DANCEHALL IS DEAD

DANCEHALL IS DEAD

I know the uproar that may attend the above utterance but having witnessed, for the umpteenth time, the mediocrity that attends our popular music scene, I feel compelled to offer my two cents.
This does purport to be a review of Wednesday Night's RockThe World show in New kIngston. That task fell to Debra Edwards. See her review in this ediiton). Neither do I seek t oblame the promoters (as is first impulse in such scenarios) for what transpired on stage.
This speaks to a much deeper frustration, one that admiteedly, has been gnawing at me for some time, and to which I have alluded in various public and personal fora prior to now.
It is a deep-seated exasperation at hearing our deejays express the same lyrical themes in the same old, mouldy ways that they have been almost since dancehall came to prominence: A generous helping of violent homophobia. Add a dollop of aversion to oral sex.Lather.Rinse.Repeat.
With precious few exceptions, this has remained the staple (of course, one is discounting the 'bad man'/gun tunes here) of our deejays' presentation was in evidence on Wednesday in the form of Spragga Benz and Beenie Man. I'm the lat person to advocate any form of censorship other than self-censorship (unless the artiste censors himself, I believe all other efforts wil prove futile). But it cannot be that in 2007, the sum total of the Jmaaican experience is refusal to tolerate homosexuals and the refusal to participate in one sexual act or another.
I readily admit that there are artistes (Tanya Stephens, Assassin -ironically, from Spragga's Red Square camp, Twin of Twins -when they first appeared) who are moving the dancehall genre outside of this rubric, but for someone who, by nature of the profession, inhabits this dancehall-popular music millieu, that can't happen quickly or forcefully enough. Yes, all that may sound high-minded to the average hardcore dancehall fan, but I just believe we can do better, and at a time when our popular culture is under increased international scrutiny, we ought to give the 'scrutineers' something more substantial to scrutinise.
Experimental rocker, the late Frank Zappa, once said "Jazz isn't dead - it just smells funny." Transposing that ot another genre, I say "Dancehall is dead - and it's starting to smell." Those who are interested in reviving it, please come forward. Otherwise, let's just bury the thing(mourn if we must) and move on.