Jamaican Slang EditorialTHE Blog for Jamaican Slang, Patois, Reggae, Rastafari, Real T’ing dem and Jamaica

With so many riddims coming out every week, it can get hard to put things in perspective. Anyways, we thought we would look at the top 5 most successful riddims to come out. Now, these are not the best riddims or our favorites, but these are the riddims that you can hear at almost any party. The list is not in any special order and let us know if you disagree or have a different top 5:

1- Playground (Beenie Man is definitely the one who made this riddim “sell off” with Who Am I.)

2- Diwali (This might be the most successful riddim outside of Jamaica and it is rddim where Sean Paul really blew up abroad. This riddim showed the world the fun dances coming out of Jamaica. Stand out artists are T.O.K., Sean Paul, Wayne Wonder, Elephant Man…and should I add Lumidee? Uh No!)

3- Bookshelf (Every single song on this riddim is pretty much classic, but the people that stand out are Sean Paul, Beenie Manand T.O.K. This is also the riddim where Sean Paul dropped Dutty Yo on Deport Dem.)

4- Buy Out ( Sean Paul and Elephant Man did their thing on this riddim. This was a fun riddim and people were signalin’ di plane all the time.)

5- Showtime (This might be the best riddim of all time because nuff artist use parts of this riddim or the riddim to launch their career. Beenie and Bounty Killer definitely murdered this riddim.)

Even before finishing this post, I have people on my case that these riddims could be replaced by others. Leave some feedback of what you think should be on this list.

Elephant Man was dropped from the performance roster at this year’s Caribana Festival in Toronto due to his extremely homophobic lyrics. This is just one of several artists to suffer some sort of ban outside of Jamaica because of negative lyrics against the gay community with some of the lyrics promoting violence. Buju Banton’s “Boom Bye Bye” was banned from several  radio stations in North America because the song was very offensive to gays. The truth is that being gay in Jamaica is not easy. PERIOD. In many cases, gay Jamaicans are “in the closet” because being gay is just NOT embraced by most groups in Jamaican society.

Rastas make it clear that homosexuality is forbiden and is subject to death. Dancehall artists like Elephant Man and T.O.K. have songs that blatantly diss homosexuals. You might ask, why is there so much anger and hate against homosexuals?

Jamaican lesbian activist Staceyann Chin believes the following explains why homosexuality is so taboo in Jamaica.

The macho ideal is celebrated, praised in Jamaica, while homosexuality is paralleled with pedophilia, rapists,” Chin said. “Markers that other people perceive as gay — they walk a certain way, wear tight pants, or are overly friendly with a male friend — make them targets. It’s a little pressure cooker waiting to pop.

Even though many of the other caribbean islands are very conservative, Chin goes on to say,

(But) what stands out about Jamaica is how absolutely, head-in-the-sand unwilling the authorities have been for years to acknowledge or address homophobic violence,” he said. “Most notably, three successive governments have completely, utterly, publicly refused even to talk about changing the buggery law — which expressly consigns gay people to second-class citizens and paints
targets on their backs.

The other thing that is not brought up by Chin is the African influence in Jamaica. Most African communities in the African Diaspora are very homophobic. For example, The Source magazine ran a piece on trying to find out who the gay rapper was. Even though, there are gay rappers, none that are openly gay are in the mainstream. Many believe being a homosexual rapper or athlete goes against the idea of being a thug or being tough. Additionally, Rastas and others continue to support the argument that it is not natural.

Although this is a much deeper issue worth exploring in depth, I think it is important that people new to Jamaican Patois and Jamaican Slang get familiar with some of the words typically used to refer to gays. Here are some of the main words:

Chi Chi Man

Batty Bwoy

Fassy

To read more about being gay in Jamaica, click here. And here is the song that cause Elephant to get banned from Caribana.

Elephant Man - Log On

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I know that alot of people think that all reggae sounds the same, but nothing could be further from the truth. Yes, there are definitely some similarities among all of the types of reggae, but there are really two dominant forms of reggae that come out of Jamaica, Ragga aka Dancehall Reggae and Roots Reggae. So what are the differences?

To begin with, Ragga which I will refer to as Dancehall is largely played with digital instruments. Most of the beats which are called Riddims are made digitally. Dancehall has been the most commercially successful Jamaican music over the years. Many Dancehall artists have experienced cross over success with mainstream music. Artists like Sean Paul, Beenie Man, Shabba Ranks, Super Cat, Vybz Kartel, Bounty Killa, Elephant Man and many more are all examples of dancehall artists with some experiencing worldwide success. In addition, to artists known strictly for dancehall, some Roots artists also record dancehall tracks. Sizzla, Buju Banton and Capelton are roots artists who also appear on dancehall tracks. Dancehall is unique in that it draws on all aspects of Jamaican culture and is often the sound where authentic Jamaican Patois can be heard (to hear some authentic Patois on Dancehall Tracks, check out the JA Mixes). The subject matter in the songs ranges from politics in Jamaica, sex, women, violence, Jamaica or a new dance. Dancehall gets its name from the event or place where people go to hear ragga tracks and as the word implies, people dance! Many of the most popular dancehall tracks have dedicated dances with choreography. Recently, one of the most popular was dances was Pon di River, also a song by Elephant Man. In addition, to Pon di River, there is also a dance for Signal de Plane (click here to see the steps for Signal de Plane!) Dancehall tracks come out at a frenzying pace and some are classics while others leave much to be desired.

Roots reggae is the largely rasta influenced form of reggae. Many roots tracks are recorded with live instruments, although many are also digital. As mentioned before, some of the most well known roots artists who venture into the dancehall world are Sizzla, Buju Banton and Capelton. Other popular artists who focus almost exclusively on roots include Morgan Heritage, Ritchie Spice, Jah Mason, Anthony B, Luciano and many more. One thing to know is that many of these artists are also rastas. Sizzla, Capelton and Anthony are all Bobo Ashanti, a very unique and obscure sect of the Rastafarian faith. Most roots songs address issues such as Rastafari, Ganja, Jah, H.I.M (His Imperial Majesty), Africa, Jamaica and other realities that face the Jamaican people. As far as learning to speak Jamaican, Roots is important for understanding the roots, reality and culture, but is much more likely to have English lyrics. From a cultural perspective, Roots songs often have Nayabinghi sounds and other instruments of the Rastafari faith.

So is one genre better than the other? Absolutely not. I go in and out of phases. Sometimes, I want to listen to roots to relax and other times I want to listen to dancehall to get energized like Elephant Man. Dancehall is great to learn to speak Jamaican and Roots really gives you insight into the culture of Jamaica and Rastafari!