No 'butts' about it! The Appleton Treasure Island 2006 Media Launch was an eye-catching affair at the Jamaica Pegasus hotel, Knutsford Boulevard, New Kingston on Tuesday, June 20. - WINSTON SILL
IN THE BEGINNING, there was a sound from the former slaves which became mento, which became ska, rocksteady, reggae, then dancehall.
And the Jamaican upper class, distinctly scornful of things not European, duly scorned them all.
Until relatively recently.
It may not be embraced with open arms (and ears) and the reasons for the movements are, I am sure, purely financial, but we should not take for granted the physical movements that reggae and dancehall have made.
I remember my surprise in the mid to late 1990s when sessions started being advertised for Skyline Drive, Jacks Hill, certainly a far cry from House of Leo on Cargill Avenue, which was Stone Love's Thursday night base.
REFLECTIONS
My reflections on these music movements came on Tuesday night at the Top of the World, Jamaica Pegasus, as the Appleton Treasure Island Party weekend was being launched. It was dancehall music from the speaker, Elephant Man, and Left Side and Esco among the performers for the live show over the series. Threr were also three leasses (who certainly do not come from downtown Kingston) with but cheeks hanging out.
I have been to a few reggae related events at the Liguanea Club, among them the launch of Steel Pulse's African Holocaust and the Red Stripe Reggae Sumfest 2006 kick-off press conference. I have seen a top deejay striding across the lawns of Terra Nova with 'big head' in hand and a cloud of smoke around his head, at another reggae related event.
I saw Flourgon rock the audience at Jamaica House's lawns for Leroy Sibbles' birthday celebrations, Jr. Gong welcome all to Jamrock on Kings House lawns during Third World's last 'Committed' and Chakademus and Pliers tease on the Faultline, Jack's Hill.
There was a time not so long ago when these things would not have happened, not in those places.
Jamaican music has moved, not necessarily with the class of people who created them, but do not ignore that some things have changed.
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