Entertainment of Friday, 13 August 2010

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Pat Thomas Rates Gospel Music Higher Than Hiplife

If cinema halls in the country are turning into churches, there will not be any surprises if many music shops are being used to retail mobile phones.

This is because these areas of businesses are bringing monies better than the other areas. Music shops are being affected the more. In an interview with one of the countries popular film producer/Director Pat Thomas who has been in the business for over 20 years, he revealed to Flex newspaper that the reason why people are now diverting from the music business is because they are not getting profit from the distribution of music.

“We have hip-life, gospel and high life but the rate at which people release hiplife music is high yet people are not buying it either” he added.

Giving reasons as to why people are not buying music albums, he recounted lots of reasons but the major ones he pointed out were good music and technology. He explained technology as the sharing of music from phone to phone, Mp3 players, the internet whiles explaining good music as musicians doing good music to attract buyers.

He continued that since he entered into the business, there is no Ghanaian music which has not passed through his hands. “Since I started this business, I can say that almost all Ghanaian music pass through me before going to the vendors. There are lots of albums that when we distribute, we don’t get anything from it. There are a few that when we produce, we wish the artiste comes out with more” he answered.|

When Flex asked him if he can mention some artistes whose woks did not bring any profit after distribution, he declared that almost all the hip life artistes who came to him did not do any better. He was comfortable working with gospel musicians like Florence Obinim and Ernest Opoku describing them as musicians who make profit anytime he distributes their albums.

Though Pat Thomas is not working with many hip life artistes, the one left in his camp is Screw Face. “When you produce a hip life artiste, you build the person`s image than making profit” he added.

When asked why Gospel music is doing far better than hip life, he responded that it`s because we have many Christians in Ghana whiles the gospel musicians are doing good music to attract more buyers. “Issues about Christianity are doing better than any material in the world so there are no surprises that gospel music is doing better than any other type of music in Ghana” he revealed.

Pat Thomas who also ventured into the movie industry not too long said he moved into that part of the business because he had been distributing movies for the past years.

If one has seen the commercials of the latest movie Love and Bullets, then the person should know that the movie is coming from the stables of Pat Thomas movies. It can be stated that he already has about 12 movies to his credit before Love and Bullets.

He revealed that he branched in the movie industry because he wants to give chances to some new faces in the movie industry who need the necessary push to move on in their career.

Love and Bullets is a movie about love and its intricacies in the world. He added that it is a movie to advice the youth who think love is all about money and pleasure. The movie is in any movie shop around you in the country.