Two Releases in the Same Year, Built on Opposite Logics.

Two releases in one year that could not have been run the same way, and I was managing both.

K.O // O.K was the only full album release under my management and the one project where I owned a release strategy end to end. It carried a concept that could easily have been lost: two EPs, K.O for getting knocked out, O.K for being okay with it. I had also been running parallel Sony Music and Universal MENA negotiations for Karim, so the release had to justify the label it landed with.

Playbook one

Make the structure do the work.

Not dropping both halves at once and hoping the narrative read through. Sequencing K.O first, letting it sit, then answering it with O.K two weeks later. I ran it as content release manager on the artist side, timing every YouTube upload and every asset against Sony’s DSP pitching windows rather than treating them as a separate lane from the label strategy, and led the post-production teams behind the videos across colour, edit and VFX on Loji and 3al Abiad. Loji went viral on its own and earned a separate sync placement. A year later I co-directed the live visuals show for Karim’s set at BRED Abu Dhabi, running 3al Abiad from the booth.

Playbook two

L NOR went the other way entirely.

Three EPs, nine fully instrumental tracks, spread across a year and a half for El Waili on WRST. No hook to chase and no vocal to market, so the work was conceptual: developing each track alongside the animators so that video and music were built together rather than one illustrating the other. Animation by Amr Adel and Amr Kamel, VFX by Mostafa Othman and Lotfy at With A Twist Studios.

As WRST’s executive and artist manager I worked our own DSP relationships directly to land organic editorial placement on Spotify and Anghami. Karim’s monthly Spotify listeners grew from roughly 200K to 500K on the way to official Apple Music and Spotify editorial placement, with no paid media behind either release. The same creative world later produced Hena, which became BRED Abu Dhabi’s official festival single.

One release was engineered to travel fast. The other was built to still make sense in three years. Knowing which an artist needs is most of the job.