Contents - Beth Lesser

dance, to hear the accolades of the crew over the big speakers. Normally, a
person would have to go up to the selector and tell him to “Big up John Tom
from New York and the crew.” So, according to Welton Irie, “Some of them
got the idea to build them own sound so that their name can call the whole
night. And then, them got the artist doing specials with them name in it, to
look big.”
As Dennis Alcapone explains, “These people was making ‘monopoly’ money,
crazy money, through the drugs trade. They would call a deejay or a singer
and give him so much thousands just to make something [a special] that call
their name on it. Just something for their pleasure. They allow everything
[as lyrical content] because they are like that; they are people that don’t care.
They don’t care what the deejay or the singer is singing about. They have their
money and that’s all they care about. They were the people that hijack the
music industry. It becomes a really messed up thing in the ‘80s. The whole
music thing changed.”
Soon, men with big money started buying expensive sound systems and
arranging extravagant affairs, even flying entire posses from New York into
Jamaica to attend a session. “More boxes, more equipment, more everything -
cars going to dance, buses carrying people,” Welton explains. “And then, each
year it got harder for those guys. When the speakers started getting damaged
and need repair, they couldn’t really bother do that. Them wonder why them
have to keep spending money on this sound. And the sound deteriorate and it
park and then the selectors gone elsewhere.”
Big money was pouring into the dancehall business and money has a way
of warping things. Denis Alcapone continues, “It’s all when the drugs people
get involve and [people] start to say they are producers because they was looking
something to do [that was] legitimate. They came in and they mess up
the whole thing and it take away the control from the normal man because
the normal man wasn’t making a lot of money.” The more money the artists
made, the more they came to see themselves as celebrities because they had
fancy cars and gold chains. The artists thought it was great, but long time,
local producers found it hard to compete with the power of this easy money.
“Who do you think is the problem?” An angry Winston Riley complained.
“Is the guys who come up on the scene with a whole heap of money. Cause
them take the artists and give them a ton load of money whe’ you can’t afford
to give them.” The new producers had a habit of handing out large sums with
ease, creating a difficult situation for the working producers who had been
toiling away in the studios of downtown Kingston and could never match
such high levels of remuneration.
new york CallinG
Drugs and music mixed easily, especially in the reggae hot spots of New
York and Miami.
“If you’re in a club in New York,” Dillinger explained, “like you go in a
340 | RUB A DUB STYLE – The Roots of Modern Dancehall