the noise begins with the
nominees. We should (and I’m sure they) know that there will always be noise
when it comes to nominees. We all have artists that we feel should’ve made the
cut but didn’t. It happens. Deal with it! As awards organisers, if they give us
a set of nominees, no matter the complaints or the noise that
fans/artists/critics/haters make, the organisers should stand by their decision.
The ZHHA organisers did the opposite. A lot of us thought Schingy deserved a
BEST NEWCOMER and maybe BEST VIDEO nomination. People made noise about it on
Facebook, on Twitter, in kombis , in studios, on blogs, at home to people who
didn’t care! Point is, people made noise. The biggest problem was that the ZHHA
organisers gave in to the noise, thereby in our view, diminishing their
credibility in as far as the other nominees. Everyone now wondered what it took
to get yourself on the nominee list, the noise of your fans? Although if you
look at it, it kind of makes sense! If your fans make noise and they put you on
the programme maybe your fans will come to the event, meaning revenue for them.
They aren’t total idiots. But they lost credibility to us.
Look we got past all that. It happens.
Normal nominee banter, happens everywhere right? Let’s move on and have the
awards. That’s what we thought right. Then a whole bunch of artists started
denouncing the awards. The likes of POY, saying he would not perform for free.
We thought that was kind of harsh of him, but hey, a man has his principles and
his is that there’s “Nothing for Mahala!”.
A whole bunch of other artists and producers seemed to go on a rant
about the whole thing, making it extremely hard for the organisers. How can we
host these properly without your support?
And theeeeeeeeeen we had pricing drama! Ooh
what drama it turned out to be! First announcements pegged tickets at $15 until
1 December when they would go up, and then obviously cost more at the door; but
that’s not how it turned out. When we think of it my eyes get teary! We bought
tickets for $15 and then these past two days tickets have been going for $10,
with mention of people getting a perfume in the mix. Why? Why did that happen? Were
ticket sales that low? Was it looking that bleak for the ZHHA organisers!
The biggest bombshell the Morning of the
awards! The panel of judges, in a press release through 3 Men on a Boat,
announced that they were removing themselves from the awards citing that
material had not been provided for them to do their jobs up until today and the
time period no longer aloud for proper winners to be announced. I’m sorry... WHAT?!!? THE JUDGES PANNEL TOLD US THIS
MORNING THAT THEY HAD DONE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING IN AS FAR AS WINNER CONSIDERATION
UP UNTIL THAT DAY!
At the same time this last minute
declaration by the judges’ panel really put the organisers in a tight spot. Yes
they didn’t give your material, but did you have to pull out on the morning of the
awards? And worse of, by making a public spectacle of it they made it harder
for the organisers to salvage credibility.
That was some heavy news to take in!!
Really heavy!! But it didn’t prepare us for the response from the ZHHA
organisers that the show would go on! The show will go on??!! But how?? Your judges’
panel just told us that they did not have the information to decide on winners
and henceforth retired! The ZHHA then told us that another panel had been put
in place to deliberate the winners.
It seemed to be raining bad news for the
awards folk when later in the ay other players in the hip hop industry decided
to hold an event, same time with the awards, across the road from the awards!
Twitter became abuzz with retweets and mentions, people obviously trying to
pool the awards crowd. We think that was unfair! It is non progressive,
unethical and a sign that the biggest enemies of Hip Hop are within not
without, Yes these awards organisers are messed up, they haven’t managed to
correct any of their fault since they started but this would be sabotaging the
industry we are trying to build. Well, we’re just glad they ended up coming to
the awards.
The ZHHA organisers wanted us to listen to
results coming from a backup panel created today about who should take the
awards? And the judges had one day to deliberate? Fortunately, there were not
too many complaints about award winners, despite the perceived reduced
credibility of the judging process. I have to commend the award organisers or
the judges’ panel. This is not to say that there is any artist undeserving of
their award, but they managed to give awards to all the people capable of
making the most noise afterwards. We say this especially given the judges panel
fiasco that had happened earlier. Like a pacifier to a baby. We won’t be
hearing much from them for a while! It
was a sound business decision.
We
had tickets. We went. We saw all the pretty faces and that is why you have to
wait for the part two coming out tomorrow morning, when we look at the winners,
loosers and moments to remember at the event.
PUSH
@PUSHzw|#KNY2013|
#ZIMHIPHOPAWARDS
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