Published:Friday | July 17, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
It has been 20 years - plus a day - since Buju Banton's fourth studio album, 'Til Shiloh, was officially released through Loose Cannon (an Island Records subsidiary) on July 18, 1995. It was three days after his 22nd birthday.Much of the album's...
Published:Wednesday | July 15, 2015 | 1:40 PMMel Cooke
Two weeks ago, I went to the 2015 staging of the International Reggae Day celebrations at Countryside Club, Half-Way Tree. It was a sound system style performance, with Ken Boothe, Andrew Tosh, Cherine Anderson, Denyque, Beenie Man, Bushman, and Ras...
Published:Sunday | July 12, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
After the fisticuffs and surrender by Richard 'Frog' Holmes' corner, the distribution of prizes, and Kemhal Russell's smile to savour his $2 million top prize, it was time for the Contender after-party at the National Indoor Sports Centre, Arthur...
Published:Wednesday | July 8, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Sometimes, it seems, the making of Jamaican popular music is a reverse of what obtains elsewhere. So, since the Sleng Teng established not only the digital sound but also the process of music mass production in 1985, our accustomed approach is to...
Published:Friday | July 3, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
As she spoke at the launch of her second poetry collection, The Way Home, published by Peepal Tree, Millicent Graham noted the serendipity of the launch at the National Gallery last Sunday.The gallery had up the exhibition Explorations 3: Seven...
Published:Wednesday | July 1, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Confession: I have not paid as much attention to film in general and Jamaican film output in particular as I should have. Sure, in the latter category, I have seen undisputed classics like The Harder They Come, Countryman and Rockers, then the batch...
Published:Wednesday | June 24, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Last week, I included the links to three online responses to the previous week's column, 'Bye Bye, Boom Bye Bye', hoping that a wider audience would read them before I addressed sections this week.I respond under certain parameters. One, this...
Published:Monday | June 22, 2015 | 4:44 AMMel Cooke
On Saturday, analysis of the Chinese impact on the Caribbean continued at the inaugural Confucius Conference at the University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona Campus. The conference's theme was 'Dragons in the Archipelago - The Chinese-Caribbean...
Published:Friday | June 19, 2015 | 10:04 AMMel Cooke
Burning Spear's Foggy Road was first released by Clement 'Sir Coxson' Dodd and then, like so many reggae songs of the time, reworked in the 1970s to emphasise the bass and horn lines. Sizzla's Solid as a Rock appears on his standout 2003 album, Da...
Published:Tuesday | June 16, 2015 | 3:01 PMMel Cooke
While the connection between Rastafari and reggae is now so commonplace as to be taken for granted, at the recent Caribbean Studies Association (CSA) conference in New Orleans, USA, Dr Michael Barnett traced the link back to pre-Independence."I...
Published:Monday | June 15, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Singer Billy Ocean had as many microphone changes and adjustments as a busy model at Sunday's closing day of runway shows at Caribbean Fashion Week 2015, held at the National Indoor Sports Centre, Arthur Wint Drive, St Andrew.But while the models'...
Published:Sunday | June 14, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Dr Erna Brodber explained the title of her new book Nothing's Mat, published by the University of the West Indies (UWI) Press, to a near full audience at the main library's multifunctional room last Thursday.It is deeply connected to personal family...
Published:Friday | June 12, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
With the proliferation of cellular phones in the country, it seems hard to believe that less than 15 years ago, the mobile handset was only for the very few. The privileged few at that - needless to add. Then came Digicel, and in short order, all...
Published:Friday | June 12, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
The 2015 Kingston on The Edge (KOTE) Urban Art Festival starts on Friday, June 19, with a mix of film, music and art at Redbones Blues Café, New Kingston. It is the first of 10 days packed with activities easily calculated by some other...
Published:Tuesday | June 9, 2015 | 1:22 PMMel Cooke
During the recent Caribbean Studies Association (CSA) conference in New Orleans, USA, Dr Keith Nurse made a case for a collective approach to the distribution of films from the region. Nurse, who chairs CaribbeanTales Worldwide Distribution (CTWD),...
Published:Monday | June 8, 2015 | 3:15 PMMel Cooke
So far, Stefhen Bryan has had as far-flung an experience presenting Doodu Boy as his life. Which is appropriate, as the one-man show is autobiographical, Bryan using the production's three acts to relive on stage distinct phases of his life in...
Published:Friday | June 5, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
If two words can summarise the renowned form of Jamaican indigenous music called reggae, they could be 'one drop'. And they could also be 'Bob Marley', so it is appropriate that he has a song of that name.However, Bob Marley is only one of the many...
Published:Wednesday | June 3, 2015 | 2:32 PMMel Cooke
WARNING: This edition of Music and More with Mel could be particularly dangerous to your sense of well-being. You will find yourself either overly irritated or enthusiastic, maybe concurrently. You will find yourself cheering or booing, maybe...
Published:Wednesday | June 3, 2015 | 2:39 PMMel Cooke
Nature's debut album is named Life's Journey and, as he performed at its official launch of the Downsound Records set on Tuesday at Redbones Blues CafÈ, New Kingston, the singer took the large audience on a trip to the first time he held a...
Published:Friday | May 22, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Just over a mere half-decade ago, in Jamaica, this time period meant solely a national focus on projects that involved physical exertion, each collective effort meant to benefit a geographic community or a community of persons. Then there was the...
Published:Wednesday | May 20, 2015 | 10:20 AMMel Cooke
I think about Dr Earl McKenzie’s exquisite poem, ‘Against Linearity’, quite often as I encounter what seems to be the national tendency to avoid order. One of those instances is coming back to Kingston through Miami (though I have not done it that...
Published:Friday | May 15, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
In the days before the significant effect of climate change hit the world, the opening lines of HD Carberry's poem Nature would have resonated even more with Jamaicans than now. The words would have been familiar to every child who went through the...
Published:Monday | May 11, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Last Tuesday, there was a gathering on the grounds of Studio One at 13 Studio One Boulevard (formerly Brentford Road), which continued what is now an established tradition of supporting a young musician.For the third consecutive year, a donation was...
Published:Sunday | May 10, 2015 | 8:07 PMMel Cooke
Jamaica has had a spotty relationship with bootleg CDs and videos: from the era in which compact discs were the medium of choice to distribute pirated music and movies up to now when it seems that everything is available online.In at least one...
Published:Friday | May 8, 2015 | 12:00 AMMel Cooke
Since his death on April 30, Ben E. King's longstanding connection with Jamaica has been extensively noted. However, while he performed in Jamaica from the 1960s until a show at the Courtleigh Auditorium, New Kingston, in May 2013, as an R...
