Sean Paul Explains Why Dancehall Has Always Been Big

Stage One, your first record, came out 16 years ago. Did you think you’d still be making No. 1 singles?

You know, I thought I was going to be a producer when I was 15-years-old. I convinced my mom to buy me a little keyboard and I started to make riddims, and then when I was about 17 or 18 I started to write lyrics for these riddims. I really, really liked Super Cat's style and Shabba Ranks, of course, so I didn't think I was gonna be the next thing. And when I wrote my first song, I thought, Wow, how am I gonna keep this up? It took, like, two weeks in terms of just procrastinating and wanting to finish it the right way and be something that people liked. I was still in college at the time; my day would consistent of waking up early for swim training, because I swam for Jamaica and did water polo as well, finishing all of that by 9 at night, and then going to studios.

A lot of my first songs were really conscious music. I was into Tony Rebel, Capleton hadn’t even come out. A couple of the songs I wrote for my demo tape were talking about the ghetto story; I was drawing comparisons between uptown, where I’m from, and downtown. A lot of times people would look at me like, What the fuck you know about this shit? You don't know nothing about it 'cause you're from uptown. Those stories were my heart, but my first producer at the time said, ‘Yo dude, girls like you. If you wanna make a mark, stay to that niche!’ I tried to write a couple songs and it just blew the fuck up.

So no regrets about changing course?

No, but I still dabble with that stuff. I have a song called "Give Thanks For Life," which is out in Jamaica right now. Those songs exist, and they're out there. It’s just people pay more attention to the party songs. But it’s fine because when I was young I spent most of my teenage life at the pool, so on weekends we would all look forward to going out and having, like, 17 beers! Music is a reflection of life, but it's also entertainment and people want to forget their problems. Remember when you were in school? Remember you had all these problems, like, your dad's in prison? Or, you don't have the money that other kids have and so you're feeling kinda alienated, or left out? This music is a relief.

Afrobeat is new to a lot of people; but you were up on it earlier than most. Are you often thinking about how to work within new global rhythms?

I have my ears up and people in the camp who are checking for things. But I was actually introduced to afrobeat in Atlanta, about four or five years ago. A promoter booked me for this show, and they’re playing dancehall, then they started playing hip-hop — but then they played soca, which I’d never heard in a hip-hop club in Atlanta. And then the promoter said, ‘Watch,’ and they started to play afrobeat and it was crazy. This music was news to me at the time: it reminded me of what Kevin Lyttle and Rupee were trying to do with soca but Afrocentric, a step further, and sounding even more modern than what we were doing. It’s never a conscious decision to be like, ‘Oh I know this music's gonna break.’ I just always liked it. This music has made it possible for me to perform in over 20 African countries; I’ve been to Uganda and Rwanda. So it’s amazing that these worlds can come together. But also, it goes both ways: Machel Montano and I did “One Wine” in 2015, which is really a dancehall EDM track.

I love that some of the newest soca is pretty much techno; it’s been very interesting to follow. How has access to the internet and technology changed the music industry in Jamaica, since you first started?

I started out getting my songs played as for radio DJs, but especially the street dudes. I looked toward giving street dudes my new music because even if no one bought it, I would get popular and make money by doing stage shows — so I had to give my music out. Back in those days, I'd record on a 24 track reel: you had to have your song down pat, like, sing it one time else you were wasting studio time and tape. Riddims were an economic thing, as opposed to paying for a band: the tape could hold a certain amounts of tracks, so there's one producer and he has many artists on. That struck such a vibe in Jamaica, because it was cool to hear that many people with different perspectives. You could have one guy singing about a girl with a fat ass, and another person singing something more conscious — and it’s on the same riddim.

But I remember years when "Get Busy" was a big song for me, and "Temperature," and "Gimme The Light." Those three songs had to be remixed by foreign mixers from America, so that it could sound as big as whatever Justin Timberlake song was playing on the radio in the States. Technology reached us slow, and we kind of suffered. And I think younger producers in Jamaica have been in search of new things. All these new pop songs are samples of old dancehall tracks from the ’90s so it’s been disappointing, personally, to see that coming from outside. “Work” by Rihanna is bumping on the radio, and that beat she’s on is called the Sail Away riddim — I had a song on it in 1998 called “Fit and Legit.