20/03/2021
Soul Jah Love’s life of multitudes . The late Zimdancehall musician was part of a generation of originators who, from the Jamaican idiom and format, created a grammar of ghetto pain and resilience.
In mapping out the legacy of Soul Jah Love, the Zimdancehall star who died last week at 31 of diabetes complications, one naturally has to go to Jamaica – the island which gave the world the idiom of rap-style chanting. An obvious reference is U Roy, the Jamaican prototypical DJ who also died last week, at the age of 78.
Even though Daddy U-Roy, as he was affectionately known, didn’t invent the toasting style which later morphed into rap when it got to the United States (before him, Count Machuki had been doing it), it was when the DJ had the microphone in his hands that the form became commercially viable. This is why U-Roy is sometimes described as the “originator” because, as he said – referring to his chart-topping studio hits – “I’m the first man who put DJ rap on wax, you know.” What has come to be a staple radio jingle, for instance, the couplet, “This station/ rules the nation,” was first chanted by U-Roy on King Tubby’s and, later, Duke Reid’s sound systems.
Yet, since Soul Jah Love sang and performed his Jamaican-influenced rhymes and raps in Shona, one also has to go into poetry in the language to look for the chanter’s possible influences and ancestors.
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Soul Jah Love’s life of multitudes . The late Zimdancehall musician was part of a generation of originators who, from the Jamaican idiom and format, created ...
