Iyanya: How We Lost Millions Trying To Feature Nicki Minaj

Nigerian Afrobeats singer, Iyanya has narrated how his team spent millions of naira trying to feature American-Trinidadian singer, Nicki Minaj.

The artiste revealed that at the peak of his career between 2012 and 2014, he and Triple MG Boss, Ubi Franklin made moves to collaborate with Nicki. He said after Kukere was released and became a massive hit; they pondered over the next big song.

According to Iyanya, his music producer, D’Tunez modified the beat for Kukere and they used it to create ‘Your Waist’ which also received huge airplay.

He said that he and Ubi Franklin decided to take the song international and it was agreed that Nicki Minaj should be featured on the remix.

That was how they started reaching out to people and they were able to get the connect to meet the Super Bass crooner.

The singer revealed that they flew out to Atlanta to arrange a meeting with Nicki per the feature and were informed that it would cost $200,000 to get her on a track.

Iyanya said they contacted many people for financial assistance, but they were only able to raise $70,000 and Nicki’s management said it would not suffice.

He explained that the money they spent on transport and other miscellaneous while trying to meet her amounted to 23,000 dollars which was about 4 million naira in 2013.

The budding singer said they eventually returned to Nigeria after an unsuccessful outing.

The Like hit maker wrote; “So kukere was so massive we did all we could to get it out there and then came the pressure of the next single. We had “Flavour” already produced and recorded but for some reason we felt it wasn’t the next single after kukere.

On one beautiful morning we decided to remake “Kukere” and turn it into a new song that became “Ur waist” Bigups to @Therealdtunes changed everything and we recorded “Ur waist” and we were clear that was the next single.

Ur waist was so massive we decided it should go international and we needed the right artiste to help with that journey. @ubifranklin1 suggested Nicki Minaj and I asked how we’re gonna pay for that, he laughed and said “if your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough”

We started making contacts to who will get us Nicki Minaj and we found someone Who had direct contacts and he asked that we fly to Atlanta for a meeting with him and then he will take us to meet Nicki Minaj for the collaboration.

@ubifranklin1 and I flew straight to Atlanta and we started meetings that will lead to the reason when we were in Atlanta. Omo na so them start to carry us go club yo light bottles to show say money Dey omo no be person tell us to wise o.

Before we met Nicki Minaj our contact person had taken us to meet R.Kelly and 2chains, And a few other celebs who were in Atlanta at the time. Oyaaaa the day don reach to meet Nicki Minaj, na so them come tell us say to get her on a verse we needed $200,000, we started making calls to raise the money, we pushed and we were able to raise $70,000 they said Nope.

We called all the chairmen at on our contact list and nada. Now here is the painful part, our tickets, Hotel for at least 10Days already, food and car hire service was already around $23,000 and then @ubifranklin1 started calculating that we for just stay Nigeria and added that money to our $70k. We beg tire and nothing

The last Night before we left Atlanta, we were invited to a studio and the message was “get there at 11:45pm no entry after 11:45pm @ubifranklin1 got a car ready for 9pm and the place was around Buckhead not far from our hotel(10mins) but we wanted to be there 2hours early

She show studio sha at 1:am, she didn’t come for our recording, she came for a diffident song, but our contact wanted us to know we he had the direct link to get her on a song. We tried to take pictures them tell us say we no fit take pictures. Our plan was take pictures send back home to give our chairmen Ginger to see we could raise the money, omo zero picture, zero collabo na so we return naija continue our Hustle.”

So kukere was so massive we did all we could to get it out there and then came the pressure of the next single.
We had “Flavour” already produced and recorded but for some reason we felt it wasn’t the next single after kukere.

— its iyanyaaaaaa 🦁 (@Iyanya) March 30, 2023

Ur waist was so massive we decided it should go international and we needed the right artiste to help with that journey.@ubifranklin1 suggested Nicki Minaj and I asked how we’re gonna pay for that, he laughed and said “if your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough”😂😂

— its iyanyaaaaaa 🦁 (@Iyanya) March 30, 2023