 Societal
impact of pum pum songs
Yeah. Oh God. I mean I know my part
in this culture but sometimes when I listen to these songs I have mixed
emotions. I don’t want to knock my peers and sound like this voice of
reason. I like the beats and sometimes I have to block the words to vibe
to the music. It’s hard. It gets harder everyday because they say so many
derogatory things about women. Now, I’m having problems relating to girls
in my country, especially the young ones. They have such a materialistic
out view but maybe that’s a worldwide thing. But I’m more exposed to Jamaican
girls.
Honestly, I’m at a loss. I don’t
what I could possibly say to [young girls] because it would be hard. What
these guys offer is so glamorous. It’s like, ‘I’m gonna put you down but
I’m gonna let you hang out in this nice car for the night and you get
to be a star for a night.’ And that’s what they want, so how can I tell
them, ‘Don’t want to be a star, don’t accept being a star.’ How can I
offer them anything else? I’m just saying, “Get your dignity back. Get
your pride back.” I think nobody really wants [to hear] that. They don’t
understand until they hit maturity. When [these women] get older, there’s
nothing to show for all of it. They have no pride left. Nobody wants to
be with them. That’s when it sets in and it’s too late.
And they have nothing to show.
Usually, they don’t spend enough time investing in their careers. They
don’t get a tangible career. Their career is hanging in the dance and
learning all the new moves. Nobody really gets paid for that. It’s sad.
It’s now become our culture. The nakedness and sex, the exploitation of
females--they welcome it. What can I do? I can’t go out and fight for
somebody who doesn’t want to be fought for. It’s just sad.
Fighting misogyny & materialism
I try but it’s hard. I hope I can
make a difference. I hope so but sometimes when I talk to females one-on-one,
I just hang out with them in their circles and ask them. I really want
to understand it for myself. How can you live the way you do? Some of
them have kids and they’ll spend thousands of dollars on hairstyles, clothes,
and their children can’t go to school tomorrow because they have no lunch
money, no books.
I have a sister who is a teacher
at a high school in Jamaica. High school is when you’re really supposed
to take your education seriously. She’ll have children coming to school
with nice gold chains and diamonds and they have the latest sneakers,
which cost hundreds of dollars but they don’t have their textbooks. Something
like this, I really can’t understand. They’re twisted priorities. When
you tell them they really don’t have to have jewelry in school, they think
you’re just envious of them being able to wear jewelry. It’s a really
twisted way of thinking. It just blows me away. I can’t think of any way
to bridge that gap--how to relate to people like this.
I think it’s bred from an inferiority
complex or some kind of twisting and all of the role models we have now.
When they look at all the role models now, they want to follow. It’s hard
to tell a child, ‘Go to school, pay attention, live this boring life,’
because it seems boring when you’re a child going to school and paying
attention to the teachers and stuff.
Look at the guy who grew up next
to their mother and he didn’t go to school. Yet, their mother is really
brilliant, she has a degree, but she doesn’t have much money. The guy
next door didn’t go to school, he got up, started to hustle, he drives
the latest car, wears all the nicest clothes. It’s hard to tell this child
now, ‘Your neighbor’s lifestyle is the wrong way to go about living.’
How can you tell him that?
This is the ultimate objective:
you want the nice car, the clothes. You know, so, it’s kind of hard to
keep trying to find ways to reach children. And I think the easiest way
is to stop thinking of them as kids you have to lecture.
Do as I say, not as I do
I remember when I was a child I
hated being told what to do. Whatever you tried to force on me, I rejected,
even if it was good. So, we have to stop acting like these perfect people
telling them not to do this, what not to do, but we hardly ever them what
to do. I try to communicate with children across to them instead of down
to them. I just show them.
It’s hard for us. We come to children,
we come down on them so hard, and we say, “Be perfect. Do this and that.”
They can see we’re messing up everyday. ‘Who are you to tell me this?”
We do everything wrong. “Why
are you telling me I shouldn’t have a boyfriend? Are you still with my
father? Why didn’t you make that work?” Then, “You don’t know anything
about relationships. You can’t talk to me.” You really can’t lecture them.
You just have to reason with them, show them what you did wrong, and show
them how much you care, that you really don’t want them to go through
what you’ve been through. It’s a whole different outlook, you know, than
just laying down rules. Nobody wants to live by no damn rules.
It takes a strong man
to partner with a strong woman
I don’t think it was something
that any of us tried to do. It just happened. [Andrew and I] make mistakes,
and we’ve had problems, and we work them out, but that’s what makes us
– brings us – closer together. That’s what makes us have more respect
for each other. I think this is the best we can get. We respect each other’s
space.
We know that we’re not perfect.
We’re gonna make mistakes. Maybe I make a little more mistakes than the
other person. The more you realize somebody means to you the more you
respect them and you figure how to deal with a relationship.
There’s no manual. You just have
learn as you go along. I get advice from my kid, too.
It can be hard. Sometimes, as females,
when we try to be strong or have very strong views, we tend to absorb
everything around us or we overshadow people around us. We tend to try,
well, I think we do more than we need to just to establish our presence.
It’s really hard for any man to be with that, to cope with that. You just
have to try to learn each other’s tendencies. You make allowances for
them.
I think I have a really strong person
who could stand me. Sometimes when I look at myself, I don’t think I can
stand me! I have many personality traits that I can’t stand about other
people. But when I notice them, I try to make allowances for them and
try to apologize. I try to cut down on the stuff I don’t like. I’m a work
in progress.
 The
business of music
We’re planning tours right now.
We are getting offers from people all over. This is great because I haven’t
really toured before. I just don’t like single shows everywhere.
I think right now I’ve grown up
in every aspect of my life, especially, musically. Right now I’m doing
whatever the hell I want to do and not what a producer thinks is commercial.
I’m not thinking of people as something I should market something to.
Instead, I try to think of people as myself. What would I buy? I try to
do that.
Right now, we’re riding this kind
of small wave that’s building and swelling. I just feel very happy that
I could do something. When I started this album, many people thought it
was too radical. On a few things that we did, Andrew and I , we got advice
from people who’ve been in the business for a long period who are much
less adventurous than we are. They tried to impose their hang-ups on us,
“Maybe you shouldn’t do this. Maybe you shouldn’t say that. That’s a little
too political.”
But who cares? This is what we
feel. This is what we want to put across, you know. You either like it
or you don’t. We’re not doing what we think you’re gonna like.
We’re telling you what we feel. And if you agree with it, that’s
great. So, right now we’re going along with what’s happening. After that,
the sky’s the limit. We have a lot more stuff that we want to do. We have
other acts that we’d like to work with.
It’s so boring [the current state
of dancehall and reggae]. There’s no formula to music. It’s so hard for
me when I walk into a record store, I keep buying all the old stuff. You
listen to Aretha Franklin and hear her just belting out whatever it is
she felt like. She didn’t program that note. It just came when she got
to that point in the song, she felt like screaming and she screamed. Hell,
I wanted to scream, too. I couldn’t scream as good as her so I let her
scream for me. I keep going back to the old stuff.
Now, I just feel like if it bothers
me so much that we’re recycling stuff then I shouldn’t do the same thing.
And if it bothers me that we’re not taking chances and trying to make
something new because music is art, it’s creativity. We haven’t created
much over the past few decades in international music. You listen to one
R&B song, you’ve heard all of it.
And you like them and you want to
love their music. They have really nice voices but they just don’t use
them for anything particular. It’s so formula, you know. I wanted to break
away from that.
The darling of “Doctor’s Darling”
I don’t have any particular way
to choose rhythms and producers. It’s whatever I feel. If I listen to
something and I’m inspired…
…this record [Gangsta Blues]
only has two established producers on it. There are a couple of new names,
especially Andrew. This is his first effort. We have a young label. It’s
Tarantula Records and this is the very first thing that came off of it.
We don’t think music is about what someone’s name is. We think it’s about
sound. If it sounds good and it can appease the people, then that’s what
I want to make. So, I can work with anybody.
That song (“It’s A Pity” on the German-produced
“Doctor’s Darling” riddim) in itself was a small revolution because it
was the first time we saw such a big hit from a non-Jamaican reggae produced
sound outside of the pop reggae circle from a real reggae roots riddim.
That was the first time it ever happened. I guess we’re playing our part
in dispelling the myth that Jamaica is the only place that can turn out
reggae. I think that’s a stupid mentality, anyway, because if somebody
from anyplace in the world at all can make a good song, why shouldn’t
it be accepted by Jamaicans?
Most Jamaicans tend to think, ‘Yeah,
‘im good but he’s not Jamaican.’ I think that’s just stupid. It’s so limited
that you deprive yourself of something good just because it didn’t come
from your backyard. That’s ridiculous.
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