From A Producer To A Global Superstar

Chapter 592: The Mountain

By the third day, Dayo was on full promotion mode that made it look like a man that had something to loose if he didn’t promote. Well he really did so he promoted like never before.

He had spent too much of his career controlling the room from behind studio doors, letting songs travel while he stayed one step away from the noise. That had always suited him. Work, release, disappear, return with something stronger. It kept the mystery alive and protected his focus.

But this time, he had said he was going all out.

So he went out.

London was gray when he arrived, the kind of gray that made the city look serious even before people started talking. The interview was not a late-night comedy chair, not a place where a host danced around questions and saved sharpness for jokes. This one was different.

The Eleanor Hart Interview was respected for one reason: Eleanor did not waste time pretending easy conversations were deep. She had interviewed legends, politicians, actors, producers, artists on the edge of collapse, and artists too famous to know they were already falling. People came on her show when they wanted to be taken seriously, or when they had no choice.

Dayo came because the campaign needed a different kind of fire.

In the green room, Sharon stood near the wall with her tablet in both hands, reading updates without disturbing him. She had learned his rhythm during promotion. Dayo could handle pressure, but he disliked noise before a serious conversation. If something mattered, she would say it. If it did not, she buried it.

His phone buzzed once on the table.

A message from Luna.

An Audio of her progress so far.

Dayo picked it up and played it quietly.

Her voice came through the speaker, rough around the edges but alive. A short piece from the EP session, probably from After Silence, though the file name only said: don’t laugh yet. Behind her voice, he could hear Wayne muttering something in the background before the clip cut off.

Dayo smiled despite himself.

Sharon looked up. "Good?"

"Very."

"Should I ask?"

"No."

"That good?"

Sharon nodded and went back to her tablet.

A producer knocked on the open door. "Mr. Jason, Miss Hart is ready for you in two."

Dayo stood and adjusted his cuff. He had no stylist hovering over him, no unnecessary entourage, no people around him turning his jacket into a national emergency. Just Sharon, the producer, and the quiet before another public room tried to understand him.

As he stepped toward the door, Sharon finally spoke.

"The third day is not falling the way it should."

Dayo paused.

She did not give him the number. He had not asked for it. But the way she said it carried enough weight.

"Good problem?" he asked.

Sharon’s mouth twitched. "For you, yes. For everyone trying to explain it, no."

Dayo nodded once and walked out.

The studio audience was smaller than Marcus Ryane’s, but the energy was different. Less screaming, more expectation. These were people who came ready to listen closely, and that made the room feel sharper. Eleanor Hart stood when he entered. She was in her late forties, composed in a way that did not need softness to feel welcoming. Her smile was polite, but her eyes were already working.

"Dayo Jason," she said as they shook hands. "Thank you for coming."

"Thank you for having me."

They sat across from each other, no desk between them. Just two chairs, a low table, a dark studio, and cameras waiting like witnesses.

Eleanor did not begin with a trap.

That was why she was good.

"Three days ago," she said, "you released Beautiful Things. In the first hour, it did numbers most artists would be grateful to see in a month. In twenty-four hours, it crossed two point eight billion global streams. By the second day, it had reached four point nine one billion. I watched several industry people try to explain it, and most of them looked personally offended by the mathematics."

The audience laughed softly.

Dayo smiled. "Wayne had a similar reaction."

"Your producer?"

"Yes. He has been emotionally fighting the numbers since day one."

"I sympathize with him." Eleanor glanced at her notes, then back at Dayo. "When you first saw the twenty-four-hour number, what did you feel? Not what your team felt. Not what the label felt. You."

Dayo took a moment.

That was already different from most interviews. Marcus had asked with excitement. Eleanor asked like she expected the answer beneath the answer.

"I felt grateful first," he said. "Then quiet."

"Quiet?"

"Yes. A number that big doesn’t make noise in your head immediately. People expect celebration, but for me, it was more like... everything stopped for a second. Because you understand that it is not just a song doing well anymore. It has become something people are using to gather around."

Eleanor leaned in slightly. "Gather around what?"

"The feeling, maybe. The story. The mystery. The fans, the streamers, the countries that took ownership of it. Different people are entering the song from different doors. Some came because of me. Some came because of Luna. Some came because they saw people arguing about the bridge. Some came because they wanted to see if the hype was real."

"And is it?"

Dayo’s smile was small. "They kept playing it, so I suppose they answered that."

The audience reacted warmly.

Eleanor let the moment pass, then shifted. "You mentioned Luna before I did."

"I did."

"Careless?"

"No."

"Strategic?"

"Also no."

She raised an eyebrow.

Dayo leaned back slightly. "She is part of the conversation, whether I say her name or not. Pretending otherwise would be strange."

Eleanor watched him for a second, clearly tempted to chase the Luna question. Then she surprised the audience by letting it go.

"For now," she said.

Dayo laughed under his breath. "That sounds dangerous."

"It is meant to."

The room loosened.

Eleanor moved to the next question. "You have not always been this visible. In fact, one of the complaints from fans and media is that you can be difficult to find when you are not releasing something. But now you are doing shows, interviews, appearances. You are moving like someone who has made a decision."

"I have."

"What changed?"

Dayo looked down briefly, not because he was avoiding the question, but because he wanted to choose the answer without turning it into a speech.

"Before, I believed if the work was strong enough, it would travel," he said. "I still believe that. But I also think there are moments where hiding becomes disrespectful. The fans showed up loudly. They are carrying the song in ways even I did not expect. So I should meet them with the same energy."

"That sounds noble," Eleanor said. "But it also sounds like ambition."

"It is ambition."

She smiled. "Good. I prefer the honest answer."

Dayo returned the smile. "I assumed you would."

"What does ambition look like for you now? Because from the outside, it seems as if you already have what many artists spend their lives chasing. Number one records. A global fanbase. A label of your own that many would do things for. Influence across markets. A song currently breaking records faster than people can write articles about it. So what is left?"

There it was Dayo had let her down this part without her knowing.

Not the Michael Jackson question yet, but the road toward it.

Dayo felt the room waiting. The audience had grown quieter. Sharon watched from the side monitor backstage, tablet pressed against her chest. In JD Records, far away from London, Luna was probably still in the booth or arguing with Wayne about a take. The world outside the studio was still playing Beautiful Things, still fighting over the bridge, still deciding whether Dayo Jason was an artist, a phenomenon, or a problem.

Dayo looked back at Eleanor.

"What is left," he said, "is the ceiling."

Eleanor did not blink. "The ceiling?"

"The point people say cannot be crossed. Every generation has one. Sometimes it is a number. Sometimes it is a name. Sometimes it is a standard people respect so much they stop trying to reach past it."

The audience made a low sound, not applause yet, more like recognition.

Eleanor sat back slightly. She had seen the opening.

"And do you believe you are at that ceiling?"

"No."

"Do you believe you can reach it?"

"Yes."

"Do you believe you can break it?"

Dayo did not answer with a joke. "I have to try."

Eleanor’s eyes sharpened. "When people talk about the ceiling in global pop, one name appears before every other. Michael Jackson."

The room changed immediately.

It was not loud. It was worse than loud. It became attentive in a way that felt almost physical. Even people who had only been mildly interested in streaming records understood the weight of that name. Michael Jackson was not just another comparison. He was a monument. A standard. A legacy so large that artists usually spoke around it, never directly at it.

Eleanor gave the name space before continuing.

"You have been compared to him more aggressively in the last forty-eight hours. Some say it is premature. Some say it is unavoidable. Some say it is unfair because he built his legacy in a completely different era, without the internet, without streaming, without the kind of instant global machinery artists have now. When you hear your name placed near his, what do you think?"

Dayo lowered his gaze for a second.

This was the moment where many artists became careful in the wrong way. Too much humility would sound false. Too much confidence would sound disrespectful. But fear had never made Dayo more honest. It only made him more precise.

"Michael Jackson is the blueprint," he said.

No one interrupted.

"There are artists you admire," Dayo continued, "and then there are artists who change the way the world understands performance. He did that. Music, dance, videos, stage presence, global reach, cultural impact. He made pop feel like mythology. I respect that more than I can explain in a short interview."

Eleanor nodded slowly. "So you see him as a role model."

"Yes."

"And yet you used the word ceiling."

Dayo looked at her. "Because that is what role models become if you are not careful."

The audience stirred.

Eleanor’s voice became quieter. "Explain that."

"If you respect someone only by standing below them forever, that is not respect. That is fear wearing good manners. A true role model should make you want to become better, not smaller."

A few people in the audience clapped before stopping, unsure if the moment was too serious for applause.

Eleanor did not let go. "So are you saying you want to surpass Michael Jackson?"

There was no way to soften that question.

There was no safe version of the answer.

Dayo knew what a publicist would have preferred. Something vague. Something like, I only want to be the best version of myself. It would have been clean, harmless, and useless. It would have produced no headlines and no movement. It would have let the world keep deciding his ambition for him.

Dayo did not come to London for that.

"Yes," he said.

The audience froze for half a second.

Then sound broke through the studio. Some people gasped. Some clapped. Someone near the back laughed in disbelief. Eleanor’s expression did not change much, but her eyes told the truth. She knew the clip had just become bigger than the interview.

Dayo did not rush to defend himself. He let the word stand.

When the room settled enough, he continued.

"Not erase him. Not insult him. Not pretend my era is the same as his. I know what he built. I know the difference between physical sales and streaming, between television moments and social media moments, between a world that waited for a video premiere and a world that can replay a song a thousand times from a phone. Those differences matter."

Eleanor leaned forward. "Then how do you compare across eras?"

"You compare by impact," Dayo said. "Not only numbers. Numbers are part of it, but not all of it. You ask: did the artist change how people listen? Did they change how people perform? Did they change how artists think about scale? Did they make the world feel smaller because the music traveled farther than anyone expected?"

The room was quiet again.

Dayo’s voice did not rise, but something in it sharpened.

"Michael Jackson set a mountain in front of every global performer after him. I am not disrespecting the mountain by climbing. I would disrespect it by pretending I do not want to reach the top."

Eleanor studied him. "And after the top?"

Dayo’s answer came without hesitation.

"Build higher."

The audience erupted.

This time, the applause did not sound confused. It sounded like people reacting before deciding whether they agreed. That was dangerous. That was useful. That was exactly the kind of sentence people would argue with, defend, misquote, stitch into clips, and replay alongside Beautiful Things until the song became evidence in a debate larger than music charts.

Eleanor waited for the applause to slow.

"You know what some people will say."

"I know i can already imagine the headline."

"They will say you are arrogant."

"Maybe more hehe."

"They will say streaming numbers make younger artists too bold."

"Maybe."

"They will say Michael Jackson did it without the tools you have."

Dayo nodded. "And they would be right about the tools."

That answer seemed to surprise her.

He continued, "I have tools he did not have. The internet, platforms, instant global communication, fan communities that can organize in minutes. I would be dishonest if I pretended those things do not help. But every era gives artists tools. The question is what you do with them. Having tools does not automatically create legacy. If it did, everyone with a phone would be a legend."

The audience reacted strongly to that.

Eleanor’s smile appeared slowly. "That is going to upset people."

"Probably."

"You don’t seem worried."

"I am worried," Dayo said sincerely.

That made the room pause again.

He smiled faintly. "I just don’t think worry is a good reason to lie."

Eleanor leaned back, almost satisfied. "So let me make sure I understand. Michael Jackson is your role model. You respect him. You believe his legacy is historic. But you are publicly saying your goal is to surpass the records, reach, and standard he left behind."

Dayo held her gaze.

"Yes."

"Without apology?"

"Without apology."

The studio went up again.

Backstage, Sharon looked at the monitor, then at her tablet, then back at the monitor. She had not screamed, because she was still at work, but the effort looked painful.

The interview continued for another twelve minutes, but both of them knew the center had already happened. Eleanor asked about Nigeria, about Luna, about the bridge, about whether Dayo understood that ambition at this level could isolate him. He answered cleanly, but not safely. He refused to confirm Luna. He refused to pretend the records did not matter. He refused to shrink the statement he had just made.

By the time the cameras cut, Eleanor stood and shook his hand.

"You know," she said quietly, away from the main mic, "most people would have walked that back."

Dayo smiled. "That is why most people should not say it."

She laughed once, surprised. "Fair."

When Dayo returned backstage, Sharon was standing with her tablet already lit up. The producer beside her looked like he wanted to say congratulations and ask for hazard pay at the same time.

Dayo took the water Sharon offered him.

"How bad?" he asked.

Sharon looked at the screen.

Then at him.

Then back at the screen.

"You are trending above the song."

Dayo opened the bottle. "Good or bad?"

Sharon’s face remained perfectly professional, except for the smallest twitch at the corner of her mouth.

"Yes."

Dayo took a sip of water.

On Sharon’s tablet, the first clipped headline had already appeared.

DAYO JASON: "MICHAEL JACKSON IS THE BLUEPRINT... BUT I WANT TO BUILD HIGHER."

Dayo read it once.

Then he handed the tablet back.

Outside the green room, the London rain kept falling. Inside the internet, the mountain had moved.