Omotena crooner, Joshua Iniyezo,popularly known as Solidstar,tellsPunchNG about his career andrelationship with actress, Tonto Dikeh Your album is coming out andthe public expectation is wayhigher than your last album.What do you have to offer yourfans? I know there is a lot of expectation ofme career-wise. I know I will live upto the expectation because I justreleased two songs online and thereviews are great. They are reallydoing well though we just released them online. The two songs are offthe album. We just want everybodyto go and get the album when it is outbecause there is going to be differentthings from Solidstar. People shouldexpect different things from me because they know me as this R‘n’B artiste but I changed theirperception when I released,Omotena and Skibo. I want my fansto know that apart from this afro-pop, I still do reggae, dancehall and the likes. It is more like a veryversatile album. I just want to giveeverybody a different feel andvarious options to choose from. This year has been good for you.It has been reported that youacquired multi-million nairaproperties this year alone. Whatdid you do differently? Last year, I performed a lot but mostof them were free shows. I was onlypaid for a few. This year I made a lotof money, did a lot of things for achange. I told my team that we hadto sit up. We had spent a lot on projects and we had to think of waysto get the money back. We had ameeting and decided that we all hadto put in our best in whatever projectwe were doing. We thank God itworked out well. Now I am proud of not just my label, but of myself also. You are still with the label thatdiscovered you, Achivas Music.Will you leave it at anytime likesome artistes do leave theirrecord labels? I doubt if I will leave Achivas Musicanytime soon because themanagement has been doing well. Itis hard to stay on your own becausethe challenge can be overwhelming.Even if I want to go, I will still be under it; something like an affiliationbecause it will not be easy. For now, Iam still with Achievas. You are known to be very closeto Tuface, why are you notsigned to his record label,Hypertek Records? I was already signed to AchivasMusic before Hypertek Recordsbecame my friend. I knew Tufacethrough my record label. We becamevery close that some people eventhought I was signed under Hypertek. Kudos to Tuface, I reallyappreciate what he has done for meover the years. He is part of mysuccess story. He got me fame andfortune and I am really grateful tohim. How is your grandmother whohas always been there tosupport you and your dream? My grandmother is late now. To methen, she was my everything; shemeant the whole world to me andgave me all her support that my ownmother and father did not give me.She sent me to school with the little she had. She was a prophetess andshe had a church. She was the kind ofwoman that liked helping people andhad a lot of people under her wings.She really tried for me and she issomebody that I will never forget. My granny would do anything to see mehappy and I was her favouritegrandchild. How do you feel, knowing yourgrandmother is not alive towitness your success? I think about it most time andanytime I do, I feel very bad. I don’tcry though but I think about it. I justwish she was here to see her sondoing good; if she were alive, shewould never go hungry for a day. While she was alive, she never everwanted to see me hungry. By now, Iprobably would have bought a housefor her. I would have taken her tosomewhere special. Is it true that you bought a 2013Infinity SUV for N13m? Why areyou not riding it about? With the kind of weather we areexperiencing now, there are justsome places you would not want totake it to. Is it true you recently bought aproperty worth about N30m? Yes, I did. Do you have any endorsement deal? No. I don’t. How did you get all that money? I got them from shows; God has beenreally merciful to me. He has been sowonderful to me. I did tours and gotmoney from that too. Why did you switch from lovesongs to party songs? I do music for love but at the sametime, you have to look at themonetary aspect. We have spent alot of money. I could remember backthen when I sang ‘One in amillion’, I sang with all my heart and soul but it did not bring memoney. My account was crying.There was nothing coming in, all I gotwas that I was a talented artiste andI got lots of thumbs up. After muchthoughts, I decided to change. I am very versatile; I can actually singanything. I decided to change andsee what would happen. That waswhen I did Omotena; that was a songthat was different from my genre ofmusic and it worked. I decided that the next one was going to be better.Then I did Skibo and the song was ahit. Are you dating Tonto Dikeh? We do hang out. We relax together;we are very very close but not likegirlfriend and boyfriend. We arereally close. We hang out together,go to places and chill together. Will you cut your dreadlocksanytime soon? I will but not yet because I still needto make a lot of money. I have asmall face. My dreads are deceiving alot of people. If I cut them off I willlook like a small boy and you maynot recognise me. When I have decided to relax with music, then Iwill cut them off. Why did you pick IndependenceDay for your album launch? The timing works for me. I feelreleasing the album on October 1 willbe very cool. That day is a free day; Idoubt if anybody will release analbum on that day. Everywhere willbe relaxed. Being a free day, I am sure people’s attention will befocused on the album launch.