The story of Tami and Tessanne
It’s almost eerie the way Tami and Tessanne Chin finish each other’s sentences. “We were in Little People together. we did everything together,” both girls said as they recounted some childhood memories.
“We used to sing in the fan. that’s probably why we both have bad sinuses,” says older sister Tami, adding that, they always wanted to be performers.
TOK wants nothing to do with Beenie Man
International dancehall group TOK says they will no longer support anything that has to do with Beenie Man, as the doc has disrespected them on more than one occasion.
The latest issue came about when Beenie Man failed to show up for ‘Bounce’, a stage show that was put on by TOK last month.
Sounding a Mosaic by Bedouin Soundclash
Sure, the Canadian band Bedouin Soundclash blends a myriad of different sounds and styles, but it doesn’t “clash†in the way that the band’s influences do, such as WashingtonD.C. veterans Bad Brains. Unlike Bedouin Soundclash, Bad Brains forces reggae into its aggressive punk, using reggae songs with refreshing breaks in between the thrashing. Instead, Bedouin Soundclash’s second album, “Sounding a Mosaic,†released in 2004, uses subtle elements of rock and ska to accompany its prominent reggae sound.
Rita Marley uses Tutu’s name in vain
Rita Marley, the widow of late reggae musician Bob Marley, has been falsely using the name of Archbishop Desmond Tutu to garner publicity for a series of concerts she hopes to hold in the country early next year to commemorate the birth of her husband.
The Africa Unite programme — which will be staged in Durban, Cape Town and Johannesburg under the auspices of the Rita and Bob Marley Foundation — is set to include music concerts, a photo exhibition and a fashion show.
Fourteen years before the devastation in New York City, Jamaica, and indeed the world, suffered a loss, though clearly not of the same magnitude, when reggae revolutionary Peter Tosh was brutally murdered at his home in Barbican, Kingston by gunmen. Also killed on that fateful night, was Wilton ‘Doc’ Brown, a herbalist friend of Tosh.
Dancehall, the business edition
As the clampdown on expletives at stage shows continues, a long whispered argument has come to the fore, that when sponsors from ‘uptown’ came with the money, the music, which was originally the ‘downtown’ lifeline was never the same again. There were new rules for an old game.
Passa Passa street parties pacify Kingston’s toughest
It’s dawn, and the fusion of hip-hop and reggae rhythms has transformed one of this city’s grittiest slums into a cross between Girls Gone Wild and Cirque du Soleil.
Gyrating women in barely-there tops and minis flash intimate flesh while roving video cameras document every erotic bump and grind — at the most risqué angles possible.
The sexually charged displays have come to characterize Passa Passa, a new party craze that has spread outside Jamaica and even to Miami while sparking an uproar in some parts of the Caribbean, including calls for its ban.
At only 16 years old, producer Stephen McGregor seems destined to make a mark on Jamaican music. One would expect the son of reggae veteran Freddie McGregor to be involved in music, but Stephen has proven he has not only creativity, but staying power as well.
It was a traffic-blocking, jam-packed, high-energy, entertainment-filled occasion inside the Amnesia Night Club’s parking lot in Ocho Rios last Saturday when the ‘Energy God’ Elephant Man held his birthday celebrations there.
Young reggae stars as relevant as their elders
Jamaica’s cultural complexity is aptly illustrated by a couple of interesting claims in the documentary Made in Jamaica, which premieres at TIFF today: the Caribbean island has more recording studios per square mile than any other country — all booked around the clock — as well as the greatest number of churches.