Air Starr has had one of the best years in African Music this year. She dropped her sophomore album The Year I Turned 21 and it has been one of the biggest, most successful and most streamed African Albums to come out from the continent this year.
She has amassed about 27 million monthly listeners on Spotify and is well poised to secure another Grammy nomination, maybe even win the award.
Now, Most people would expect that she’d have announced a world tour of her own a while ago, and taken the album to the road to promote and secure new audiences.
Coming off a year when Air Starr had one of the most streamed songs in Afrobeats in Comma, a collaboration that’s about to hit 500 million Spotify streams in Santa, moments with Rihanna, 21 Savage, Jaden Smith and more, one would expect a flyer on her page announcing a World Tour where she takes on the biggest arenas and cities in the world with her music.
Yesterday, she announced that she’d be on Coldplay’s world tour and performed at the Marvel Stadium in Melbourne, Australia. She delivered a captivating performance that made a lot of fans take to X to commend her outstanding delivery.
This makes me realize that Ayra Starr has been on two world tours this year. The first one was with Chris Brown, one of the biggest pop acts in the world and now Coldplay, one of the biggest bands in the world. She’s toured the world twice with her albums without having to worry about setting up a world tour.
She’s cut down massively on logistics, budgeting, set and the entire financing of a world tour. She’s managed to find a way to go around the world twice with some of the biggest stars in the world, have the arenas and stadiums filled and deliver her music to thousands of people.
If this isn’t genius, I cannot identify what is. Most artists struggle with world tours. We see a lot of them cancel after a while and refund tickets to the few who purchase due to low sales or logistics issues. Having a successful world tour under your belt is insane, and having two in one year is mesmerizing. Genius.
It’s also a great promotional strategy on many fronts. First off, she’s selling her music to the world at a very reduced cost. Secondly, she’s getting new fans and streamers. She’s also preparing those countries and arenas for when she’d come on her own terms. Ayra Starr is becoming a familiar name and face to them.
With successful albums and singles, selling out her own shows should be light work.
Whatever Ayra Starr’s play is, whether this idea of touring the world twice without organizing a world tour is intentional or coincidental, it comes off as plain genius. Whoever’s behind the thought process deserves something cold.
Maybe it’s a new promotional strategy to be explored. Maybe it’s something random working out great. It however does bring a certain aura to Ayra’s stardom. Well done, Ayra Starr.