News from the streets

Well today marks the end of an 8-day trip to Jamaica for me. It was great to be home and to connect with many of the artists we work closely with and more importantly, to link with ones we haven't worked with as yet.

We got some great connect and arranged some great deals that will only add to RealVibez. Of course you see some of the videos we have (we have videos for 4 of the top 5 songs in Jamaica right now on the site).

What did I learn while being here?

• Munga out of Don Corleon's camp is blowing up fast
• T.O.K. is finishing up their album
• Shaggy's next album is coming out on VP Records
• Mavado's album is wicked (heard the preview at VP Records)
• Tanya Stephens' Rebelution album can't stay on shelves long enough
• Tempo now has actual ads on the channel
• The dancing is still there - Tek weh yuhself a dun it!
• Sean Paul has two songs in particular with American artists that are going to be INSANE!

Hanging out with Sean Paul, T.O.K., Wayne Marshall, Cezar and Mr. Peppa have been the highlights. Stay tuned for video of songs being written and voiced, I mean the ENTIRE writing process, freestyling, live performances and more.

Plus....LOTS of videos!

Dancehall: A Negative Force

A letter was written to the Jamaica regarding Dancehall being a negative force in Jamaica. Read it here.

I have sent my response and hope it will be published. This is not the first time I have sent a letter to the Gleaner related to Dancehall, and I am sure it will not be the last. Ultimately though the writer raises some VERY important questions, some of the same that were asked about Rap music during the Don Imus scandal.

Music can play a positive or negative role in a society and some Dancehall songs are currently paying a negative one, that I do not disagree with. Glorifying 'badmanism' and 'drug dealers' cannot be good for a society that is a World leader in murders.

However I do not blame the artists, they are simply trying to put food on their tables. They do what makes them money. The labels buy the riddims with this music, so the producers make more of it. The general public pays money to go to stage shows with these artists and the artist gets paid handsomely, so they keep making more of the same music.

There are producers who also pay disc jockeys to play their music so we cannot get away from it if we tried. However, companies that advertise on the radio stations could threaten to boycott specific time-slots, shows or stations altogether. If it is not profitable for the radio station, they will adapt and find music that the companies are willing to run their ads beside. Procter and Gamble played that card on CBS and NBC when it came to Don Imus.

When Sean Paul first started, he wrote positive songs and social commentary but producers told him that those wouldn't sell and he should do girl songs and party songs. That shows who has the real influence.

When Wayne Marshall did the song "Overcome", that was one of the most positive dancehall songs ever recorded and still stands today as an example of how dancehall can HELP. Don't get me wrong, I WANT my party songs of course, I just want a bit of the slackness to stop and more importantly, no more glorifying of violence and druggists.

I recently downloaded a Coppershot Dancehall mix CD, their latest, and I was shocked at the number of vulgar songs - that was not the dancehall I remembered at all and I found myself tuning out too many songs.

Here are the links for the latest CDs:

Coppershot Dancehall Mix Coppershot Culture Mix

Sean Paul makes a girl's wish come true

I now rate Sean 100 times more than ever before (and I already rated him nuff).....I saw this girl backstage sitting on the curb across from his trailer and went over to find out if she was waiting to meet him. When I started talking to her, I noticed she didn't respond. That's when her mom stepped in and said that she was mentally challenged and had the mind of a kindergarten student!

The mom said they volunteered backstage partially to try and meet him and how her daughter is in the Special Olympics. I promised I would get autographed stuff for them and call them in a few weeks to drop it off and that I would go to talk to Sean to see what I could work out - a picture, a hug, whatever.

Well I spoke to Jigzag and he was in, then Steve, Sean's co-manager said he loved the "Make A Wish" type thing and then Sean came out and told me to bring her over.

He gave her a hug, posed for a picture and congratulated her on participating in the special Olympics. He was SOOOO genuine about the whole thing and I really had this warm feeling inside. Then the girl gave me a hug too. Sometimes it really is the little things like that hug that just make your day, week or year for you. That girl is sooooo happy and Sean promised her some autographed stuff too.

Ratings to Sean Paul and his crew for showing a truly human, down-to-earth side that few artists would ever show.

Where are people coming to RealVibez from?

I figured this would be a cool question to answer because we have access to so much information regarding the site and I am sure you would LOVE to know who else is on here watching videos.

Below is a screen shot that shows a map of the World. All the yellow dots represent locations where people are visiting the site from. The bigger the dot, the more people from that region.

Enjoy!

RealVibez good to go

I was up until 7 am this morning getting the final version ready. We took a number of suggestions and combined it with our own research to arrive at what you now see.

The player is far and away a significant improvement over the previous edition, even just from a looks point of view. The navigation it offers is just icing on the cake.

Why did I stay up until 7am? Because it would be less likely for people to see me make mistakes as I make the changes and test things out, plus it's always fun to have people log on in the morning and get a dose of freshness.

The videos are now embedded in pages which makes them easier to watch and we have good info on the side. We have launched a top 9 count down called VibezNine and it will track the top videos on the site based on weekly views across the entire World, quite possibly the only countdown of its kind pertaining to Caribbean music. We hope it will become as important to the industry as MTV's TRL and BET's 106th and Park.

Recently added videos are even easier to access as well but we left the text version in case people don't realize they can just check in the front page player to know what's new.

We fixed the "Browse Artists" section and that is the easiest way to find videos. Lastly, make sure to check out the "enlarge" option on the player, it takes up the entire width of the site and the quality is still excellent.

The entire team is looking forward to your feedback and we hope you enjoy the site as much as we enjoy running it.

Updates to site coming

The site has not officially launched as yet, that will be May 7, but it was important that we get it out there with a soft launch to test the site and make tweaks based on user feedback.

So far we have gotten excellent feedback and will be addressing all the issues. Some of the things to expect include:

• widened from 800 x 600 to 1024 x 768
  
• videos embedded in pages instead of pop-up windows
• new and improved video player
• recently added player making it easier to find the latest additions
• top nine countdown called VibezNine (might eventually have a host)
• expanded nav bar