"Interview with RED RAT"

Written by Maya and Patricia

Jamaican reggae star Red Rat is known for dancehall Hits like “Shelly Ann”, “Tight Up Skirt”, and “Rubber Waist” and on November 26, 2002 he came to the bay area for a show at the Justice League were he played a hot and cozy concert of his best known hits. Red Rat, the falsetto of the reggae superstars showed off his versatility—ad libbing at will and gyrating his waistline to no end. But just before all of that Red Rat took the time to sit down with jouvay.com to give us the low down on what it’s like in his Caribbean world where reggae butts up with soca and, surprisingly, Michael Jackson. Read on….

Jouvay.com: So, we’re some big soca heads on Jouvay.com. When did you start working with Machel Montano?

Red Rat: It was 1998/99 with “Rubber Waist”. It was the first time I meet
him. The vibe clicked. To me him a cool dude. Meh rate him. We met in
Jamaica. He was doing an album with VP and VP referred him to Danny Browne
who was my manager at the time and we just hook up.

J: Are you with VP now?

RR: No, I have my own record company. Me and my manager Delroy Scofferey
start our own company Rat-a-Kastle Records. We’re signing a few
artists.

J: Are they mainly reggae?

RR: Not necessarily. Right now we have 2 DJs, a singing group called QT…to
me is the best singing group I hear in a long long time. Since Boyz to Men.

J: Better than TOK?

RR: Much much better than TOK. TOK know them. TOK love them and rate them.
They came out the same time, but TOK was a dancehall act, they are more R
and B-ish.

J: Really. When’s the album going to drop?

RR: I’m working on that now. Hopefully sometime next year in the summer or
something.

J: So you’re doing a lot of business stuff?

RR: Well, I’ve been a producer from 1998/99 so I start my record company and all so I thinking like a business man, but I am still an artist. I started the Rat-a-Kastle records earlier this year. But I had my own record label which was Brat camp which most of my songs came out on.

J: So, on your site you say you took time off to finish school because that’s what your dad wanted.

RR: I finished school, gave him my diploma and now I am doing my thing. He
was a musician too. He used to play for Byron Lee and the Dragoinaires. He
produced one of their albums. I grew up on soca till I tired of soca. I love soca though.

J: So where this tourist dance come from? (a dance he had the crowd in Miami doing).

RR: One day I was just in Montego Bay in the hotel watching the tourist people dancing to reggae music and I’m wondering what them listening to cause it’s not the rhythm and it’s not the words, so what them dancing to and meh realize dem just dance to what dem feel comfortable to. It’s not any on-time dance, you just dance anyway you want to
dance.

J: Yeah, we just could not get off beat. It’s hilarious. You’re planning on doing a song with Machel for 2003?

RR: The song with Machel will just be a hot hot hot hot calypso song. I’d probably produce it, but me want him do it cause him know more bout soca than I do. I produced a soca track last year called “Another Man’s Partner” but it did not take off as
well as I thought it would. It was me, Spragga Benz, Machel and Buccaneer.

J: Serious. We never heard about it.

RR: I sent it to the radio stations in Trinidad but it did not pick up. So we did not put it out. I might put it out again. Not on my album, but…is a real soca track.

J: How it goes? Ohhh Noo.

RR: Nah. Let me see. The hook goes like “Fling it up pon another man partner fling it up pon another man partner”. Somebody teach me something bout carnival. Once carnival time, if you wid somebody forget about it. Once carnival come you go dance wid who you want dance with and she go dance with who she want dance wid.
After carnival done everything done. You back to yuh spouse again.

J: You have your own label. It’s the same thing with Rupee. He did his last CD. That would be someone to work with.

RR: Who Rupee? Me and him talking bout it. Rupee would be someone cool to work with. He is cool cool cool. I rate him man. We talking bout it, I have to come up with the concept. I came up with the concept for Rubber Waist. I have another track for carnival with ammm, should I should I not?

J: With whom?

RR: With am, Alison and Denise. It’s called threesome.

J: Oh gosh they’re going to kill you.

RR: Alison has the best waistline I’ve ever seen in my life.

J: Alison has the best bumper. Go on jouvay.com and see. Denise Belfon can wine. That’s going to be hilarious. You between the two of them.

RR: I’ll be right in the middle. I don’t care if they kill me. We’re talking about it. Yeah, I’ll be really lost. But don’t take me that simple.

J: So, you just did the Reggae Fest.

RR: The Reggae Fest in Miami was the biggest show I ever see in Miami with about 20,000 people. And Machel and Denise they performed well, they did their thing. But, people say it was my night.

J: Who inspired you to perform?

RR: Shabba Ranks, Super Cat, Sanchez.

J: Have you ever done a song with Shabba?

RR: No, but I’d love to. To me they are the best DJs ever. Shabba is de
man. Shabba to me is like how people look pon Michael Jackson. That’s how me look pon Shabba. Shabba is de man in dancehall music to me.

J: He has not done something in a while.

RR: He was in some BS with his first management that tied him up for about 10 years so now he’s working on his new album. Why I started my own label because I was also in some BS too.

J: And was it also because your dad wanted you to finish school?

RR: Actually, I really stopped for 2 years because of my daughter Taye (he stopped performing twice. First to finish high school and then again after his 2nd album “I’m a Big Kid Now”). I wanted her to know who her father was and now she know so dat’s why I started doing back some songs.

J: Are you and her mom together still?

RR: No we’re not together. We’re still friends, very good friends. I support her in what she do cause she’s a singer also. She’s working on her album too and she, she is bad. She gone blow up. It’s like Alanis Morisette kind of stuff.

J: That’s good. What’s her name? Is she based in Jamaica? Is she on your label also?

RR: Her name is Italie. She’s doing stuff in NY right now. She’s not on my label, she’s on a label higher than me. On the label with Baha Men, S curve.

J: Really. How’d they find her?

RR: I hooked her up with Salaam Remy who is like one of the biggest producers in America. He buss Fugees and he’s working with Naz now. His father is one of the biggest A&R type of guy. He pushes every reggae song that you know hit, he produce that. He hooked her up with S-curve. Like Brian Mcknight is writing songs for her. She will blow up.

J: Maybe she’ll remember you.

RR: Of course she’ll remember me. Who can forget me? Nobody can forget me.

J: You’re just all over.

RR: I’m an entertainer I do everything. We all have to hook up to make Caribbean music big. That’s what hip-hop did, that’s what Spanish music did 2 years ago. Every body came toegther as one.

J: What do you think about the direction in which reggae/dancehall is going?

RR: To me Sean Paul open a big gate. I mean Shaggy did it in a sense, but Shaggy was not considered reggae. He was considered pop and he did not push it and say no man reggae. But Sean Paul and Beenie Man open a big gate now and meh see Sean Paul on MTV performing and yo, meh proud a him. Beenie Man inspire me as a performer too because he’s a great performer. Him and Machel, dem two is my favorite performers.

J: Your site www.redrat.com is cool. How old is the site? Are you going to sell CDs
from your site?

RR: The site is 2 months and we have like 10,000 hits already. I’ll eventually sell CDs on the website. You could buy now on amazon.com.

J: Do you do any community work?

RR: I help out homeless kids in Jamaica. I’m working on building a home for
homeless kids. Rat-a-Kastle is doing that. That’s our main mission right now. Yeah, everyday when you drive in Jamaica there are kids on the street wiping car glass for money and it’s sad. Kids, and when dem grow up dem end up find a gun , shoot a one man and gain power and den dem feel like dis is it and they become gunman and we don’t want that. Government know that, but they ain’t doing shit about it.

J: It’s good that you’re doing that as an entertainer. You all have such
influence on youth.

RR: Entertainers are the voice of the people. In another 2 years it will
be up and running properly. The kids would work to help to keep it running.
They will have people teaching them a trade.

J: You do stuff to promote youth in music?

RR: I sign young artists. I search for talent. Most time young artists come to me. I don’t block meh ears to nobody. You’re an artist, ok sing something. Make me laugh or make me enjoy myself.

J: Are there training schools in Jamaica, I mean how did you start singing?

RR: I born in music. My father used to play guitar for Byron Lee, my older brother play bass for Jimmy Cliff and Diana King. My brother plays drums. He used to play for Dennis Brown and him now in my band, Harddrive. I started singing from when I was 4. My first first time touching a mic on the stage was when I was 4 in Jamaica at a hotel in Ocho Rios. They used to play in a hotel and dem call me up one day and I just do “ABC 123”. Lock de place.

J: That must have been real cute. The mic was probably bigger than you.

RR: It worked. Michael Jackson was my idol. He was the man. I would sue myself if I were him now. He should have stopped right at Black and White. He did not have to do no more plastic surgery after that.

J: Does your daughter live with you?

RR: Yeah, I just talked to her. She said “daddy what you doing?”. “I doing an interview” “why?”. She’s 3 going on 36. If you sit down and talk with her you would not believe she’s 3. She too prime for a 3 year old. She did not creep. She got up and walked at 7 months. She knows her ABCs from one and a half. She can count from 1 to 40 now. She start learning Spanish. She can count from 1 to 10 in Spanish. She’s going to be a great child. She spoilt though. My fault.

J: No kid is too spoilt. Well, it’s 10 pm. How long will you perform tonight?

RR: Till you all tell me to stop. Redrat.com…..Log on.

Pictures from the show in San Francisco