Yeah we have agreed on this here many times.
Just to add something new
Two main factors
1. The change in equipment (computers/digital) made producers go less with live musicians cause it was way cheaper. And those horrid digital drums and keyboards
2. People got sick about roots reggae singing about jah jah, repatriation, Halie Sellasie and dreads particularly when things in Jamaica got increasingly violent AND the lyrics about 1979 began to shift into dancehall (pum pum, rub a dub and slackness)
And
3. Key figures kept getting killed or moving to Canada, US, UK to avoid getting killed…or laying low in Jamaica to stay alive….reggae became really dangerous…also really political…just read about Peter Tosh’s death…Jamaica got really bad: see King Tubby’s end (and he was laying low). Too many key people moved out: Coxsone of Studio One, the Chin’s of Randy’s Records… so many of them moved to Brooklyn or Queens
So the music becomes stiff digital rhythm backed by lyrics that offer nothing
Such a bummer cause for about 20 years Jamaican music ruled and really evolved…in interesting directions
The optimism reflected in early Jamaican music as an outgrowth of independence in 1962 -with ska- and evolving through rocksteady, reggae, roots, DJ, dub etc 20 years later became violent…sort of parallels the evolution of black music in America from r&b to Motown to soul to Philly soul to rap.. that’s not a coincidence
