When People ask me why Reggae

Reggae Lucky

Disclaimer: This is a very personal post about Reggae music and why Lucky chose it. The easily triggered should strongly consider whether to continue.

A lot of people ask me why I chose Reggae to be the music that Lucky identifies with first.  They say, „Your are a rapper, why not rap!?“They say that reggae is on the decline and you can not reach young people with it. So,“Why did you choose Reggae?“

Firstly I chose it because my brother Patrick introduced me to it when I was a soldier.

Secondly because it’s the only music that has done with consistency what I think all black American music does. It talks to God. It begs for mercy. It begs for forgiveness and it is the only music that doesn’t consistently reminds of God’s grace without constantly reminding us to fear God. There is already enough fear in the world.

I don’t know much about Reggae. When I first heard that Bob Marley was the original performer of „ I shot the sheriff“  and Clapton was the remake, I was shocked. That’s really an understatement.  Of course I knew the song but it was Clapton that I used to sing along to. I loved metal and Clapton was one of the few exceptions. Mostly because of that song. Lyrically I always felt that it was the rock artists that sang commercially about God, gods, and demons.  In my opinion the Green Paper God had taken over the voice contemporary black music. That was how I saw the world. Until rap! Then the gods took the music  back and gave it to the children! Even the ladies in the church didn’t mind hearing little brothers rhyme. There was nothing vulgar about it. At least not when mama was around or a real one was rapping but that’ another story.

White people already know every fucking thing so I won’t even try to school them. Like all children that have chosen to identify as a color they are like black people to triggered to listen. Though there are many that need to be schooled. To all people that feel offended by what I just said, fuck you! I don’t care. That is what it means to be a fucking American. Even in America we don’t have to fucking care. We don’t have to care if you understand our democracy or not. We do not care if you can’t understand the concept of our republic which likes to identify as democracy.

Please excuse the digression, I am not using  AI but that’s no excuse.

I chose reggae because no matter how much or to what extent the genre changes, there are  always „mainstream“ artists within the reggae community that sing of nothing but peace, love and joy. They mostly sing of unity. Unity is a lovely three syllable word that consists of  five letters U N I T Y. I know a beautiful Persian soul singer that has a song where she spells it out her name is Kaye-Ree. I have always loved the message of that song. She is known for her rendition of Bob Marley’s „ I want to love you“.

Reggae is also one of the most misunderstood genres (for lack of a better term) and I mean that both figuratively and literally. You see once I discovered that Bob Marley did in fact sing the original song (I shot the sheriff) I discovered and fell in love with the music of Bob Marley and the joy of  Jah.

Years later, to my shock and dismay, I discovered that more than half the world of non native English speakers misunderstood one of Bob Marley’s most touching songs. NO WOMAN NO CRY. Bob Marley sang the song in the dialect of his Rastafarian brethren. He omitted an auxiliary verb. In this case don’t. More than half the non native English  speaking listeners didn’t understand that „don’t“ is implied / understood.

In other words , in standard American English“,  He would have said „ No woman, don’t cry“. But because he omitted the auxiliary verb half the world thought/thinks there is a hint of anti-feminism in that song. There are actually people walking this earth that don’t understand that the song was a desperate man’s plea to comfort the woman than he loves so deeply that he never wants to see cry. One can hear the desperation in the lyrics, even now I hear him singing Everything’s gonna be alright! Everything’s gonna be alright. So woman no cry. No No No woman, No woman no cry. Dear little sister don’t shed no tears. No woman no cry.

When you listen to the message of peace in Reggae music you hear God singing to you from your own heart. Only you can hear the voice of God. The men and women of the cloth can take you to the places where they say the spirit lives namely the house of God. To the rastafarian nature is God’s house.

I am a rapper. I actually rap like this too and I still rap because I love rap. I don’t know what it feels like to do it for money. I love talking to God and you don’t have to believe me, I don’t give a fuck. I don’t give a fuck if you understand why I chose Reggae even after reading this. I chose it because God told me that is what the children need. There are snakes in the garden! I am Leonard Nimoy Slater but I am also unapologetically Icy Mother Fucking Bro, I am Dollbaby’s son.

This is Hashemo’s Haus!

I AM NOT WOKE , I JUST DON’T SLEEP