Jesse Royal promotes love, unity at Dubwise TT

Grammy-nominated Jamaican reggae artiste Jesse Royal thrilled many during his second visit to TT at Dubwise on Sunday night.

Dubwise, a Jamaican event created in 2013, promotes and highlights reggae – primarily roots and dub – and has since been extended to the US, Ethiopia and TT.

The event was held at SoundForge, St James, and organised by the Wadada Movement.

Speaking with Newsday just before showtime, Royal said he's seeing progress in reggae music in TT as he's seeing more young artistes than during his first visit in 2017.

His most recent album – Royal – earned a Grammy nomination for best reggae album in 2021.

He said so far, people have been receiving the songs on the album well.

"Especially stage side in Jamaica – everybody loves it. I'm just so grateful to have dropped a body of work (like this).

"I am a humble servant of reggae music."

The album features other Jamaican artistes including Vybz Kartel, Protoje and Kumar.

Asked what he hoped his set would achieve that night, he said, "We just want ears open, hearts open and minds free in a way where dem can accept the message...That's the beauty of art – everybody interpret it in a different way, it hit people in a different way."

He performed many of his earlier and more recent hits, including Modern Day Judas, LionOrder and Natty Pablo.

During his set, he spoke highly of love and unity and wondered how some young dancehall artistes felt not being able to trust anyone in their circles.

"Imagine if every day you wake up, and you friend dem you a go out with, you nuh trust dem. Imagine the people you call you friend dem, every day you get up and you a pree seh dem a guh do you something. Mi seh not a b--------t. Not I and I."

He said this was the thought process behind one of the songs he would be performing called Strongest Link.

He recalled spending time with a lot of TT people while living in Canada, proclaiming that people from this country are filled with love.

He also commended the audience for coming to the event, saying:

"When dancehall a fire shot, everybody shows up. When a wining time, everybody show up, you see when it's time to hold the righteous vibrations, make sure seh we show up.

“We don't have to pick one over the other but just know seh balance is a part of life and this is coming from a reggae man with a soca wife."

Other artistes who performed at Dubwise included TT's Jalifa Fyah Princess and BuzzRock.

Entrepreneurs also had stalls set up with handcrafted jewellery, woodwork, cannabis-infused eats and drinks, among other things.