The Style & Vibes Podcast
The Style & Vibes Podcast
The Most Hated Number in Dancehall...#2 (Throwback Episode)
What does it mean to be queer and Caribbean? Throwing back to my conversation with Stush an’ Bush podcast crew, Khadieme and Robert. We explore the complicated relationship between Dancehall and the LGBTQ+ Community. Although lyrical content has evolved over the years, we cite older lyrics and expressions commonly used in Dancehall and evaluate how the lyrics used then possibly contributing to sexual curiosity and exploration. We also discuss the impacts on the Queeribean community.
Hear the poignant stories of asylum seekers who are forced to leave their homeland, offering a heartfelt insight into the resilience of queer Caribbean people as they navigate cultural identity amidst adversity.
Moving deeper into the realm of music, we delve into the queerness embedded within Dancehall lyrics. With these musical backdrops, Kadeem and Robert help us explore the visual and lyrical representation of gay relationships and the significant impact these songs have on young queer listeners in the Caribbean. The episode challenges traditional notions by linking queerness with femininity and emphasizes the need for recognizing diverse expressions of gay masculinity.
Finally, we scrutinize the topic of queer tourism and its impacts on local communities, peeling back the layers of economic dependence and temporary tolerance for affluent visitors. The conversation draws attention to the evolution of sexual lyrics in dancehall, where artists like Alkaline, I-Shawna, Dovey Magnum, and Spice are pushing boundaries and challenging societal norms. From oral sex to bisexuality, we spotlight how modern dancehall is creating inclusive spaces for queer communities. This episode underscores the nuanced relationship between queerness and Caribbean culture, advocating for more inclusive narratives that celebrate diversity and resilience.
The Most Hated Number in Dancehall...#2 (Part 1)
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What does it mean to be queer and Caribbean? Throwing back to my conversation with the Stusham Bush podcast crew, kadeem and Robert, we explore the complicated relationship between dancehall and the LGBTQ plus community. Although lyrical content has evolved over the years, we cite older lyrics and expressions commonly used in dancehall and evaluate how those lyrics possibly contributed to sexual curiosity and exploration. We also discussed the impacts of the global queer Caribbean community, as they put it Now. This originally was a two-part episode, but I am throwing it back to the second part as that is the most fruitful part of our conversation. However, the link to part one will be available in the show notes if you want to go back and listen. Testing one tree, but not test two. What about you? Welcome to the Style and Vibes podcast with me, makayla. I'll be giving you the inside scoop on music, fashion, culture and more from Caribbean celebrities and tastemakers across the globe, pushing our culture with authenticity and, of course, style and vibes. Hello everyone, and welcome to another edition of the Style and Vibes podcast with yours truly, makayla. I hope you guys are doing well. If you are new here, welcome to the family, as I like to say. Make sure you go back and check out some of our previous episodes. If you're listening to this episode, it is a continuation of our last episode, so you might want to check that one out first and then check out this one. So we are still talking about the most hated number in a dancehall Number two, let's jump right in. So we are continuing our conversation.
Speaker 1:I had Kadeem end on an interesting thought, because what came to my mind initially was the idea of homophobia and its presence being absent from Caribbean as an identity for individuals who are of that community. So you were saying how this guy was just like you were in China, and the guy was essentially saying they have gay people in Jamaica. And it was such a revelation to him at that moment that it actually made you upset that you would even think that like we're all over the place, what are you talking about? So for him it was a sort of revelation of cultural awareness that he had never had, because probably perceptually, all of the images and things that he had seen and heard and felt about Jamaica it wasn't that, and for you it was like do you think that we just don't exist anywhere else? So it was kind of puzzling. But also when you were sharing about.
Speaker 1:A lot of the stories that come out of Jamaica referring to homophobia are often very violent. It's about asylum and it's about, you know, escaping something. But the community has been there for a very long time. You know, I've heard stories from you know my mom, or you know cousins or aunts and uncles and it doesn't seem I didn't grow up there so I don't know Right but it doesn't feel like they didn't know people of that community and that that was happening all the time, like these deaths were the thing or so. But it has become such a big part of the stories that you hear and it's primarily the reason, going back to the lyrics, why boom, bye, bye was.
Speaker 1:So it was like this perfect storm of lyrics that were completely violent, as well as what the stories that were happening, the support that the community was receiving abroad in terms of asylum and understanding, because not only where we were going through here, that sort of political stance around the LGBTQ plus community as a whole, that they were just like okay, it's not just us, we have to go and make sure that this experience is highlighted everywhere and how can we help in that sense? So those became the stories. So it's either this one spectrum or this other, and you and Robert really kind of are talking about all of it and everything in between. Tell me about that piece, because you can be of the queer or LGBTQ plus community and still embrace your culture in a rich way, and to me, you guys really bring that to the forefront of your platform. So I'd love for both of you to really expand on some of the things that. I know I said a lot, but you know just how all of this has really impacted you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the Caribbean is a beautiful and complicated place and I think I'll sort of like work my way in a circle, right, like the note about asylum that queer folks in the Caribbean will sort of like use to truly flee. That violence I don't think is a fleeing of the Caribbean, right, like no one wants to leave their home. Right, like the touch points that make it familiar the things that are there and like our memories that sustain, like no one wants to readily just like leave. Right, there is something that makes it so that people must leave. And when you do leave and you enter diaspora, that diaspora connection means that, like you now are like working to recreate a thing, make a copy of a copy in a place where you are, like, not deeply rooted or connected to it, hoping and assuming that, like the place that you once were can be where you are now.
Speaker 2:So, with that being said, I think that what we're attempting to do, especially with the podcast, is to go that there are so many things that can exist at once in complexity. We can hold all of those things and it doesn't take a lot of work to do it either. Right, like we get to be all of these things. Because we are all of these things, we are the intersection of being affected by and deeply harmed by some of the thoughts that go into the creation of boom, bye, bye, and also really loving that stuff like it's good, it's so good. I get to question how it's possible, for, you know, buju allegedly hopped out the car and then all of a sudden was like the world is in trouble, right, and and then goes off into this really beautiful tirade about the violence that, like he needs to inflict against queer, in particular, gay men, right. So I'm pretty sure that there are people who are like listening to this right now and going like I'm confused, is it okay?
Speaker 1:no, I don't think so okay, great, I think it's such a complicated thing that like it's like okay, I've observed that, so I'm like okay, I've seen this play out and we still, we still, for whatever reason, love the song, and it happens a lot with misogynist lyrics in hip-hop as well. I love snoop Dogg's first album. That was a misogynal mess of a first album, but I still sing the lyrics as if I was. You know, like we have problematic lyrics that we are enamored with. So I think it makes sense. But we're also in a space where we can acknowledge that enamorment and disassociate ourselves with the actions in real life, if, if you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So it makes sense this is where I want to bring kadim into it. Right, like it is worth noting, and when I say worth noting, I mean like there's like some profound shit going on there. For in, in part one where you were like dance hall allowed for, uh, a sort of like bringing together, of engaging with dance hall music and an exploration, a heightening, uh increased relationship to queerness. Right, the dance hall space makes that possible. Right, and if we want to continue to increase the complexity around this, dance hall lyrics attempt to do one thing which we might, they do mean anything, but we want, for this purpose, to assume that, like it's there for the oppression of queer people in the Caribbean and also is the space where resistance happens, where meaning and belonging is facilitated you're trying one thing, and you're doing a lot more um
Speaker 3:tell us girl, you know, as you were talking, you know you always do this thing, like things are just coming up for me, uh, and and boom, bye, bye for me, because two things on that. I think it was Key Miller, who is a prominent queer or gay Caribbean writer, who sort of like wrote about how Bum Ba Ba is such a queer ass song by sort of like, how it's imagined and how the lyrics is like like the visual description of two men coming together and having sex and coitus. It's such a queer thing to sing a song about two men having sex.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry, that's just it, right. And, as Robert said, it's doing a queer thing to sing a song about two men having sex. I'm sorry, that's just it, right. And as Robert said, it's doing this one thing, or it does a lot of things, as Robert says, but like we're focusing on this one thing right now, and yet it's also allowing for the. Because how many young queer folks, for so many young queer folks, how many of them, was that song the first kind of queer envisioning that they ever had? Right, and that's a very important thing to think about. Sort of like, where that homophobia exists, so too is that ability to imagine homosexuality existing freely. If we just simply took away what we're sort of like having, which is that, which is that, and that's compounded for several other things, right? Um, that space where, like, the girls are saying boom, bye, bye, and then the verse of describing two men itch-upping and and and loving and caressing each other like I'm, so that that's sexy, that's sexy as fuck. Can I curse? Can I curse?
Speaker 1:it's also a rebellion, if you will, because it's almost like you know, when your mom says don't touch that, don't touch that, don't touch that, and then you go and you touch that because you want to experience it for yourself.
Speaker 1:So instead of it's intention, but what I'm saying is you know it kind of makes sense in terms of just not the artists themselves, but if you're, you're listening to it. It's this forbidden act that makes it a little bit more enticing, if you will, because if it's such a hot topic, if it's so, you know, discussed so frequently, then there must be something there that feels good about it as to why we keep talking about it. It's something I've never thought of, so that's why I'm I'm kind of exploring that route with you down. Yeah, we're going down the path, down the land.
Speaker 2:No, up in more lyrics too right, like you referenced the number two right Tara Fabulous song, right, if we do a close textual analysis of the lyrics, ooh, close textual.
Speaker 1:Let me pull it up, let me pull it up, let me pull it up.
Speaker 2:The hook.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Song right the first two lines, right Some man a play number two right.
Speaker 3:And then he goes into saying two lines right, some man a play number two right and then he goes into say enough man, a oil and a vaseline girl, how do you know that? Right, who told you which? But also like, like, for so many reasons too. Right, because I'm not going to admit to using any oil or vaseline for any reason. I'm not. I'm not that kind of girl. I'm not coming on the people in podcasts and talk about my sexual escapades.
Speaker 3:The girls in some of their first experiences oil, vaseline, baby oil in particular tends to serve as lube, like that tends to be like a very like young kind of experience, cause, like you can't just go to the pharmacy at 15 and go buy lube, but you can't go, but you can't pick up the vaseline that's in your grandmother's room, right, and I think, in addition to yes, how do you know and how are you so hype? There is something about the hyper specificity of the oil and the Vaseline, particularly in the Caribbean context where, like, the girls didn't know what lube was. The girls were using baby oil. Right, and I know this to be a thing because of, like, growing up in the Caribbean and you know, I had queer friends in the. I still have queer friends in the Caribbean, right, and oil and Vaseline are very two important props in our, in our world. So so there is something about this hyper, how specific it is, that once also speaks to this queer Caribbean upbringing, or this queer Caribbean like sexual life, which is really interesting, that, like he's bringing that out, he's bringing out both the, the, the yes, how you know that, but also the fact that, like younger people in their experiences, this is they're using what they're having, this is the, the.
Speaker 3:I don't know there's something about this, how specific it is that that really highlights um, it, it. It raises some questions. Um, yes, how you know, but but what, why, what, why? Why put it there? What function does it serve with the oil and the vaseline being there? Like I, for me, I don't know. There's something that also it's at the beginning. He's lubing up the conversation for how he's talking about women. There's the position of it as well. There are certain things that for me, just this song is very queer as well, you know.
Speaker 1:But I also think it's the automatic association that queerness is associated specifically with gay men, right and by being a gay man. In order to be a gay man, you have to want to emulate a woman. In order to be a gay man, you have to want to emulate a woman, and that's a huge association that I think has been around for a very long time, not just within Caribbean community. But you can be what is deemed as a masculine gay man and not be feminine and be gay, and that isn't, at that time, wasn't quite understood as something, unless it was, you know, outside of the whole buggery or molestation type of conversation. So it's that association. So it's almost like you know the association and we're going into deep analysis here. I wasn't even planning on going down this road, but it's almost like the conversation around women and the conversation around gay men coexist because there are so Stereotypically, there are, so many ideals between the two in terms of how they behave in real life. Quote unquote Can.
Speaker 2:I get a wow.
Speaker 3:Can I get another? Wow, give me a wow, call the ambulance. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, call the ambulance because, duh, right, like, like the, the anti-queerness that exists, it's very anti-woman, it's very misog and it's very misogynistic, right and like questions to ask for a shift, right is, can people who are having heterosexual sex also not use lube?
Speaker 2:yeah, might. Might that also be a thing that, like, you might want to use, maybe, right, so, if we can like pause and like tap into like the misogyny piece for a hot second right, yeah, there is this um referring to a woman in the Caribbean as like spicy and like having pepper is like one thing that shows up, I think, in the Terrified of a Song. One, right, and then also Buju comes in with Boom, bye, bye, and then he's bringing in this element of like what is the sweetness between the legs? Right, so there's like the spicy and the sweet, but notice how like women show up in the lyrics, right, what is the purpose, the presence, like, what function does invoking imagery of women and like what is going to be done to women? Do for the song?
Speaker 2:Who is in control in the entirety of the song?
Speaker 2:It it's men, right, men are terming who people are, what purpose it is that they get to serve in any given relationship, um, and then like what needs to be done to them, and then what we miss from this entire conversation is the way that other women love other women, right?
Speaker 2:So when we talk about like this, this naming and this domination, there's a naming that happens for gay men that then, like, leads to their violence and killing and erasure. And then there's a naming of women and a misnaming of women also that leads to erasure and violence and reduces the possibilities for there to be more beyond this, because what we've been doing in this entire conversation is going like, yes, we can zero in on, uh, gay identity, but then we zoom out to queerness, because there's more that's happening in the lyrics that speaks to through misogyny, through homophobia and then also through class. Right, if we're talking about navigation, like, who is safe in the Caribbean, who's able to express their identities where they want to, there's a class component to that as well. Class allows you to seek asylum. Class allows you to navigate the Caribbean in a certain way, in safety.
Speaker 3:Because it's really important to note as it relates to the violence and death where they occur, to whom they occur, and oftentimes we're going to realize that it is the poorest, it is the darkest of skins, it is the fat queer folks, it is the queer folks with disabilities, like. It has a huge thing to do with folks' proximity to class and recognizing that the uptown queers are perfectly fine, they're okay, I'm not. Goingers are perfectly fine, they're, they're not okay. I'm not gonna say perfectly fine, um, that's too much um, but the girls are. The girls are not thinking about death in the way that they have to. Yeah, the girls are not thinking about violence being enacted the way that some other girls have to.
Speaker 3:Um, and I think that's that's a very important thing to note here that like it's the poor folks who are experiencing this.
Speaker 3:So what, what are we really saying? And then also going into class a little bit and talking about sort of like when tourists come to to the Caribbean, like gay tourists are fine, and we talk about like, yeah, well, yeah, come to the Caribbean, we want your gay money. Like you, your gay money is really helpful here. We love you if you're gay, gay tourists are perfectly fine there is this kind of the over-reliance we have on tourism allows for what we call our values and our systems, which is to be anti-queer, is somehow dissolved somehow, uh, it somehow dissipates, and unless it's about poor queer people and that's like a really important to to, to recognize as well this all comes through in the songs, right, like, like we have like moved beyond, like what we might want to be, like as like the the skeleton of this conversation, but like this still shows, like it shows up in the music and it shows up in the response to the music.
Speaker 2:We weren't 100 sure in part one about uh buju's attempted alleged cancellation, but I believe earlier when we were talking, the reason why uh boom bye Bai gets removed, sort of like from the public record is because white queer folks wanted to come to the Caribbean and I believe that he was going to be performing at a concert and they're like no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you can't do that over here because we don't want that Right. So the tourism tie-in, the international sort of like queer politicking tie-in, the international sort of like queer politicking tie-in, and then, like this cancellation of a thing that is steeped in culture, trying to cancel that, questioning whether cancellation, culture operates in the way that it's supposed to operate, are you also not trying to erase, without doing any sort of intentional work, the cultural codification that we see in boom bye bye? What is lost there by trying to cancel him abroad? What pieces of the Caribbean do you continue to misunderstand, misrepresent and try to cancel as well?
Speaker 3:and this is not to say oh I was gonna say, and this is not to say that Bujoo and every other uh folks who sort of perpetuate it shouldn't have some level of accountability. But that accountability cannot happen unless queer Caribbean people are in the room, and oftentimes we see the articles top 15 homophobic country in the world. Jamaica is number one, two are three and you look at the writers it's two white people from Minnesota who've been to the Caribbean once and who judged the Caribbean and use different indices that have nothing to do with what would really be done, such as if Jamaica has hate crime laws, as if hate crime laws are actually successful here. Let's be honest about the efficacy of hate crime laws and what it's doing and what it's not doing right. And and I think it's and robert hears me go off all the time, I have probably said it three times on our podcast it really pisses me off, uh, that an article is written that sort of like categorize or rather characterizes the caribbean as this top homophobic place. That doesn't necessarily take in the experiences of queer Caribbean people who are actually there. There haven't been many queer Caribbean writers who are actually writing about their experiences in the Caribbean. Are. When the Guardian posts one of their 50 million articles on how homophobic we are, the Caribbean is.
Speaker 3:This is not to say we ain't got our issues. This is not to say whatever. It is to say that this kind of whiteness, this kind of whitewashing around our pain and suffering really just perpetuates it. Right, like, like. It's not helpful that we're taught that. You know folks are going to write all these different articles on how homophobic our songs are but doesn't capture like the complicated relationship that queer people have to dance hall and it doesn't capture the fact that queer people can safely be queer in the dance hall scene and have been right and also have not been. It's very obviously again. It's a way more nuanced. It's not binary, it's not. You're either safe or you're either not. It's a lot of gauging. It's a lot of nuances and a lot of things that people have to factor. When I went to a Caribbean party in LA, this DJ was like I don't care if I'm going to get deported, I'm going to play this song for you all.
Speaker 3:And he played boom bye bye and I got up on the table and started whining and started like whatever. And folks were looking at me because they were like folks who had stopped because they didn't support what was going on, looked at me like questioning what was going on, like why is that the case? I'm going to enjoy the song because here you are promoting my death, and that's cool. Do your thing. But we have to have an accountability conversation and my dancing is not that I'm. It's not necessarily as easy as oh Kareem loves this song. So therefore queer people think it's perfectly fine. That's not it. It is that our relationship is different and it is that there is something about the song that draws us to it, that creates some kind of pleasure, and we can hold that. And also hold that white folks aren't necessarily doing a really good job of characterizing our pain, and also hold that. We need to figure out a way in which we can hold all of these different artists, that sort of profit off of this kind of violence, accountable.
Speaker 1:Me and Robert are like that's a word.
Speaker 2:Right, because we're pressed. What is the accountability process here?
Speaker 1:I think what you said a lot of what you said was important, specifically the complicated piece that hasn't really been captured, which is why a platform like yours is really key, because, essentially, you're peeling back the onion and it's many layers and it's a continued conversation. So, and I think that there's this misrepresentation and understanding that the people who are queer in the Caribbean don't can't live and can't function and it's just like. No, this is more of a human rights issue than it. You know, being able to be respected in your spaces and being able to exist and be seen, and it's more about, like you said, people don't want to leave their homes. They just want to feel comfortable in the place that they do call home, and I think some of that reckoning is kind of happening now.
Speaker 1:And I think it's even more interesting that you talk about you know some random writer just writing about you know something that is going to get hits, and for me, it kind of feels like this modern day colonial thought of I need to go and help these people because they're in such separation and they need me to. We need ally, we need help, but you can't define what that help looks like. It's up to that community to decide how they need to be helped. And it just it. You just said so much, it gave me chills yeah, I mean.
Speaker 3:The one thing I'll just say, too, though, is that, like it's, it's, it's lazy work. It's lazy work to write an article, uh, that says top 20 homophobic, and and I'm quite frank it oftentimes just stops right there and like there is no. Well, how about we find the foundation that's doing the work and and raise money?
Speaker 1:and the progression that is happening, the work that is being done.
Speaker 3:Honestly, I don't even care about that too, that, right, right, I personally even like, whatever progressions are happening, like I, yes, highlight those two, but, quite frankly, the girls need money. Like, give the girls, give the girls the money that they need to exist in this world. Like, like, like, I think I've become, I think I've become, I think, like my, my position and sort of like what these folks who sort of like write these articles white people, 98 percent, um, and the two percent I will make space for the fact that I know two queer Caribbean people who are writing about these experiences and I also disagree with how they do it. So I'll also say that, because it is in a way where, like, the spotlight comes on the Caribbean as homophobic and then it stops there. But there's not a conversation of, like, underground movements that are happening that, like you know, folks had made, like J-Fl flag had worked on propositions to, to repeal buggery, and the government was like, oh, actually we're gonna make that a people issue, so we're gonna put it like a referendum to what.
Speaker 3:Like these are things that are happening right now. Right, and like, these are things that, like, even if you try to capture it, capture it, but all you just gonna capture the one little something. Now you're not not going to tell people what to do. You have somebody from Ohio getting this whole top 10 homophobic places, but not 10 ways in which you can support LGBTQ folks in the Caribbean. Like the framing, it's lazy journalism, it's lazy work, it's lazy travel blogging and that's oftentimes what it is. It's a travel blog, but like it brings up this kind of heightened focus on our lives in a way that doesn't help, right. So now folks have to deal with this extra attention. That's going to happen, this conversation that's going to happen, but nothing is going to come of it, of it and and I think it's that frustration, right, like you can't just say actually, you know, I feel like I'm gonna repeat my point like six times, so I'm gonna stop right there, but all this to say it's annoying indeed.
Speaker 1:So we talked a little bit about specifically, you know, the those songs were of like the 90s era. How do you think the music has changed and there is what work has been done in your opinion. From a lyrical standpoint I kind of shared in the last podcast, it's not as blatant, it's, you know, a little bit more subtle. Um, there is more. Yeah, I, I think it's just more subtle. I don't think it's it's gone. I think there are innuendos and I think you know it also has come with this new sexual energy that is happening. So I think, especially during that, oral sex wasn't a thing, okay, and now it's a thing that people talk about, that people enact.
Speaker 1:I've seen videos. I've seen not, not, not porn.
Speaker 3:You're, you're, you're, you're citing the policeman, aren't you? You're talking about the policeman.
Speaker 1:Oh, no, no, no, I wasn't talking about the policeman, I was literally talking about like. So I remember like alkaline had a song and they talk about body washing and, uh, you know, aishana has come out with, you know, um, the ed sharon remix to that song where she had that boat. You know, tree some and all of those sexual things. Dovey magnum talks about oral sex and I'm just like, well, all these women are giving oral sex and not getting anything. I don't know Jamaican women that operate that way. So you know, as oral sex has become more popular and that was heavily associated with the gay community, so has gayness and queerness.
Speaker 1:In the dancehall it's kind of softened its barrier a bit. In the dance hall it's kind of softened its barrier a bit. There are still men who are definitively stating their claim to to being a heterosexual, but there's a little bit more freedom in terms of the raunchiness and directness of the lyrics that have made queerness a little bit. I don't think it's like the gates are open, but I think it's a little bit more freeing, if you will. But that's just my outsider assumption. What are your thoughts in terms of the progression of lyrics and the space itself and how it has changed and I know you're now like an adult partying here, so it's definitely vastly different. It's even more freeing here than I. But what are your? What are your thoughts? Robert is like I don't go nowhere.
Speaker 2:I'm I'm wondering if there's like a gender component to this. Right, like, as more women enter the dance hall reggae scene, do we also see a shift in the lyrics? Right, like I'm remembering Ramping Shop, which was like early 2000s, sorry, like late, or like mid to late 2000s, right, um, and like that has uh men and women on the song teaming up against the gays, so, um, and I believe like they uh then bring in like women, like men to, maybe I believe so right, um, man to man, gal to gal, that runs sconding which go ahead, go ahead we have that and then like, again I'm jumping.
Speaker 2:But then we have Spice who comes in and again I don't know like the line itself in particular, but she says something about like scooby doo drawers or like something like that, where I only stiff cooking use, met galcom, right. So like she comes in and she reinforces that, uh, what men were saying in the 90s about like stiff buddy is the only thing that's like going to happen in the sexual liaison. She comes in, she goes, yeah, that's it, because like that is the marker of a true man. But then we have other people, uh, of the queer persuasion or not, coming in and going, but everyone can kind of just like, do this thing, that is oral sex, and like that is fine for you to go ahead and do that and it doesn't speak to your manhood or not.
Speaker 2:What I think is the line between all of this is that there are certain people in dance hall, the dance hall artists, who have enough cultural capital to be able to demand things of people in society. Right, one of the earlier artists that we were talking about has this line where he's like but what, minat? Test number two, what about you? Right, there's this call to go. I'm not doing this. What are you doing, right? How does that keep happening in the lyrics later on into the 2000s, uh, the 2010 teens area? To now, like, what calls are being made at each other and who has enough power and capital culturally? Who is like of the best dance hall artists to be making demands of what it looks like to be a man? A loosening of the hold that music has on culture itself, right? Like we love to say that culture informs music and music informs culture. But there's a rift, a necessary rift, that's going on, where there's a loosening going on. But, like, what is the reason for that?
Speaker 3:I'm not answering.
Speaker 2:Robert's question.
Speaker 1:I was clarifying your question the reason for the rift or the reason that?
Speaker 2:the reason for the rift and and I tend to ask questions like don't need to be, we can like sit with them to go. Well, there is something going on here. It had a grip on us from, you know, the 90s well, the 80s really, until like the early 2000s, and then now it's loosening. Yeah, what is it that is creating for that expansion between how music literally and lyrically defines how sex is able to happen? Something is like some work right, progress or not is being done there. What is it?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm thinking about like dance hall serving as this Initially, when the girls sort of like got into the dance. It's like it's this thing to talk about slackness. Dance hall is about slackness, da, da, da da. And I like, back in the days the girls, the girls were going off right Like ladies, all in the days the girls, the girls were, were going off Right Like Lady Saw had the lyrics like the very, the very slack, lewd, sexually deviant kind of things that really went against what the values I guess were of the country at the time. And I'm seeing now a very similar thing with that. And I'll be very transparent I'm not every single dancer or artist that I listen to, no, like Malik Skilibing, malik Kushtan, you know, et cetera, et cetera, and I'll say why I say that in a bit.
Speaker 3:But there has always been women singing about the things that women should not sing about, right? And yes, the oral sex also has a lot to do with men and their refusal. But I'm also thinking about people like Queen Lady Gangsta and Shensia. And Queen Lady Gangsta who in her one viral song is like me, love kaki, I'm a love pussy too. First touch me, baby. What you gonna do him? Say him want me and she say him want me to. She said she want me to like this kind of bisexuality that's happening in the lyric um which live for right, I think. I think there has always been this thing of women singing about their sexual deviance, either in their acts and what they do, and it being a queer thing, and I think now what's happening is that I don't want to say, with progression, with time, the lyrics have gotten more lewd and more open, because I think that's a really, you know that's a claim that I don't feel confident backing up right now, in this moment, but what I will say is that consistent women singing about, um, their experiences as the, the person who's doing things that they're not supposed to do because they're women in a in a Jamaican society, um, there's this openness that's happening now right and like.
Speaker 3:I can cite Queen Lady's lyrics because I listen to it every single day um, uh, but like Shensia singing at Jamaica's Pride some years ago, d'angelo doing the same, like, every year, there is some kind of dancehall artist every year, there is this kind of meshing that's happening right, um, that for me doesn't feel new as much as it feels familiar, um, based on sort of like what I've read and understood around, like how queer people have existed in the dance hall space and how queer people have made, uh, the dance hall space theirs. Like, if you listen to the fish tea podcast, they talk about this thing that used to happen called the batty party. Uh, that used to happen in jamaica. That's like queer gatherings, first of all, that's a great name, but, but, um, but, like queer people gathering and dancing to dance hall and then being in new york now and seeing uh, uh, like queer people dancing, like the bashment girls, um, doing the head top spin and the head top drop on their butt, like there are lyrics that allow for all these different things to happen. And I see that now. But I think it's also because I think 20, 30 years ago I would have been in the space where I would see something similar, with sort of like how people responded to and performed artists lyrics and their songs.
Speaker 3:All this to say kind of went all the way around. But all this to say, do I notice a progression? I notice an openness and I notice this kind of where dance hall artists are not saying or asserting their cis heterosexuality. Um, there is this quietness there, this silence that like, all right, I just love girls and that's it. Or I love my women and it doesn't. I love my women at the expense of men, or I I love my women at the expense of queer men. I don't see that. I don't't experience that. With the music that I listen to as much Every so, not every now and then, yes, that's with men with with women artists I see a lot more openness and a lot more. I'm going to do this thing, but I find that to be a consistent thing that has happened throughout. Women performing in dance hall.
Speaker 3:I just find that the topics become a little bit more great, because I don't know if, 30 years ago, if somebody had said bisexuality, they would have like what the reactions would have been. But that's what I see. I see this openness, I see this willingness to this kind of heightened focus on silence one, but then openness by uh, with women too. So that's what I would say. I don't, but I don't know if I would say progression or none. Uh, I think it's. It's. It's that itself, in and of itself, feels like a binary um, and I can say, yeah, spice doesn't say scorn them anymore, and Spice does a really great job, you know, posting queer people on her Instagram and hiring queer people, but like that's Spice, you know, and I think it becomes a little bit individualistic. Queen Africa is still banned in some countries, like you know, so, and she's not all here, she's all here just being quiet. Not that Queen Africa is a dancehall artist, she's just the person who came to my mind right now um, yeah, that's what I think.
Speaker 1:Robert, what are your thoughts on the work being done? I gotta. I like that so much, I'm just gonna use it all the time work is being done that's being done it's been a question of.
Speaker 2:It came up in my meditation practice and now I'm just like, oh, work is being done, um, all right, um, you know, honestly, I'm I'm not sure. I'm not sure, uh, because I can't say, like music isn't my space, like the, the music I listen to is, you know, here's where I tap into the career of uh granny identity. So I uh, you know, take on the uh caribbean, like that's me, um, so it's giving uh sitting on the veranda making you a cup of tea, you know, feeding you, and listening to Grace thrillers and like 80s, 90s reggae and looking at the young people and going, but dancehall music don't sound too nice. I mean, it's like I will like enjoy it, it, but like I'm not like in the dance hall world and because of like this, like uh posh of care, that is the caribbean granny identity, um dance hall for me and like looking at it, I feel like I'm almost like experiencing it, because like dance hall is like being produced in and like marketed to people of like my age and at the same time, I'm sort of like sitting out, removed from it, going. I'm seeing some things in operation here that I wish we didn't do anymore and I don't want to come across as like not thinking that people deserve to have their own expression and to do whatever the hell it is that they want to do, as long as they're not oppressing somebody right to like. Bring this into the diaspora outside of the caribbean.
Speaker 2:Right like kat williams has been, you know, going viral as of late because of a comment that he made on the like joe budden podcast. Right where he was like uh, if you uh can like make jokes, uh, without sort of like using specific derogatory and offensive language, then you were never funny. I believe it's possible for you to make really amazing music and not oppress people at the same time. It's possible. You just need to do the work right. So Kadeem talks about like lazy journalism. I might apply the same thinking to that and like songwriting and performance, right when it's like you can do some additional work, some different work, to continue to produce something that is good and doesn't oppress people. That's my wish.
Speaker 2:Right when we go back to how queerness functions here, like there is some futurity, there is some work, work that I don't think in the sort of like direct music industry I have anything to say about. I really don't. People go listen to me and be like who the hell is Robert, who the hell am I? I don't know. But what I am saying, though, though, is that, like there are some societal things that I'm seeing manifesting in here that like, if we will like shift our language, we as a society, as a culture, as a people, would be in a better place.
Speaker 2:A conversation with Kadima, I was like I don't think I'm here to be like policing the words that people use, right, because when we're talking about few or two, I'm like listen, if you want to use few or two, do what you want to do, I don't care. I'm not going to sit here and like beg you to shift it, but what I will say is that, now that there is some additional work being done, now there's some openness, I it's possible maybe not right now, but possible in the near future that the lyrics will begin to shift the language, and that shift will then happen both like culturally and like interpersonally, where more songs might not use few, someone might intentionally put the two and like redress it, have it show up differently, so that people continue to practice culturally the use of language that is open, that is affirming, that is non-oppressive, that allows people to live their lives and to enjoy music, because that's why you're producing the thing, aren't you?
Speaker 2:aren't you aren't, you are you is. Why are you doing this? Why are you here? What is your purpose in life? Maybe the people need to go to meditation retreat to start asking themselves some deep questions about why it is they do the things that they do, having heard, but it is, uh, not so great you know what I think that's a great place to end.
Speaker 1:It brought us back full circle to the number and and how we are are just exploring the, the identity around it and and, in turn, our own connection to, to the number. So thank you guys so much for just joining me. I have to really just thank you guys so much. This was so much fun um I really love. You know having these kinds of conversations and you guys were highly insightful as well as entertaining a little mess, like you promised just a little, just a little twip, you know you know, I mean, we do say mix up and blend exactly so, of course, please share.
Speaker 1:You know what you guys have coming up as a team separately um with stush and bush. Of course you know we want to make sure that we're highlighting some of the stories that you guys have told and are continuing to tell on your platform yeah, so, um, if you're like we want more conversation with you, we're out there on instagram at stush and bush no d right s-t-u-s-h-a-n, because you know that's the only way to spell an uh bush, b-u-s-h, um.
Speaker 2:And if you want to like, dm us there, that's cool. I mean, if you want to email us and be like, well, I want to continue the conversation. We're truly open to also hop on a phone call, a zoom call. Don't text me, because I don't like texting and like just talk, because that's what we're here to do. We're here to talk and to think and to ask questions.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, give us, give us a few days, our weeks in advance, though, if you're trying to do that, because you know, we have to prepare, but also you can just also just follow us and reach out to us as well.
Speaker 3:Um, robert's at is queer. We also do this every time. Robert does the switch at which part and I do the the individual handles. Um, you can follow robert at queer rib granny, obviously. Q? U e e, q? U e e r I b g r a n n? I e? Uh, you can follow me at kadim k-h-a-d-i-e-m-e or at sketto drinks. Uh, which is like this cool little home bartending thing I'm doing because you know hobbies. But yeah, and what you can expect from us, I mean, we have more episodes coming up where we're going to talk about a lot of really cute things and have more guests. If this is the first time you're hearing about us, you're lucky because we have four seasons, four whole seasons of content that will catch you right on up.
Speaker 2:Um, start from the top so you can see our natural progression as well um, we also have a website, caribbeancom, and there's like some cool resources there that sort of like take it out of the podcasting world and sort of like. In like the larger. What is the theoretical thing going on in the background?
Speaker 3:and very interesting yeah, and obviously if you want to donate, because why we never said that you can donate Venmo cash up at Caribbean? Thanks, please and thanks thanks, just in case, just in case your pocket look full pride month black music history month. Come on, we did all three. Today I'm going to switch off the pride month one thank you guys, I really enjoyed having you guys.
Speaker 1:It was such a pleasure. Thank you again for sharing your voices. I appreciate it. Thanks for listening to the latest episode of the style and vibes podcast. If you like what you hear and I know you do share it with your friends and family. If you want more, make sure you visit styleandvibescom and follow us on our social channels, twitter and instagram at styling vibes until next time.
