Entertainment of Monday, 13 January 2014

Source: Swaye Kidd

OPINION: Be creative with your publicity stunts

There is nothing wrong with playing out a stunt to achieve a certain result. However, there is everything wrong when the stunt backfires. The effect of stunt-gone-bad could be debilitating; it could see shares plummet or kill a career.

In the entertainment circles stunts are not a strange. We have witnessed many of such stunts-from club brawls, attacks on paparazzis, arrest by police, jail times for stupid acts and interrupting – and more to either announce a new album or sell a product or increase once dying name on the lips of fans, bloggers and websites by international acts.

Stunt pulling seems to have caught on with some Ghanaian entertainers these couple of years and just recently news that rapper Nana Borro has been involved in a ‘fatal accident in the US’ was rife. Some even pronounced him dead. The news trended for some days.

He has since come out to deny any of such reports. Good work. However, there is suspicion that the ‘Aha Aye D3’ hit maker deliberately pulled this out because he has an album in the works.

Why can’t musicians be a bit creative when pulling such stunts? Why should the ‘news’ always be about their death or ‘fatal accident’? This kind of stunt has lost its value. It has been overly used.

Ofori Amponsah, Kofi B, and others have all pulled such stunts before. Unfortunately for Ofori Amponsah that marked the end of his career. Kofi B is still trying to find his feet from the ‘assault’ he received from a police officer.

Artistes, be creative, that’s all I’m saying. Come out with something crazy, more like that of MzBel and less of Wanlov.

A measured, recklessness on the road, an arranged brawl with some paid people, accusation that someone has leaked your songs or spreading some photo-shopped nudes or making some weird comments or attacking a colleague artistes verbally could give you the same ‘milage’ and its better than putting death on you when you are alive.