Tiwa Savage Reflects on Her Journey with Mavin Records: “I Don’t Have Shame—So I Asked Again”

Award-winning Nigerian singer Tiwatope Savage, popularly known as Tiwa Savage, has opened up about how she got signed to Mavin Records and what the experience meant to her, during a revealing conversation with Afrobeats Intelligence.

Tiwa shared that she had to be persistent in her pursuit of a record deal with Don Jazzy. She recalled personally approaching the music mogul multiple times, asking him to sign her when he launched Mavin Records, especially since she hadn’t been signed under his former label, Mo’Hits.

“So when Don Jazzy started Mavin, I went to him and I said, can you sign me now? Because you didn’t sign me in Mo’Hits before. And now you’ve started Mavin,” she recounted.
“And he was just like, you know what? I don’t have a first lady. I asked again. Yes. Wow. Oh, my God. I don’t have shame. Yeah, you really asked everyone. Yeah, I did. And I went to Jazzy and I asked him again. And then he just said, yes, like that.”

Beyond the signing, Tiwa reflected on her time at Mavin with a sense of nostalgia, saying there were elements of the experience that she deeply missed—particularly the emotional support and family-like environment.

“Who you sign to is very important. Like, I didn’t appreciate it until after I left. Like Mavin still is like family,” she said.
“So if there’s something that’s going on, like online or whatever, I promise you, I would run to Jazzy’s room and we will all come. Like Sid, Tega, Reekado, all of us in his room, on the floor, on the bed. We’ll talk about it—if I have to cry or whatever—and we’ll get through it.”

Tiwa contrasted that experience with her current reality, noting that being with a label outside of that tight-knit circle comes with emotional distance.

“Being with a label, they don’t really care about your personal stuff. So I can’t really go to the Empire office and be like, oh my God. Like, I miss that part of it.”

Her reflections offered fans a rare glimpse into the behind-the-scenes bonds within the Mavin team and how they shaped her early years in the Nigerian music industry.