Reggae Music: Are Jamaicans Loosing Reggae Music to Foreigners

The two most popular forms of indigenous Jamaican music today are Reggae and Dancehall. With Reggae as the trailblazer, both have made significant inroads, cutting across every single continent globally. This popularity has meant that the music and its attendant culture have also found homes in many different countries and the terrain of production and consumption has changed a great deal. So, as a part of this, a big question today is whether or not Jamaica/Jamaicans are losing their indigenous, popular music to foreigners. Is it that our special Jamaicanness is being taken over by others – especially with the rise of “legitimate” Reggae and Dancehall artistes all over the world? Is this also true because of the renewed attention that is focused on the well-established income-generating potential of the Jamaican brand?

So, what makes the music or other cultural product indigenous? Does it have to be produced entirely in Jamaica and feature only Jamaican artistes, using the Jamaican sound, attitude and style? Can it be made in Jamaica by non-Jamaicans, using all the other inputs? Can it be made outside of Jamaica, by Jamaicans, using the Jamaican sound, attitude and style? Does a collaboration done in Jamaica, with Jamaican and foreign artistes qualify? Can it be made by non-Jamaicans, outside of Jamaica, using the Jamaican sound, attitude and style? As the music industry continues to explode and expand, we are grappling with the answers to these questions.

From where I sit, the truth is that claims for Jamaican music, made in Jamaica by Jamaicans being the one and true indigenous forms are under significant siege. And some aspects of this have long since gone the way of the bathwater – dash wey. Jamaica is steadily losing its lien on claims for sole ownership and authenticity of its music. Yes, Jamaican music, for example Reggae, is revered and sanctified by Reggaephiles all over the world. And since imitation is the greatest form of flattery, these Reggae worshippers have moved from the altar to the stage, and then to the cash register. Europe’s love affair with Jamaican music is well-documented – it was built on the heels of Bob Marley and the Reggae Ambassadors and has exploded and expanded into a grand industry complete with annual festivals, artistes, bands, promoters, radio stations, books, studios, etc. devoted to the worship and sale of Reggae in all its facets.

Indeed, there are over 560 Reggae Festivals held annually worldwide in Europe, the USA, Canada, etc., that draw large crowds, paying good, strong Euros, US dollars and other toppa toppa currencies for entry fees, camping fees, branded products, food and a whiff of Jamaican music and culture, backed by peace and love. The largest Reggae Festivals are held in Europe and the Jamaican artistes (Reggae and Dancehall) who make the bill, ply their trade as workers for hire, side by side with big name Reggae and Dancehall artistes from Germany, Italy and France, among others.

I visited Rototom Sunsplash twice, once in Italy and once in Spain and was awestruck by the palpable love of Reggae and Jamaican culture that was on display – music, dance, food, Rastafari, books, clothes, style and pattan and more. I visited the book display tent and saw so many books written on marijuana in Italian, German and French, etc., that I wondered about our own output in Jamaica. I watched the young Europeans practise dancing to the latest dancehall styles in the Dancehall tent. I listened to them talk about their love of Reggae and the string of festivals that they attended each summer.

I was also introduced to Yard Gear clothing and accessories, the German brand of “the ultimate dancehall fashion for urban people addicted to Caribbean lifestyle” with photos of reggae and dancehall artistes and Jamaican slang and feeling a pang of something. I wondered how that little youth in some garrison somewhere in Jamaica would know that his slang, her style and pattan had travelled so far and done so much and earned real money…but very little of it will make its way back home. Over the ten days of my first visit to Rototom in 2009 I saw almost 200,000 persons pass through the then ten-day festival that was and is totally funded by gate receipts, camping fees and sale of branded products. In Jamaica, the home of Reggae, only Sting (30 years), Reggae Sumfest (21 years) and Rebel Salute (20 years) have held on for dear life, despite the odds, to be a part of the present-day (with Jazz Festival rounding off) annual offerings of Jamaican music. These annual festivals/stage shows in Jamaica have survived without the full support of Government, and many can only show intermittent corporate sponsorship.

Of the approximately US$255M dollars that I last heard that Jamaican music earns annually, only a paltry sum makes its way back home to Jamaica’s coffers – mainly on the backs of artistes who work hard on tour all over the world to make their food and spread their name. It seems that others have figured out how to capitalize on Jamaican music and are selling themselves as new Reggae ambassadors to their own crowds and literally bypassing the so-called authenticity that some feel is owned by Jamaicans and no one else. Remember Matisyahu? And now we have the renewed Snoop Lion? Have you ever listened to Seeed, the popular German dancehall group? You do know Gentleman and Alborosie? It is high time that Jamaicans at home wake up to the fact that the Jamaican music pie is being shared abroad, and Jamaica is receiving the crumbs!

Where Dancehall is concerned, as we spend more time in now denying its Jamaicanness others in Europe, Africa and Asia are grabbing it up and running with it. Japanese dancers won this year’s staging of our World Reggae Dance Competition, held as a part of the Jamaican National celebration of our 51st year of Independence. What a thing! Here we see it is fun and games and a good moment for controversy about ‘how di man dem ah dance like ooman’. There they see it as a route to setting up a dancehall shop and showcasing their prowess to others far removed from our shores – at a price. Dancehall artistes, tunes, dances, lyrics, style and fashion are big catches and big business…and now I see the American artistes – hip hop, R&B and pop making the salutary pilgrimages to Jamaica, the mecca, to get their stripes, before running off to re-make, re-brand and re-do Jamaican music. Everybody wants a piece of the Jamaican pie…and we here at home have always been very glad to oblige – giving away huge slices of the secrets of our culture, our style and pattan to those who come and then leave with the goods. It is amazing that we are so grateful for a moment on BET, a plug on someone’s VW or Saturn advertisement in some developed country somewhere, a moment of some so-called visibility on the USA’s Superbowl – vistas that we already have conquered. If Jamaicaness, Jamaican music, Jamaican style and pattan were not so attractive, so saleable, we would not be deemed worthy of notice and attention and no one would want to jump on the wagon of our music and culture.

The Creative Economy 2010 published by the United Nations recommends that the “Government of Jamaica (GOJ) needs to focus on reggae, , film and other creative services to grow ailing economy” (p.15). Reggae, for instance, values billions in US dollars with Jamaica only getting a fraction of that. The report also notes Jamaica had a US$6 million trade surplus in its creative services (as at 2008). These data indicate that the creative/cultural industries in Jamaica need to be re-considered as viable planks on which Jamaica’s economy can flourish. So Jamaica’s music and culture ‘done large aready’. What is critical now is for the key players to understand that they are already poised for success and treat this as a highly professional enterprise. Vybz Kartel was on to an excellent model with his move as a recording artiste into multiple branded products – club, rum, condoms, cake soap, etc. And I do not believe that Governments, who are notoriously bad at capitalist business models should be the drivers of Jamaica’s culture or music industry. Governments should continue to develop the necessary legislation and structures that will provide a facilitating environment – copyright, protection of indigenous forms, royalty collection, training, seed money, etc. – and leave the business of transforming Jamaican music and culture into tangible end-products to those entrepreneurs whose passion and drive will ensure success in this highly competitive environment.