What’s in a listening party?

Last year, on the 25th day of what most Kenyans refer to as 'Njaanuary', Blinky Bill decided to charge his fans Sh1,500 to come listen to his album We Cut Keys 2 at The Mall rooftop in anticipation of the project’s release the day after.

The Mungu Halali, Atenshan and Ama Aje hits maker had not done anything in Nairobi in years and he felt it was a good opportunity for lovers of his music to come and congregate.

The feedback from his fans was that before his album dropped, he needed to do something and it “doesn’t need to be very pompous, we can just gather and enjoy listening to the music before it goes out”.

“I was just being hopeful. The listening party was me just sharing music, playing it on the speakers and seeing how people are feeling the vibe; it wasn’t necessarily a performance. It was the first time the audience would get to interact with it. So, it didn’t take so much time to prepare,” remembers the artiste, whose real name is Bill Selanga.

This was the first time Blinky Bill was doing an album listening party and he was fascinated that about 600 fans would show up. More pleasant surprising was the revenue he was able to collect from selling memorabilia.

“I feel like my fans want to be involved in the processes. If there are vinyl copies or merchandise related to the project, they want to have it. The people who are really into my music are my first sponsors; the fans are really supporting me,” he says.

And some attended just because it was the only thing happening in the dry January events calendar, while some were egged on by his diehards.

Caribbean content creator Cindy, who goes by Book of Cinz on TikTok, was among those who the listening party was suggested to, and she said she had time. In her video afterwards, she told her 113,000 followers how she was impressed by the fashion statements made by the attendees.

“My friend didn’t even warn me. Everybody just looked gorgeous. The vibes were vibing. I didn’t understand what they were singing, but the sounds… I’m now a Blinky fan,” the Jamaican said in her video of her first time in Nairobi and at a listening party.

On February 12, Njerae held a listening party for her new EP, Four Letter Word, at KO Kraft Room in Westlands, Nairobi. The collection of four songs is a more upbeat, party and dance-themed body of work compared to her previous releases.

Among those in attendance at the invite-only even included Bensoul, Charisma, and Mordecai Dex (who have all collaborated with the musician) as well as representatives of different forms of entertainment media, corporate folks, and some lucky up-and-coming artistes and select fans.

Njerae is probably one of the artistes whose following can be termed religious. Famous for her ballads OTD (with more than a million views on YouTube) and Aki Sioni, Spotify places her listeners per month at over 269,000 even though her Instagram following is at 42,0000.

Using music as her therapy, writing at a point of letting go or releasing her emotions, she jests that people seem to enjoy singing along to her problems since they can relate to her topics.

She also explains that hers are the type of songs that people listen to when going to sleep at night or are going through tough times.

“I can tap into both worlds, but majority of the songs are based on personal experiences,” says Njerae on whether all the songs are about her.

Njerae, who had released another EP last year, Out With The Old, said preparing for a listening party involves knowing what information you want the audience to know and then figuring out what to say around that.

“Exercises like these allow the artiste to comfortably talk about their music. A lot of artistes don’t really know how to explain why they do things and sometimes it can hinder the audience from fully engaging with the art; maybe there could be a language barrier in the song and someone doesn’t understand it,” says Njerae.

She writes on a regular which helps her come up with material when she needs to. “What am I doing just sitting at home? Keeping my voice for who?” jokes the catchy songstress who has been performing a lot over the last few months.

Chinasa Udeala – General Manager for East Africa, Universal Music Group – says that listening parties are meant to get industry taste makers together to listen to the body of work by an artiste.

“Music is not made to everyone’s taste and people will choose what they like. Media are the ones who will champion this stuff. It’s good to give them the first listen so that they will even understand how to deliver it to their audience,” he says, adding brands are also invited since some songs could be good for jingles.

Chinasa says a song usually takes about a month to push before it drops and two months to market. The listening parties are also useful for gauging ways a song can be “cooked” further: remix, adding a feature or introducing new beats all together (refix).

For the real lovers of music, it is more than just a sound you listen to get your mind off of things. It goes into a sensory feel, a decipher of the feelings one is experiencing at the moment.

Audiences have always been wanting to have an up-close with their artistes to find out what about them makes their music is so enthralling. Due to concert numbers, a fan will feel less sense of proximity to the artiste unless they’re right next to stage.

Ceal Wairimu travelled from Thika for Njerae’s listening party.

“I would like to one day have something similar and get to talk about what inspired me, the people I got to work with and my favourite songs. I liked hearing the artiste’s perspective,” she says.

When Nikita Kering held a Valentine’s Special for some of her super fans who follow her on the Ringerz Instagram page (which only has 6,406 followers against the 630K on her main page) through DM invites, she said it was to thank them for holding her down and encouraging her, especially when things are tough. Her biggest fear is this music thing not working out.

Accompanied by just three background vocalists, a keyboardist and lead guitarist, Nikita would sing for and with the crowd, perhaps the freest she’s ever been with a crowd; which included all her siblings, and many of her close friends too. There were also some differently-themed t-shirts available as merchandise for purchase.

In fact, so open was she with this select crowd, she let it known that although she usually writes from other people’s experiences, “Let You Down” was targeted to an ex whose memory she will have to carry as long as she still has the matching tattoo they got together.

After her performance, she stayed to take photos and engage with the fans one-on-one, after having cut a cake for her mum whose birthday had been the previous day.

Telvin Mbugu, a “Ringer”, likened the event to a journey.

“You can tell someone’s story; how they got from point A to B. It is inspiring. It was very fun because she agreed to interact with people,” he said of his time.

Another “Ringer”, Nicole, said, “The setup is amazing; very intimate. Fans are not just going to listen to these kind of artiste’s music because of the beats, they’re going to have a heart-to-heart with the songs.”

Sheila Wanjiku Gatere, a fan, said of the experience, “This is better than a concert because chances of interacting with an artiste are higher. I admire Nikita – she’s pretty, her voice is amazing, she looks good – and you want to meet the artiste and tell them how you feel about them. The setting is also more peaceful (compared to concerts).”

Nyaga Wandere aka Big Nyagz, the events and experience manager at Masshouse, said the collaboration between them and artistes like Nikita is pegged on growing the industry; both entertainment and leisure.

"As our tagline says - home of amazing experiences - we focus on the experience of any consumer or fan coming into this space to have good sound and ambience," he says, adding that getting people like Nikita's fans over to experience the artistic and technological touch into their fittings and furnishings, service, and food and drinks creates marketing and sales opportunities for them.

In the early to late 2010s, seats at Thursday Nite Live by Roots International (ran by Abdi Rashid Jibril) used to be a hot cake at then Choices club on Baricho Road, and then moved to the J’s in Westlands.

Acts like Sauti Sol, Blinky Bill, H_art The Band, Mayonde, Kaz and Kidum graced that stage. The shows were so popular to the point that if you hadn’t found a seat by 7pm, you will likely be standing by the time the two-act performances start at 8pm till 11pm. The artistes would interact with the audience freely, with only about a metre of space between them and the first row.

In an interview he did with Music In Africa in 2015 on why he started Thursday Nite Live, Roots International managing director Abdi Rashid Jibril stated, “The initial intent for creating the platform was inspired by the dearth of platforms for people performing their own material.”

He said that in 2009, when he returned home from the US, he had grown tired of going to entertainment spots in the city where the performers only did cover versions of music from Nigeria, Congo, the US, Europe and so on.

“We decided to create Choices Thursday Night Live for artistes who are looking for a venue where they can showcase their material and develop their sound and launch themselves into bigger platforms within the region,” Jibril said of the event, whose first edition was held in November of 2011.

Eric Wainaina also had the monthly Live At The Elephant on Kanjata Road with a similar but more spacious outdoor setting.

In recognition of this connection that runs between artistes, their works and the listeners, over the last few years, musicians have started curating mini events in which they can mingle with those who interact with their songs. Nakili Sessions at Beer District, Delta Towers, Westlands is the hot cake nowadays.

Mutoria Mwaura aka Mutoriah loved listened to acoustic music once and realised that people were missing out on enjoying the core of music: lyrics, melodies and the soul of an artiste puts in as they perform a song.

He has always loved what he calls timeless music and started Nakili Sessions, then OS Sessions at home during the Covid lockdown that he would shoot then upload to his YouTube page.

He featured what he describes as amazing artistes; artistes who perform music that evoke emotions to listeners. He had just began applying a rule he had learnt from fellow artiste and “For Lovers” collaborator, Aliye, who would play nine Kenyan songs out of every ten he listened to at his house for visitors.

People sometimes forget that artistes are human, too, and Mutoriah wanted audiences to know the stories of the musicians deeper in order to relate to them better as a whole.

“There was good feedback. The audience appreciated the artistes, even when they hadn’t known about them or their music prior,” remembers Mutoriah.

He took that same template when Nakili Sessions moved from his house to Beer District in Westlands in 2023. He wanted it to be a home to folks who would also be ambassadors for Kenyan music.

Nakili Sessions has hosted about 70 artistes currently, and they are planning to do 50 more this year. The movement’s success has validated his belief that Kenyan music is actually “dope”.

“We don’t usually repeat artistes because we also want to plug people to new artistes; to grow that community,” says Mutoriah, who says patrons are the ones who now come up to him and tell him how people should listen to more Kenyan music after the sessions.

Mutoriah believes that since Kenyans who appreciated local music didn’t have a “home” they could meet and appreciate talented acts, criticism of Kenyan music was louder before.

Mutoriah had approached Beer District with just his dream of exporting Kenyan music to the world in February 2023. He wanted a day that people would come strictly because they wanted to catch Nakili Sessions, and settled on doing it on Tuesdays (which held until last year’s protests, when they moved it to Wednesday).

The show is recorded every week. Artistes have to be compensated. There’s a show producer and band that plays with the artiste. It’s not cheap, but he bore a lot of the costs in the initial months and relationships he had to get discounted or deferred payment plans.

After a few months, he was able to come back to Beer District’s management with data he had been collecting about number of people attending and sales made during the shows. There was a noticeable improvement, as well as putting the establishment’s name out there even more.

“The good thing is that Beer District is partly owned by 254 Brewery, a Kenyan brand looking to be associated with and is interested in the Kenyan art scene,” sums Mutoria.

George Ngugi, the marketing director at Beer District, says the establishment was built as a space that is centred around music. The stage is right at the middle; they built the stage and then everything else ancillary (providing necessary support to the primary activities) to it.

It was always going to be about live music. He and his partners were convinced to come on board with Nakili Sessions because of the tagline “community that loves and values timeless Kenyan music”, and they promised a deeper understanding of the music.

“They were very authentic on how they would do it; Mutoriah is a musician and producer, he’s also a friend to the artistes,” says Mr Ngugi, adding they wanted to offer a unique live music experience, which is why behind the stage there is equipment that was used to make traditional beer like muratina and busaa.

Also, next to the beer equipment are traditional musical instruments like nyatiti, drums and others from all over Kenya. For a lot of digital-first creators – whose music or content is on audio streaming services – when they are growing, this space has given them a place in the real world to interact with their communities.

“We’ll definitely get more traffic on the days we have live music and live events, and that speaks to the appetite of Kenyans to consume this. We also have walk ins during sports watch parties for rugby and formula one, at no extra cost,” says Mr Ngugi.

The Beer District has seen the value of building community. Being a smaller venue that can hold only about three hundred people, the execution of Nakili may have sparked something else.

Beer District are making themselves the venue of choice for up-and-coming acts, who will get to use their state-of-the-art audio and visual equipment at no cost; maintaining the same quality of production whoever the performer may be.

They’re looking to start a showcase for the artsites who are less known where they’ll be able to charge and get to keep the full ticket sales on Sundays.

“The zero to one thousand sized concert venues don’t exist here (in Nairobi). If you feel you’re an artiste that can pull off something, we’ll discuss it and if we feel that it aligns with our ethos, we want to lean more into building an enabling environment for guys to come produce their own shows, sell their merchandise and speak to their fans directly,” said Mr Ngugi, who added that also podcasters like Mic Cheque, TMI, and VIP Access have used the space in the past to meet their fans.

Even as they are not trying to mine value from artiste, wanting them to be part and parcel of the business – to understand how they can monetise their brand and start working at a very small level, while grasping how they can scale themselves to selling out bigger shows – this has enabled them to add value to Beer District and 254 Brewery (majority shareholder and who have a beer community) community from their art. It keeps them engaged by giving them something they would not ordinarily get.

And the people have a kinship to the establishment and its brands. The 10-year veteran of the food and beverage industry says the importance of having authentic community is a key ingredient to building a long term sustainable business.

“We have guys who come for comedy and ask if we also show Formula One. Some come over for music and return for dates. Acts who’ve performed here feel it’s like home and when they’re having business meetings, they’re having it here. The smaller artistes like Muringi super fast-rising Kikuyu artiste – are really loved. When you’re watching your favourite artiste as you drink a Niaje (draught beer) or have that slow smoked brisquette or pork shoulder, the next time you go somewhere else and you see it on the menu or shelf, you’ll attach that to that happy experience you had,” says Mr Ngugi adding that if they had opted to just bring in notable deejays, the minute the neighbour across the road opens a larger club with a flashier name and they pulled that deejay their crowd would be gone.