Producer JonFX Says New Dancehall Lacks Basic Elements Of Music Structure
Award-winning music producer JonFX says new-day Jamaican Dancehall songs are failing to rack up numbers on streaming platforms such as Spotify, as the majority are improperly produced, and lack “the basic rudiments of music structure”, particularly melodies.
Speaking during an interview with Television Jamaica’s Anthony Miller, the St. Andrew native who produced XXXTentacion’s platinum-selling Jocelyn Flores, Gyptian’s Hold Yuh album, and Sizzla’s I’m Yours, said that at the heart of Dancehall’s dilemma, was that beatmakers, who do not know the rudiments of song production or songwriting, were the ones assuming the role of producers.
“I used to be a beatmaker growing up. I have evolved into a producer. What we have (in Jamaica) is mostly beatmakers. Guys who just take beats, take some loops, splice or whatever, and then just give you some beats,” said the producer, who also produced the Gun Session single which featured Shabba Ranks, Vybz Kartel, Sizzla and Akon.
“What we need is producers who can sit and say: ‘send me that vocal, let me find that vocal; let me find that chord structure; let me find what works around the voice’. But what artistes are doing, they are writing to the beat. But the song- it’s about the song. We as musicians should write to the song. Not you geta bunch of beats and you have to write the songs to the beat, because then it takes out the musical elements out of it,” he added.
Jon FX pointed to songs such as Shaggy’s It Wasn’t me, Wayne Wonder’s No Letting Go and Chaka Demus and Pliers’ Murder She Wrote, whose seasoned producers were able to ensure that these songs had melodies and followed the tested and proven structure for music.
“Intro, pre-hook, chorus, bridge: those were all in Dancehall records enuh. All the Dancehall records that we knew over the years enuh… All these records have the structure… and then the verses come een, then there’s the pitch,” he explained.
“Producers in Jamaica listened to a larger variety of music. That’s what a producer does. So he knows that… the world is hooking to the melody. They don’t know what the verses are saying… Shaggy they don’t know much of what he is saying but they are hooked on the chorus,” he added.
At the same time, the US-based producer pointed out that ‘although the songs that the young people are doing are great’, the requisite expertise to get them to international standards are lacking.
“So the younger guys, are a bunch a bad artistes, and they deserve it, the problem we have now is that they don’t have any melody… A bunch a words and no melody… Your ears get tired of records after a while if they don’t have the basic rudiments of music structure,” he explained.
“So we need producers who have a wider span of music. That’s where production comes in. We as producers would be like: ‘I need a musician; I need a musical vocal coach to help me to translate more melodies in the song’”, he added.
Continued JonFX: “So although we are doing Reggae, we have lost the way how to appeal to the international audience, because there are some rudimentary elements that are needed in the songs. That is where real producers come in. Not beatmakers, or beat-buyers.”
The producer, whose given name is John Alexander Crawford, also explained that when the Jamaican Dancehall and Reggae music were dominant globally, there were quality checks and balances at every stage of the music writing and production process, as opposed to nowadays.
“There was a big old studio at Anchor; there was a mixing engineer; there was a producer sitting there; there were musicians there and there were people also helping with the artiste and the vocals and all that stuff… Many songs were structured properly, so they were surer to hit,” he said, recounting his early studio experience.
“Now you in studio, with your little artiste fren saying ‘yeh man, dat bad’. That’s not enough – because you are not experienced…,” he added.
As for the performance of Dancehall songs on Spotify, JonFX said in order to attract attention, the songs coming out of Jamaica, ought not to all sound similar.
“When we do records, we should do it in a way that it is welcoming to the streaming audience. It has to be different. We all tied up with the same drum sounds, same sounds. You have to create your own new audience on Spotify. It’s hard because most of our fan base is from Jamaica and Spotify doesn’t work as well as I think here on the island…,” he said.