Dancehall gone crazy in Jamaica Mr Vegas
Mr Vegas

Mr Vegas

Fred Zindi Music
Jamaica is the country where dancehall was born. It has since spread its wings to reach countries like Zimbabwe where the ghetto youths have labeled it Zimdancehall. In Zimbabwe this genre has almost toppled other genres like rumba, sungura or museve.

However, despite its popularity, dancehall is often viewed negatively by the society at large mainly due to its negative lyrics, lurid sexual promotion, drug use, violence and misogyny.

As if that is not enough, a new craze called “daggering” is, according to the Jamaican Gleaner, sweeping Jamaica’s night clubs. No, it’s not murder on the dance-floor, it is a new dance craze where couples are seen simulating sex.

According to the Gleaner, broadcasting regulators are trying to put a stop to it.

Jamaica’s Broadcasting Commission is trying to put an end to “daggering”, a fad that is sweeping the country’s dancehall and soca clubs. While the term suggests knife attacks, it is actually a sexy dance where fornication is simulated in relatively graphic movements.

Though an initial announcement on February 6, 2016, explicitly targeted daggering and daggering-related songs. Banished from the airwaves is “any recording, live song or music video that promotes and/or glorifies the use of guns or other offensive weapons; any recording, live song or music video which promotes or glorifies any offence against the person such as murder, rape, and mob violence or other offences such as arson”.

Will “daggering” ever reach Zimbabwe? My answer to this question is that it has already arrived.

In 2011, Zimbabwean promoter, Clint Robinson and his partners in C&A Entertainment brought into the country a well-known Jamaican dancehall artiste and “daggering” activist, Mr Vegas, to perform in Zimbabwe. Those who attended the concert say that it was very exciting and that they learnt quite a few dancing tricks from Mr Vegas. Those dancing styles are still being practised here in Zimbabwe today.

“Gee it was so amazing! I learnt to do a few clarks dancing styles and also the Taliban dance from that man,” remarked Jennifer Daniels from Arcadia when I asked her about her experiences at the Mr Vegas show.

Another interviewee, John Mabaya said that he did not enjoy the show because it was full of “dirty dancing”.

“If the culture of throwing cans at the performers on stage was in existence then, I would have knocked Vegas over with beer cans. He was full of nasty dances. They were ghastly and dirty,” he elaborated.

A lot has changed in Jamaica regarding the broadcasting of music. Radio listeners in Jamaica have been forced to say goodbye to many of their favourite songs, thanks to a new ban on tunes that “promote” sex, violence, murder or arson.

The ban applies equally to “soca, hip-hop or any other music”, making the Angels’ “My Boyfriend’s Back (“and you’re gonna be in trouble)” just as verboten as Mr Vegas’s hit dancehall tune, “Daggering”.

The new legislation will not allow radio stations to censor the offending songs through bleeping as they used to do before. According to the ban announcement: “There shall not be transmitted through radio or television or cable services any audio recording, song or music video which employs editing techniques of “bleeping” or “beeping” of its original lyrical content,” the commission ruled.

With naughty behaviour inspiring much of the past 50 years of popular music, there may not be much left on Jamaican radio by the time the Broadcasting Commission has its way. We can imagine the charts now – a little classical music, part of Tiny Tim’s discography, and some soca tunes about taxes. Imagine, going to Kingston, Jamaica and turning on the radio, only to hear Beethoven, Mozart, Bach or Tchaikovsky’s music blurting out of the radio stations! That is not the Jamaica we all know.

I am still yet to carefully listen to Mr Vegas’ “Daggering” to judge for myself. I tried to sample it from You Tube before I began to write this article, but my network was playing up. I will give it a listen soon. If the Jamaican Broadcasting Commission gets its way, it will be goodbye to Mr Vegas aka Clifford Smith and his music unless he changes to cleaner lyrics. He has often been labelled a troublemaker.

Clifford Smith was born in Kingston in 1974. The moniker “Mr Vegas” was given to Smith by his schoolyard football-mates, who thought that he kicked the ball like a Las Vegas dancer. In his early years as a singjay, Vegas sang covers of Jamaican hits at local parties and shows, and acquired a reputation as a troublemaker for his lyrics. During a scuffle over stolen master tapes, Vegas was hit in the face with a crowbar and had his jaw wired shut for six weeks. Vegas claims that, after hearing Beenie Man’s’s hit, “Who Am I?”, he immediately demanded that his still-healing jaw be unwired, changing his speech pattern but allowing him to practise toasting.

He found fame in 1998 with hits such as “Yu Sure”, “Jack It Up”, and “Latest News”.

For his first major hit, Vegas versioned the wildly popular “Playground” Riddim (Sean Paul’s “Infiltrate” among others) to create “Nike Air”, which became a huge hit .

In September 2008, Smith who had had a long history of musical hits, announced that he was retiring from the music industry <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_industry>, citing unhappiness with his work and a desire to spend more time with his children and be “closer to God Almighty”. Although he had been suffering from ill-health for some time, he denied that this was a factor in his retirement. However, despite this announcement, in 2009 and 2010 he made new songs such as “Man A Gallis”, “Can’t Stop Now”, “Mix Up Peggy”, “Wanna See You Move” and “Fi Get Rich”.

Recording throughout 2011 & early in 2012 for his newly formed label imprint, MV Music, Mr Vegas released his new album, “Sweet Jamaica” on May 29, 2012.

To celebrate Jamaica’s 50th Anniversary, Mr Vegas took to the studio to produce an all star remix, The Voices of Sweet Jamaica with a cast of reggae greats including Shaggy, U-Roy, Barrington Levy, Marcia Griffiths and more. Proceeds of the recording went to benefit the children of Mustard Seed Communities in Kingston Jamaica.

“Reggae Euphoria” was released in September 2014. He featured on a remixed version of Beyonce’s “Standing on the Sun”, which was included on the 2014 “Platinum Edition” of her self-titled album.

An album of cover versions, “Lovers Rock and Soul”, was released in October 2015.

One wonders why a man who had almost retired from music in 2008 because he wanted to be close to Almighy God, would suddenly compose a song called “Daggering”?

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