Ice Prince loses mum
Chocolate City
rapper and 2009 Hennessey Artistry winner, Ice Prince, real name
Panshak Zamani, lost his mother last week. According to a Chocolate
City manager, Mrs Zamani died in a hospital in Jos, although details of
the cause of death is yet to be confirmed. Mrs Zamani, who is said to
be hypertensive, passed away on Thursday May 5, 2011.
Earlier, Ice
Prince, who lost his father in 1999, rolled out with the other members
of the Chocolate City imprint to put up an impressive concert in
London. It was reported that he arrived back in Nigeria on the day of
his mother’s death.
B.E.A.T Band wins 2011 Star Quest
The gender-balanced
musical band of three males and three females, B.E.A.T. have won the
2011 instalment of the Nigerian Breweries sponsored musical talent hunt
reality show, Star Quest. The band was declared winner at the grand
finale which held at Eko Hotel and Suites on Saturday May 7, after they
amassed the highest numbers of votes, beating rival bands, Harmonic and
Storm. The sextet carted away the prize of ?3.6 million cash prize, a
recording contract worth ?7.5 million, a mini-van and one year free
accommodation in Lagos.
Past winners of the show, which started in 2002, are KC Presh, D’Accord, Jewelz, Diamondz, The Pulse and JukeBox.
Will Smith is frontrunner for Tarantino’s next film
Will Smith has
emerged as the frontrunner to star in Quentin Tarantino’s next film, a
spaghetti Western about a slave in the old South who teams with a
German bounty hunter to search for his wife.
Tarantino stalwarts, Samuel L. Jackson and Christoph Waltz also are circling key parts.
“Django Unchained,”
Tarantino’s follow up to his worldwide blockbuster Inglourious
Basterds, will be distributed domestically by the Weinstein Co. but
Tarantino is in the process of selecting a studio partner to release
the film internationally. Sources say he is meeting with Universal
executives today, and similar meetings with Sony, Paramount, Warner
Bros. and possibly others have been scheduled.
Sources prepped for
those meetings say Tarantino would like Smith to star in the film, the
script for which has been making the rounds in recent days to wide
acclaim. No official offer has been made to Smith, and any deal would
of course be subject to working out financials, which might be
difficult given Smith’s status as one of Hollywood’s few sure-thing
stars.
Indeed, although
Smith has been out of multiplexes since 2008’s ‘Seven Pounds’, he is
still considered among the top two or three box office draws worldwide.
Smith is being
teed-up for the title role of Django, a freed slave who seeks to
reunite with his slave wife, a journey which will see him team up with
a German bounty hunter to take down an evil plantation owner.
Finesse releases mixtape
New music imprint,
Finesse Entertainment, has released a new collaborative mixtape,
‘Finessed’ featuring all five acts on the label. The mixtape which was
released last week is a 19-tracker album and has production credits
from acclaimed producers including Sosick, Dokta Frabz and Syndik8’s
in-house producer, Ikon. According to a press release from the record
company’s management, the mixtape is geared towards introducing these
artists to the public.
“The mixtape is a
collective effort featuring all five individual acts in a display of
talent and artistry over 19 tracks,” the release reads.
“Finesse is an
unconventional, forward looking, innovative, radical, progressive, new
wave, leading-edge, state of the art, pioneering entertainment outfit.
The sound coming from the our team is evergreen and fresh, we want to
nurture that by establishing the right relationships, with notable
industry heads and people who will recognize the game in the acts and
help furnish them with the right material; material that can complement
the sounds of greatness the team has to deliver,” Habeeb Funsho the
chief executive of Finesse said about the mission of the imprint.
Finesse Entertainment’s acts include T-Rex, Ene’gma, Classiq, Femi Knight and Blaqshyne.
