Last year’s Ghana DJ Awards came with its hullabaloo when some nominees went home disappointed as others got away with underserved awards.
This year’s nomination forms are out and all Benjamin Hector Antwi, better known as Mr. Shark wishes for the year is transparency on the part of the organizers. His desire for this is as a result of last year’s award for DJ of the year going out to DJ Azonto. That award he says, was never supposed to be given him as he didn’t deserve it.
“I was a bit disappointed last year; I wasn’t expecting to win that category but that award going for him was not right. It should rather have gone in for someone else and I don’t want to believe he took that for the sake of being a part sponsor for the show.”Mr. Shark expects this year’s awards to be devoid of favoritism or buy offs but one that really is accountable for the votes compassed by the general public. He is in no fear at all towards this year’s as he goes in for best music promoter, best radio DJ, hip life DJ and DJ of the year for he believes his hard work will pay off together with enough transparency.
On other issues still pertaining DJs, musician Yaa Pono sometime past made a statement that the invasion of Nigerian music onto the Ghanaian market is due to their hard work and that the call for their songs being banned on local radio stations should be scrubbed off. This statement, well Mr. Shark is in total agreement of it.
“Ghanaian artistes aren’t putting much efforts in to their craft which they can capitalize on to hard work. They don’t want to invest and are also very ungrateful. When issues of this nature comes up, they tend to compare Ghana to South Africa claiming songs are only given to programs managers after which its being played without a dime for the DJ. No problem, they should just walk to my station, give the song to the programs manager and on your way home, call the manager to tell me to play the song. If you don’t invest, how can you reap?”
He further explained the means on how a DJ will be able to make himself known to the public. He said the relevance on social media is the best option for every DJ to be known. “You must be constant on social media; active on Facebook and twitter for the world is now run through social media. It is the only means now to build your brand and make people feel your presence. Just make good use of social media and you will be very much relevant.”
However Mr. Shark is pretty much worried about the ungrateful nature of artistes and would love if DJs are appreciated if not with money, they should be appreciated for their work.