Foreign producers can’t afford Jamaicans

 

Frenchman claims local artistes price themselves out of the market

Curtis Campbell, STAR Writer

Senshighj also known as Jean Sebastian, an avid French producer, is adamant that Jamaican artistes are charging foreign producers too much to record on rhythms.

According to the producers, the artistes assume that foreign producers are wealthy and, therefore, request high sums of money to record.

Jean Sebastian, who was recently in Jamaica promoting and producing singles, says the Jamaican industry players and citizens are very hospitable, however, the music is seen too much like a hustle.

“A lot of producers in Europe have good rhythms, but they can’t afford the prices that some of these Jamaican artistes are charging, especially if they are young producers. When it is a big producer, it’s different, but they think everybody from foreign have nuff money,” he said.

 

More established

According to Jean Sebastian, there are young European producers who love reggae and dancehall and can do wonders for the music if they are given a fair chance to compete with the more-established producers.

However, the ridiculous financial demands made by some artistes reduces their ability to compete.

“Some of them are not hype nor blazing like they used to and they have some really high prices, like really, really high and are asking for prices that many people can’t afford. Things like that will turn away business. If things were not so expensive we could do more music out of Europe and expose it to the world. But right now dem a outprice demself,” he said.

The producer was in Jamaica for two weeks promoting Don’t Burn Your Bridges, which was produced by his Y Not Production label and features dancehall artiste Eklypse. He also filmed a music video and recorded several local acts many of which were paid.

Local producer/DJ Cashflow Neil, says established local labels are not charged on most occasions by artistes. However, he agreed that new producers might have that experience because the artistes are uncertain if their effort is worth the hassle.

“At Cashflow we set a standard so we don’t have to pay an artiste to go on a rhythm because we do a lot in music. I know that some young producers have to pay because the artiste does not know if he will be wasting his time or not – it mostly affects young producers,” he said.

Jean Sebastian revealed that one particular dancehall artiste who is way past his glory days charged as much as US$2,000 to record a song.

 

By: Curtis Campbell, STAR Writer

For the original report go to http://jamaica-star.com/thestar/20131002/ent/ent1.html