Ghanaian veteran reggae artist, Blak Mexxiah, a former member of Ghanaian Afro-rock band, Osibisa Kete Warriors, recounts his role in introducing sound system culture in Ghana.
In a recent Facebook post, he discussed how he was initially met with mockery from other artists and selectors, who suggested he should leave the dubplate scene and focus solely on music, etc.
“When I started introducing sound system culture with dubplate making from the year 2000 as it was new to the many selectors likewise artists in Ghana. I knew it was imperative to be introduced not disrespecting the elder selectors like the great Black Santino, Daddy Bosco, Culture B, and many others who were not much into clashes and dubplate cutting but the regular juggling keeps on always, sometimes alongside with artist passing through to perform.”
“But from 2006 there few sounds began to come up but not interested in cutting dubplates so for not having no many big hits in Ghana introducing it got mocked by many artists and Selectors that I should focus on my music to make hits and leave this dubplate thing alone because that won’t put food on my table. So before I met with king lagaze me as selector garlic jahta man who was my engineer and dj the same time in jahta yard studios in Madina, we planned for doing some dubplates for sounds in Ghana so started with Xman who was by then the Radio icon when it comes to Dancehall in ghana on XFm I made the dubplate titled show them for xman and Xman fm which was played for over a year on the radio so When King Lagazee Met me with jahta man aka selector Garlic we were doing so much with sound system culture also the key person who witnessed this was Nana Kwasi whom also had so much interest in the culture from Kumasi playing on radio till he came to Accra to play on the air with happy Fm.”
“We need public support for all the sounds in Ghana and also artist should find a way can help Ghana sounds to grow so that they can keep frequent clashes and jugglings. Long live Reggae Dancehall In Ghana and Long live Sound system culture.“
Read his post below:
Leave a Review