By Ayo Onikoyi

Just as Tiwa Savage is having the duo of Ayra Starr and Tems breathing down her neck in the pecking order in the music industry, the trio of Burna Boy, Davido and Wizkid may have to shift the position they have occupied so smugly for so long as top dogs of the Nigerian music space to accommodate, a new entrant, Rema into their fold.

Either by push or shove, this illustrious son of Edo State, born Divine Ikubor is already in the big league with a superstar status. Just last weekend, he was part of a lineup of world’s superstar singers who performed at the world’s biggest wedding in history.

That’s the wedding of the son of Asia’s wealthiest man, Mukesh Ambani in India which reportedly gulped a whooping 600 million dollars to put together.

Rema was reportedly paid 3 million dollars to perform his hit single “Calm Down” at the wedding. No African artist has ever been paid that much as performance fee, even for a repertoire of songs at a concert for that fee. Not even Burna Boy,  Davido or Wizkid.

Just about the same time he set the record for the highest performance fee for an African artist at an event, his new album titled “Heis”  set a new record on Spotify Nigeria where it recorded the biggest opening day streams of 2024 yet.

The album garnered 2.71 million streams which surpasses the previous record of 1.86 million streams held by Olamide’s ‘Ikigai’.

Rema’s new record follows the record he set with ‘Benin Boys,’ his collaboration with Shallipopi which recorded the biggest opening day streams for a song on Spotify Nigeria in 2024.

Rema’s ‘HEIS’ also became the third biggest opening day stream for an album on Spotify Nigeria just only behind Burna Boy’s ‘I Told Them’ which had 2.93 million streams and Davido’s ‘Timeless’ which tallied 4.91 million streams.

Before “Calm Down” with Selena Gomez became an international explosion, Rema was already on the gravy train, commanding a handsome performance fee. A Potpourri’s investigation revealed he was raking off about 200 thousand dollars.

 Rema took his global relevance to an entirely new level when he performed his hit song “Calm Down” at the 2023 Ballon d’Or ceremony. The Afrobeat star made history as he became the first Nigerian to perform at the global award event.

With his O2 Arena sold out show and the MTV Europe Music Award for Best Afrobeats in 2023, and the Billboard Music Award for Top Afrobeats Song in 2023 , Rema became an African world’s powerhouse, almost in the same standing as Burna Boy and Wizkid who rate 1 million dollars as performance fee.

“Rema now charges 1 million dollars internationally, the same way as Burna Boy and Wizkid. His international exploits have seen him jump to the level of the two superstars,” says music executive, Sola Obadinah of Cole Management Services.

“As at May of 2023, Rema was charging 200 thousand dollars, but things have changed dramatically for him,” Obadinah added

In 2023, “Calm Down” reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spent a record-setting 58 weeks atop U.S. Afrobeats Songs.

The infectious, Selena Gomez-assisted track also reached No. 1 on the all-genre Radio Songs chart, making history for a song by an African lead artist.