TUNDE OBE shares his marriage secrets

What we haven’t told the world about our marriage – Tunde Obe of TWO

By Samod Biobaku

Sixthsense34@yahoo.com

If the love life of popular singers, Tunde Obe and his wife, Wunmi Obe were to be chronicled on the pages of a best seller, perhaps one of the titles that millions of authors would have a hard time casting into the dustbin of irrelevance would be ‘Tunde & Wunmi Obe: A 23-year-old love story.’

Over the years, the duo have made a complete mockery of the alarming statistics of failed celebrity marriages that have become part and parcel of the Nigerian entertainment industry and interestingly, classy examples are not far fetched.

However, despite the glaring short lifespan of celebrity marriage, both Tunde and his wife have continued to bask in the euphoria that their marriage holds for them.

A love story that began 23 years ago when they both met has today, become a reference point in the Nigerian entertainment and showbiz circle with more than a few celebrities working hard and praying harder towards having a semblance of what they share.

In a chat with Tunde Obe in Lagos, he spoke about his marriage and revealed some of the things that he and his wife have not told the world about their marriage especially what makes it tick.

He also spoke on the $300 million infused into the Nigerian entertainment industry by President Goodluck Janathan, its implication and what he described as the grey areas.

Excerpts:

We all recall that Jonathan injected $300 million into the Nigerian entertainment industry. What exactly do you think this portends for the industry?

To say it’s enough would mean that I understand it fully. Like I keep telling people; I think I am one of the more educated musicians in Nigeria. I am more enlightened. I am one of the older musicians and if I keep telling you that I do not fully understand the philosophy behind the $300 million and who it is really meant for. You can imagine what my younger colleagues would think. They should have explained this thing a little bit better. They should break it down so people would understand. How is it possible to access it? What are the modalities for accessing this fund? Are they to be paid back? For how long? Do people have to bring collateral? How long would be money be available for? Do you have a process to ensure that the fund can be revolved? So that generations unborn can still benefit from it. These are the things that I don’t understand. Who is in charge of this fund? Who is the person to decide who the most talented person is that requires this fund? If they can tell us these things then I will tell you whether it’s enough.

I’ve seen a good number of your music videos and I must say that they are always of impressive quality. One thing that strikes me about your videos is the glaring level of creativity that goes into them. What exactly motivates you to pick the subject matter that you deal with in your songs and music videos?

I think first and foremost and most importantly is the fact that we are very humble about it. The industry has gone haywire and there are so many people doing fantastic jobs so if you come into the industry with that ‘we’ve been there’ or ‘our fan base is tight’ kind of attitude, you would just find yourself losing out. So, the first thing we did was to listening to what is happening now knowing fully well that we couldn’t sell out totally and still fall in line with what everybody else was doing. But what we could do was to borrow from the rhythm and the styles and then still keep our own unique influence on it. We worked with ID Cabasa to come out with ‘Fine Bara.’ We worked with Puffy Tee to come up with ‘Too Legit.’ We worked with so many different producers and that’s why the album is such a mix of so many materials but I think the key element is the humility. We didn’t go into it believing that we knew it all. We went into it humbly; trying to do an album that would still sell – that people would still buy and say these guys are still trying and we just had to make sure that it was desensitive because we have grown up kids and we’re role models. So there are certain topics that we can’t broach. Basically, we did the best we could and we are happy that people like it.

Is Copy Cat Records planning to sign new artistes probably in the near future?

Definitely! We have two artistes in line now. Jay Search is different from our own business.

There’s all this noise about celebrity marriages and all that yet you have been able to keep your matrimonial life in one happy piece. Is there anything you haven’t told the world about what makes you and your wife tick?

Maybe we haven’t told the world how much we love each other and I think that is the key element. We both leave stardom at the door when we enter our house. Whenever we enter our house, we are Tunde and Wunmi. We remain the young guys and girl that met each other in 1988. The child that was born in 1988 is not a kid in any way. We’ve been together for a long time and I think if at this point in time, we begin to show attitude… We met each other when we had nothing – when we were nobodies and we came up together so that love would always be there. We still have that unity of purpose as well and we remember every single achievement that we have made together as a couple and we still laugh about a lot of things that we had to go through and endure while coming up. So, I think we have that unique blend from grass to grace together. We got married in 1998.