Meet The Vibrant Omolola Oyedele, The Entertainment & Media Lawyer Moving The Needle in Afrobeats

I spoke to an entertainment lawyer about what she does and how she operates behind the scenes in the Nigerian music industry

Hello guys. I apologize for not writing to you last week. I got held up doing some work. I’ve also been working on a project that is taking a huge part of my time.

Like I mentioned earlier this year, I want to tell important stories in the sphere of Afrobeats. Not just opinion pieces or essays, but meaningful stories of people making heavy contributions, especially in the background.

For this week’s newsletter, I spoke to an entertainment and media lawyer, Omolola Oyedele. I met Lola on Twitter nearly two years ago and what really fascinated me about her was her patience and understanding.

Speaking to Lola was at the same time exhilarating and insightful. She is currently studying in the UK for her Masters.

Since her childhood, Lola has always had a flair for entertainment. Her first love happened to be drums and as a kid, she would cause a ruckus in the house, striking any platform that bore a similitude to drums. This motivated her parents to put her in a choir, where Lola learned how to play the drums as well as other musical instruments.

Lola studied Law in the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Kaduna State. She wasn’t particularly interested in studying law, but she was unable to convince her parents otherwise. Why? Lola detests failing, so naturally she had good grades, which made it impossible for her parents to see how she wasn’t interested in Law. But in her third year, something changed.

She began taking a course titled Intellectual Property Law. While taking the course, Lola’s eyes opened, and she realized that she could follow her dreams and make her parents happy at the same time. She could go after her interest in the entertainment and media industry, while practising Law. At that point, she doubled as the manager of a Gospel and Hip-hop group.

A few years later, after finishing from Law school, Lola was eager to start practising. She reached out to a lawyer (Fozadoza) on Twitter and sought to work with her. Just around that time, Lola’s friend, a music producer, sent her a publishing contract and begged her to help review it. It was a challenge, one that Lola took with utmost zeal.

Things drastically changed for Lola shortly afterwards. The lawyers who drafted the publishing contract that was sent to the music producer asked to meet with Lola officially. They were stunned by her work. It was at the meeting that Lola found out that one of the lawyers was the same person she had reached out to on Twitter for work. The Lawyers offered Lola a job at their law firm. Her stars aligned.

As an entertainment and media lawyer, Lola has worked with numerous creators across the entertainment industry including Music, Fashion, Film, and Sports. She has drafted and negotiated countless contracts for upcoming and established artistes, actors, film directors, underground football talents, and many others. She has worked with the likes of Teni Entertainer, Sarz, and MTV Shuga.

In the entertainment field, Lola’s passion lies in the music industry. This is perhaps because she is herself a creator, with an undying love for drums and music production.

So, as someone who has a little experience working with upcoming artistes, I prompted a conversation with Lola, curious about how entertainment lawyers work with upcoming/independent artistes, her experience working with them.

When I asked her when artistes should start working with lawyers, she unwaveringly told me that it’s best at the beginning of their careers. According to Lola, there’s music and then there’s the music business. For an artiste to properly earn and not get tangled in messy contracts, they need the expertise of an entertainment lawyer.

Lola warned that it is not enough to just get a lawyer, it is imperative to work with a lawyer who specializes in the entertainment industry, specifically the music industry. As much as any lawyer can read, understand, and break down a contract, words and terms have contextual meanings based on the industry.

Although, Lola made it clear that the lawyer’s job is simply to advise the artiste, it is ultimately the artist that makes the decision. She has been in the industry long enough to know that you can advise an artiste and they would still go ahead to make the wrong decision.

We spoke about one of the issues that occur between record labels and artistes. When a record label signs an artiste, they offer them an advance. The advance is different from the budget that’s set aside for your music and marketing. It is meant for the artiste’s upkeep and miscellaneous things. Artistes tend to think that these advances are gifts from the record label.

A record label approaches an artiste with a deal, and gives them a contract to sign. The artiste, marinated in a broth of desperation, gleefully signs the contract without consulting a lawyer. They receive an advance and spend on whatever they deem necessary, like a car.

At the end of the contract, the artist realizes that he or she cannot leave the label without paying back the advance. They had no idea that it was written somewhere in the contract that the advance would be recouped from the artiste’s future royalties (from their music). Artistes owe that kind of money for years.

I know of an artiste whose contract has expired and is expected to pay nearly 3 million Naira in expenses back to the label. This is asides the advance that would be recouped from royalties. The expenses are money or resources that the artist requested for outside of their budget and advance. On the termination of the contract, the artiste is expected to pay the expenses back in cash. It is the kind of mess that artistes get stuck in, lose everything they own, and their careers just go downhill from there.

And that is precisely why the importance of an entertainment lawyer cannot be overemphasized. The lawyer would have pointed all of these things out before the artiste signed the contract.

Another scenario is an agreement between an investor and an artiste. An independent artiste gets an offer from an investor. The investor is willing to invest 10 million Naira and expects his capital and ROI in two years. It is such a tempting offer and many artistes take it up, seeing it as a means to accelerate their success. As much as that seems like a good thing, it is quite a tricky deal to accept. Why?

Without the aid of a lawyer, the artiste’s first instinct is to accept the deal. But what happens after you sign the contract and receive the money? You record songs, mix and master, make music videos, promote them, and before you know, the money is gone.

Two years go by in a flash, the investor starts asking for his money. The artiste doesn’t have his money so they end up paying with some of their equity or they are entwined in legal issues with so much back and forth. Eventually, the artiste ends up depressed, in a whirlpool of debt.

If the artiste had consulted a lawyer, then he or she would have been advised to do a market research or to do a viable projection on how to make the money back. This could mean spending less on expensive production or music videos, looking for alternative and effective ways to use resources made available by technology and the internet.

And in a case where making the money and returning it with interest isn’t feasible, the artiste is advised to not sign the contract.

Our conversation also went in the direction of the fairness of contracts. What does this mean? Contracts should be fair to both parties. However, it is hardly so in the Nigerian music industry. It is either the artiste feels entitled to the record label’s money and resources or the record label is doing everything possible to rip the artiste off.

Lola is certain that all of these can be prevented with a contract that is fair to both parties. She strongly wishes entertainment lawyers would learn to be more considerate when drafting/negotiating contracts for their clients.

Whether it is a distribution deal or an investment deal or a publishing deal, artistes, songwriters, and producers should enlist the services of an entertainment lawyer. That is how creators can protect their intellectual property.

How do you tell if an entertainment lawyer is competent? Lola advises that you check their track record. What contracts/agreements have they worked on? Who have they worked with? What is their overall reputation in the entertainment(/music) industry? You just need to do a little research to ensure that you’re working with the right person.

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What have you been listening to? Enjoying the new Oxlade yet? Terri also dropped after going off for ages. What Buju did on that Falz’ song is absolutely bonkers.

You should expect more stories like this. There are so many people working to push the culture forward. There are too many stories to be told. I spoke to someone last weekend and he gave me the encouragement I needed to do this. So yeah, I’m definitely doing more of this.

I should also mention that I’m trying to do more with this platform. And I’ll likely make an announcement soon, hopefully sooner than you imagine.