Do we have an album rollout culture in Namibia? Do artists and their management strategise a rollout plan?

 Do artists and their management know what a rollout plan is in the first place? 

In a Namibian context, what does your typical generic album rollout plan look like? Will you, as a consumer, be able to recognise a rollout plan? Do you even care enough to recognise a rollout plan?

According to Google, an album rollout plan is a strategic, phased marketing campaign designed to build excitement and awareness for a new album. 

It usually involves innovative pre-release activities like singles and teasers.

It extends through the official release and post-release promotion to ensure a successful and impactful launch.

As we are in the content creation era, an album rollout plan in a 2025 context should involve creating content that will prompt fan engagement and talkability over a strategic timeframe. 

In all tangible senses, your generic album rollout should include interviews for print media, visual media and radio. 

The idea really is to get the streets excited about your upcoming project. 

A Facebook post or a minimalist approach on Instagram is not an album rollout.

Unless, of course, you want to A-Reece this thing, where your only worry is your core fan base. 

A-Reece, this thing as in you have no interest in growing your fan base. 

A-Reece, this thing as in you are too cool to go above and beyond for your own product. 

If that is your brand, then hey, album rollout stories do not exist in your duchy.

However, if you want to Nasty C this thing, then you will literally be everywhere! 

If you want to Nasty C this thing, you will be visible in all layers of society for that strategic rollout time frame.

 If you want to Nasty C this thing, you will have people talking about you from Tseiblaagte to the riverbanks in Rundu. 

That right there is the ideal rollout plan.

So again, I ask, what does a Namibian album rollout plan look like? 

Get all the newspaper brands to publish that “you are dropping an album”? 

Secure radio interviews on all the major stations that speak to your music market, and announce that your album is dropping soon? 

To visit all three TV stations to say the same thing again that ‘my album is dropping’? 

That is it, right? That is your typical Namibian album rollout plan, right? 

That sh*t is boring as f**k! 

How many times am I, as a potential fan, going to hear, read and see you answer generic, boring and agonistic questions like “what inspired you” and “how did you come up with that concept”?

I do not know if artists have noticed, but these traditional media platforms are slowly but surely starting to shy away from publishing and gifting airtime to artists who come with that same generic approach.

 Traditional media houses understand that one needs to innovate. 

Traditional media houses understand that they are fighting a brutal battle against social media and people’s shortened attention span.

Basically, if you are going to come with the same generic, boring and recycled album rollout plan, chances are that these traditional media platforms will ignore you or dump your message in and around outside primetime spaces and slots. 

The last album rollout that had me intrigued was when Emmanuel Rose hit the streets. 

He had the whole helmet thing going on. 

He had some of the biggest reaction channels on the continent and the states reacting to his music video on YouTube – so much so that it caught Nasty C’s attention. 

That is a rollout that I respect to this day.

So, next time you think of doing your usual yawn-inducing TV, radio and print interviews, remember that no one cares until you innovate!

Check out the latest episode of #IndustryLoop podcast on all New Era platforms. 

Next week, I will properly contextualise the conversation I had with the mountain shifter, Glendyrr Bailey.

Until the next Loop, we say #GMTM                                                

*Need an MC? I’m your guy. Hit me up: naobebsekind@gmail.com