Da’Ville: Voice Of Conviction Listening to your heart while welcoming change signals the genesis of one’s evolution. Through his career in music, singer Da’Ville has willingly opened his heart and soul to new blessings and ideas, which he admits, has contributed enormously to his personal and artistic growth.
Queen Ifrica’s single has substance Sure, incest and sexual abuse are unlikely subjects for a hit single, but when Queen Ifrica’s “Daddy” took Jamaican radio by storm last fall, she was surprised by demands to ban the tune. “They were trying to say that I was making it difficult for fathers who had good relationships [...]
Out and Raw In this age of cameras probing everywhere and recording what was once considered private and even taboo to venture too far into public, dancehall has brought sex out into the musical open. This does not mean, of course, that sex is a new topic, any number of dancehall artistes from General Echo [...]
New Compilation CD Features ‘The Best Of’ Lucky Dube’s Music Music fans who mourned the death of reggae icon Lucky Dube in October last year should be pleased to hear his record company has released a compilation of his greatest hits. The 17-track CD is titled Lucky Dube – The Best Of. It features all [...]
Simon, Steffens’ ‘Scrapbook’ a hit Peter Simon and Roger Steffens were big-time lovers of Jamaican pop culture when they first met in 1981. Last year, the two Americans pooled their knowledge and produced The Reggae Scrapbook which has been getting strong reviews since it was released in November. On Saturday, Simon and Steffens will get [...]
Japanese make it ‘Jam’-aica Taking a musical pilgrimage each year, many Japanese nationals travel to Jamaica, the motherland of reggae and dancehall. With an almost fanatical interest in the culture Japanese visitors eat, sleep and drink in everything Jamaican.
So many dances … all at the same time What started out as a few street dances in the early 1960s and 1970s has now burgeoned into a barrage of street sessions, where revellers launch out in the early morning, and party until sunrise. These street dances which have gained some form of copyright legitimacy, [...]
UB40 reveal new lead singer: Ali Campbell’s brother Duncan The feud between UB40, the world’s biggest reggae band, took a further twist when it was announced that lead singer Ali Campbell would be replaced by a new member – his brother Duncan. The Birmingham group, who topped the charts with Red Red Wine, have sold [...]
Good songs, up and down Mello Vibes Shabba’s X-Rated came in the middle of a set of songs by the ‘big dutty one’. Terror Fabulous’ Position was muffled, as the top end on the recording was low. The same went for Kriss Kross’ Jump. Dollar Wine was played too fast and Colin Lucas sounded like [...]
Giving rocksteady its due He may have played some of the ‘baddest’ bass lines in Jamaican popular music a but Jackie Jackson is far from a household name. In fact, most persons know him as the husband of singer Karen Smith. Get Ready To Rocksteady, a film on the beat that preceded reggae, gives musicians [...]