YOU! by Calvin French YOU! Magazine - Issue 1 | Page 74

Caribbean
Music Fuses
with Afrobeats
By: Brian Matthew
Caribbean music genres are diverse. They are
all fusions of African, European, Indian and
Indigenous influences, largely created by our
descendants from slavery and colonialism.
Emanating from this, today we have two
prominent Caribbean music genres – Soca
and Dancehall. In the past few years however,
there seems to be a new hybrid being born and
a fascinating overlap of soca, dancehall, and
afrobeats is taking place.
Afrobeats, if you did not know, is a modern
genre of West African music that incorporates
elements of traditional Yoruba music and
74 - YOU! Magazine by Calvin French
Ghanaian highlife genre, mixed with the Western
sounds of jazz, funk, and soul.
Artists from both African and Caribbean
regions are building on their shared histories
and existing similarities with collaborations
and remixes that are blurring the boundaries
between of their sounds even further. Jamaica’s
Konshens released a remix of his “Gal Ting”
featuring Nigeria’s Patoranking, and Sean Paul
has paired with both Fuse ODG and Timaya in
the last two years. The video for “Bend Down
Pause” a heavily dancehall-based single from
Wizkid and Runtown, both Nigerian, features
an intro from Jamaican-born Major Lazer MC
Walshy Fire and Kingston-originated moves