[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="360" caption="Assassin"][/caption]

According to Sean Paul, “Assassin is the one to take dancehall music to an international level and step up on it like I have been doing it, Beenie Man, Shaggy… The girls dem like him, the lyrics he puts together are always top, he chooses good melodies, and he has an image,” as stated on a BBC 1 Extra Interview. 

“On his second album, Assassin brings the energy level of an Elephant Man, the passionate delivery of a Capleton and the fierceness of a young Buju Banton, all rolled into one deejay” according to an early review inside Jamrock Magazine.   

When Jeffrey Campbell first became involved with the music business at the age of 17, he adapted the moniker Assassinf or a deliberate reason.  Although he never claimed to be a killer per se, the DJ’s energetic, rough-edge vocal style and uncommonly well constructed lyrics allowed him to pick off all competitors with cold-blooded precision. Yet somehow they never see him coming.

“Once upon a time, you could go back and forth with another artist lyrically and it would be just about music, and trying to establish dominance on a musical note.  But when it starts to become about who is the bigger gangster, then it is not about music anymore. I am an artist. I am not proclaiming to be no bad man. I want to make music. I don’t want to be involved in a situation where me haffi start move like an outlaw, with a million man ‘round you all the time. I never got involved in the music for that purpose. I wanted to do what I love and contribute positively to the industry.”

While still a student at Camperdown High School, Assassin wrote “Big Up All The Shotta Dem”, which Spragga Benz recorded on the Street Sweeper riddim. Before long, he was recording for himself, and from “Ruffest”, his breakthrough hit on the Diwali riddim and through Infiltration, his critically acclaimed 2005 debut album on VP Records, Assassin distinguished himself in a musical arena known for bluster and bravado.  Debunking the common perception of Reggae artists as dunces and reprobates, Assassin enrolled as a student at the University of Sunderland in England, studying towards a degree in Business Management.

“I always make a conscious effort to try to learn and improve, as opposed to feeling like you already know everything and making your ego control your learning curve.  So we try to learn from people who are making a positive contribution to the music.  And as we go along we try to pick up the right attitude and work eithic. I always believe in maximizing potential.  And whatever that potential is, I only would realize it through hard work.  So I just continue to work hard and hopefully I will realize my true potential.”

And just as Bob Marley once sang of “burning all illusion”, Assassin eliminates numerous misconceptions on his sophomore release “Gully Sit’n”.  As the title once suggests, this record comes straight from the streets, but with a difference.  Assassin explains that the title track is “a celebration of ghetto lifestyle as opposed to a lamentation about how horrible it is”.  Instead of demonizing ghetto residents as unruly savages, Assassin’s lyrics offer an acknowledgement of the fact that people are people even without an abundance of material things. “You can still be happy while you’re working towards better”, he points out.  “It’s all about not being resigned to your surroundings”.

The rest of the album continues in a similar vein, subverting stereo types in the interest of truly “keeping it real”.  Musical, Gully Sit’n boasts an all-star roaster of producers ranging from veterans like Dean Fraser ad Dave Kelly (whose massive 85 riddim provides the aural backdrop for Assassin’s player anthem “Anywhere We Go”) to newer talents like Lenky Marsden and Daseca Productions.  Songs like “The A.R.” take an uncompromising look at the reality behind the gun play so prevlant in popular entertainment, from movies to video games and music.  “A song like ‘AR’ is really looking on the whole issue of a gun don’t have brain”, Assassin explains.  “The gun really don’t’ care about social background. It don’t care ‘bout race or creed.  It’s just hardware, a tool like any other” – as an assassin should know.

“On this album I just wanted to have fun with it. We hear that all the time and it probably sounds like a cliché nowadays, but I just remember in high school when this thing was all about music and there wasn’t any strings attached. There wasn’t any business behind it or any complications.  All you wanted to do is beat a desk and hold a vibes with your bredren and make a song that you like.  This album is like that. I don’t want to go too deep with anything. I just want to enjoy myself and sing some songs and hold a vibe.  And the whole “Gully Sit’n” approach is reminiscent of that. Growing up in Kintyre, I was in the gully.  That’s where it was at.  Just fi make music be music.  And just let it be without any additional thought process.  Without any desire to “sell some units” or whatever.  E-eh. If that should be the result, excellent and we all have a good day.  But I wanted to focus pon just doing music weh me like.  And just being carefree with it, hopefully when it is presented in that authentic kind of form, it will take a good standing with the people.  Because that’s when something flows free through you.  That’s when the magic happens.”

BORN ROHAN SMITH on December 17, 1974, Anthony Cruz grew up in Mandeville, Manchester. Hailing from a talented musical family – being the nephew of the celebrated singer Garnett Silk, as well as having a mother and father who were excellent singers – Cruz was convinced from a young age that he was destined to be a great singer. After graduating from Holmwood Technical High School, Cruz migrated to the United States, spending a few years in New York before moving to Miami.

In 1993, while residing in Miami, fate would lead him to meet producer Willie Lindo who was impressed with a demo tape he heard of the artiste. Lindo decided to take him under his wings, working with the young singer to hone his rich vocals. Under his management, Cruz’s career blossomed and the singer learnt the ropes of the entertainment business. Convinced the world was ready for him, Lindo released Cruz’s debut single, ‘Tell Me What’s Up’ (an original), with several others to follow. It wasn’t long before Cruz became a hit in Miami with the number one tune, ‘Just Call My Name’. The single made him a household name, and as it made its way to the airwaves and charts in New York, England and other places, Cruz’s popularity spread.

The singer’s debut album followed. Produced by Willie Lindo and titled ‘Where There Is Love’, the album featured the title track as well as the big hits ‘When You Get Lonely’ and ‘Love Will Never Die’, among others. The quiet, soft-spoken singer continued recording several tracks for Lindo, as well as making his name as a smooth performer on stage shows and club events in Miami, New York, Bahamas, among other parts of the world, working with some of Jamaica’s top acts.

In 1999, Cruz decided to return to Jamaica to claim his piece of the pie in the land of his birth and the home of Reggae music. The first song he recorded back home became a hit. Recorded on the Chemist label, the song was titled ‘Maria Maria’ (a cover of the Santana/Product G&B big hit). The lovers’ rock singer went on to record for other producers, releasing tunes like the popular ‘Them Boy Deh Nuh Really Know We’ for CJ Records, with an accompanying music video; and ‘You Remind Me’ for John John.

Always sticking to his themes of love, culture and reality lyrics, Cruz’s more recent releases include the popular, big hit ‘You Got It Bad’ for Mixing Finger, ‘Closer I Get To You’, ‘Single Once Again’, ‘In The Club’ (a combination with Louie Culture), ‘Crazy Over You’, ‘Love Has Taken Over Me’, ‘Turn It Up’, ‘I Pray’, ‘A Man’s Weakness’, among others. Cruz has also been working the stage show circuit, showcasing his unique style and soulful voice on several big gigs the likes of Sting, Rebel Salute, Stone Love’s annual anniversary dance, not to mention several school fetes where the girls swarm him like bees to honey as he charms his way into their hearts.

Continuing on the path to take his career to the ultimate level, Anthony Cruz signed a management, booking and recording contract with Fifth Element Records in the summer of 2000. And the label has every intention to make the singer into an international star. His sophomore album is scheduled to hit the stores in March 2003 with fresh, new joints as well as some old favorites. It should be interesting. Striving to be the most famous singer ever, Cruz is now focusing heavily on recording mainly original tracks of lyrics he has written. Considering that he is so engrossed in music that he sings morning, noon and night even in his sleep the world can expect great things from this talented singer and songwriter.

After blazing on to the international reggae scene in 1996 with the incendiary single “Fire ‘Pon Rome”, dancehall reggae artist Anthony B has been an uncompromising voice for the oppressed and the downtrodden. Released in 1996, “Fire ‘Pon Rome’s” forthright lyrical stance, rebuking the island’s politicians for their apathy towards the underprivileged masses, proved too controversial in an election year and was quickly banned from Jamaica’s airwaves.

Anthony B’s auspicious arrival on the Jamaican music scene helped revitalized reggae as a potent medium for social agitation. Clad in African garments with his trademark staff in hand, his dreadlocks tightly wrapped in a turban signifying his affiliation with the orthodox Bobo Shanti sect of Rastafari, Anthony B is one of Jamaica’s most electrifying live performers and the present embodiment of Reggae’s provocative militancy. Anthony’s current critiques, on his new VP release “That’s Life” which are delivered in his powerful trademark sing-jay style (a blend of classic roots singing and modern deejaying) retain the combustibility of “Fire ‘Pon Rome” while embracing the struggles waged globally by diverse peoples. “Growing up in Jamaica, that was the only wisdom I got, what I see there,” observes Anthony who has attracted tens of thousands of fans in concert appearances throughout Europe, Africa, North America and The Caribbean. “Travelling the world, you see suffering is a system designed to hold people back and all kinds of people suffer. You get to see that what you are crying for, other people are fighting for the same cause. That’s why music is so effective in different countries.”

Born Keith Anthony Blair on March 31, 1976 in the rural sugar farming community of Clarkstown located in the northwestern Jamaican parish of Trelawny, Anthony B grew up in a deeply religious family. Singing hymns in church (as well as giving impromptu performances on the roadside in his community) helped Anthony refine his vocal skills. “My mother was an Adventist and my grandmother was a Revivalist, so I’d have to go to church both Saturday and Sunday,” he recalls. Anthony however, chose his own spiritual path, adopting the Rastafarian way of life as a teenager, a decision that caused dissension among his family members. “As a youth growing up, my grandmother say dem Rasta is a blackheart people and they said I had to leave if I didn’t trim (cut his dreadlocks). I wasn’t going to change so I went to live with my Aunt and Uncle in Portmore (a suburb of Jamaica’s capital city Kingston).”

While still attending school, Anthony joined forces with other aspiring teenage artists and began deejaying (rapping) with a local sound system. Despite his youth, Anthony’s lyrics reflected spiritual convictions and a strong social consciousness, a stark contrast to the pervasive guns and girls rhymes that dominated dancehall Reggae in the early 90s. Another deejay, Little Devon, heard Anthony’s cultural lyrics and introduced him to producer Richard “Bello” Bell of Star Trail Records. Bello, a Bobo Shanti Rastafarian was also known for making uplifting records at a time when such music opposed the prevailing trends. Bello was immediately impressed with Anthony’s vocals and his ability to construct song lyrics.

Anthony recorded a succession of hits for Star Trail including “A De Man” followed by “Hurt The Heart”, “One Thing”, “Rumors” and the classic “Raid The Barn”. Several of Anthony’s Star Trail singles including “Fire ‘Pon Rome” were featured on his critically acclaimed debut album “So Many Things” (VP Records). Anthony’s sophomore effort for VP, 1997’s “Universal Struggle” featured “Nah Vote Again” which continued to lash out against “politricks”; the deejay, however, cast his vote in a campaign to elevate Bob Marley to status of Jamaican National Hero in the Ska flavored “Marley Memories”. “Seven Seals” released in 1999 by VP, adhered to Anthony’s insurrectionary route with the profound “Mr. Heartless” “aimed at all the Governments of the world who are not doing much to help the sufferers” along with “Who Shoot First” and the foreboding “Wicked People”. With each subsequent album, Anthony’s lyrical skills grew more sophisticated while the BelloStar Trail productions took greater risks, incorporating disparate influences from hard rock guitar riffs to jazzy saxophone solos into a compelling brand of roots rock dancehall.

Several of the 16 tracks featured on Anthony B’s new 2001 release “That’s Life” (VP Records) continue to fuel the revolutionary flames. “Fire ‘Pon The Government” transcends the Jamaican oppressors identified in “Fire ‘Pon Rome” and chastises systems worldwide that enforce racism and corruption: “Haffe burn Fire Pon de Government, Mr. President to the poor you’re negligentpure fire burn ‘pon de systempoor man alone turn a victim.” “That song is coming from a vibe going through black history in America”, Anthony comments. “In this modern time we feel racism should be abolished, discrimination put away.” Anthony’s razor sharp commentary continues with “Rally Round”. The title is chanted as an empowering mantra with Anthony imploring the youth to “rise up for the struggle, no time to sit by the roadside and wonderdash way the chain, release the anger, your destiny lies over yonder.” He explains “I didn’t set out to write something controversial but I try to write things that are the truth, something that means something to society. People either like it or they don’t but I’m saying it because it needs to be said. People complain about the state of Reggae today that it’s not uplifting but they don’t want to put that message music forward.”

Bello produced “Fire ‘Pon The Government”, “Mad Dem” and the rollicking “Fire Dance” for “That’s Life” but Anthony recruited additional producers for the remaining 13 tracks to create “a different sort of record”. The title track, courtesy of Bak Beat productions, employs a sparse rhythm as Anthony recounts some of life’s vicissitudes: “superstars get hooked on coke, man get rich, then get broke”. Other producers contributions include New York’s Bobby Konders’ “Dust Dem Out”; Fat Eyes’ “Man Got To Do” and Reggae group Morgan Heritage’s “Wave Off The Cross” and “Lock The Guns Dem”, inspired by the 1999 Columbine High School shooting. Soulful Reggae crooner Beres Hammond produced Anthony’s smash hit “Good Life” (on the smash “They Gonna Talk” riddim) a simple yet effective expression of cooperation: “if it’s one slice a bread, please let we break it”. The Bobo youth from Trelawny also displays romantic inclinations on “Love or Infatuation” (Bak Beat Productions) and the warmly brewed “Black Coffee” produced by Keith Blair (a.k.a. Anthony B).

Anthony B is often compared to Peter Tosh, perhaps the most militant Reggae artist Jamaica has ever produced. Anthony ranks Tosh among his primary musical influences and pays tribute by covering Tosh’s signature anthem “Equal Rights”. Sly and Robbie, who played on Tosh’s 1977 “Equal Rights” album produced the track. “When Peter Tosh sings, you can really feel it, it sounds meaningful, convincing,” explains Anthony. “I stand for Equal Rights and Justice, that’s why I did his song; my music is all about love, purity, not about “downpression”, aggression, racism, and maliciousness.”

“That’s Life” concludes with the blues inspired “Never Bow Down Low” (to “bow” in Jamaican vernacular means to compromise one’s ethics). The song’s title is an apt summation of Anthony’s valiant efforts towards reestablishing Reggae as a preeminent, uncompromising force in global reform. “I write that track to show we will never stoop to Babylon,” he declares. “Sometimes you got to sellout your heritage and your culture if you want to make it in their society. We don’t need a space in their society. We will always stand for freedom of speech and equal rights and justice no matter the consequences.”

Alison Hinds was born in London and lived in Plaistow, East London as an only child until 11 years old when her parents divorced. Her mother Marcella Hinds then took her home to Barbados.

She attended Foundation School in Barbados where she discovered a love for languages (French in particular) and singing. She entered the Richard Stoute teen talent show at 16 years old, encouraged by Anderson “Young Blood” Armstrong. They soon formed Square One.

Square One started began as a cover band performing in hotels and then nightclubs. The band helped Alison to come out of her shyness. In 1996, their single “Ragamuffin” landed Hinds the title of Barbados’s Road March queen. They followed up the next year with “In the Meantime” which also earned a second consecutive title.

With “Ragamuffin” the band became intensely popular and Alison became known as the “Ragamuffin” Queen. The band took to the road and began performing internationally in Trinidad & Tobago, The U.S., Canada and elsewhere. They followed up with several hit singles.

The band has a policy of learning the most popular song of the country they are performing in and in Suriname they discovered “Faluma,” a song from the bush Negroes of that country. They recorded it when they returned to Barbados. By the time they got to Guatemala, the band was surprised to discover that “Faluma” had been number one on the charts of one radio station for 45 weeks there.

Now the band tours incessantly spreading Soca vibes with high-energy performances. Once a shy-girl who trembled the first time she performed, Alison Hinds is now known for her wassi stage antics, fuscia dreadlocks and fit physique. She is truly the premier diva of soca music.