Since the overwhelming success of the Beenie Man / Bounty Killer Verzuz competition a couple weeks ago, the Jamaican dancehall king has been very busy releasing and promoting new merchandise unique to the show.
His official online store – beenieman merch dot com – is up and running, and it features a stunning ‘Verzuz Collection’ t-shirt line. We cannot say how sales are going, but the online chatter is very positive and optimistic.
A few days ago Karamanti released the official video for “Eyes Open Up,” which is featured on her 2019 album, “Hurt People.”
The visuals were captured in Karamanti‘s city, Kingston 20 (Jamaica), a few weeks before the corona virus pandemic disrupted our daily routines. As this is her favorite song on the album, she insisted on creating a simple video that would not distract from the message in the music. That being said, the video shows her performing the song in a fun, but purposeful and deliberate manner, while clips of onlookers are sporadically placed throughout.
The “Hurt People” album was created to shine light on domestic abuse, child abuse and molestation (at home and in the church), severe despondency and dejection, and above all else, on the importance of reclaiming ones happiness after a traumatic experience. A couple years ago Karamanti went into, and eventually overcame, deep depression. The song “Eyes Open Up” was written around that time and it has since been a source of inspiration for her.
Our digital music station, Maria Jackson Radio (MJR), is now back online! The station began broadcasting again on June 2nd, 2020 after being off air for a couple of weeks due to technical difficulties.
Now that the station is back online, listeners can expect some changes to our playlist. In the past we only streamed reggae music and all sub-genres deriving from that style; however, going forward MJR will begin to slowly incorporate other urban genres providing the content is positive.
The theme of the station will follow our overall theme, which is: “Promoting Positive Black Music & Telling The Stories Of The People Behind It.” We stream 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, with new music added to our playlist every week.
Over the past few weeks, Irie Jam Radio, which is based in New York, has been giving us quality digital concerts to tie us over while we were all on lock-down and in quarantine.
Even though a lot of the stay at home orders are now being relaxed the show will still go on this Saturday, June 6th, at 6:00 PM EST. There will be performances from Chris Martin, Nadine Sutherland, Jesse Royal, D Major and Zac Jones. The concert will be streamed live on Irie Jam Radio’s social media platforms.
On Saturday, May 30th, Jamaican pop star, Koffee, shared the following statement on her social media platforms:
“As we witness the constant injustice towards our brothers and sisters, we must stand together. I may be young, but I can fully feel the weight of the decades of oppression and abuse towards not only Black Americans, but Black people all over the world. Let George Floyd’s life be not in vein. We must fight for freedom and fight against injustice. We are all in this together. None of us are free until all of us are free.”
Recording artist Demarco just released one of the most compelling dancehall songs for 2020. The track, titled “Homage,” is a tribute to two of the biggest names in the dancehall music industry: Beenie Man and Bounty Killer.
What makes “Homage” compelling is the passion heard in Demarco’s voice as he makes it clear, on the record, that he will never disrespect Beenie or Bounty. He also highlights something we all know to be true; the fact that a lot of Jamaica’s inner-city youths are able to make a living because of these two musical giants.
“24hrs,” track number 7 on Bugle‘s “Picture Perfect” album, now has some visuals. The sing-jay published the official video, which was directed by Damaniac Visualz, yesterday (May 25th).
Though the song was released last year the message is very relevant to what we are all going through right now, this is as it relates to not going to work and practicing social distancing.
Click here or on the image above to watch the video, and remember to like, comment and share.
MARIA JACKSON 27 MAGAZINE 