Ini Kamoze

INI KAMOZE was born in Port Maria St. Mary 9th October 1957...A disciplined Libran...Raised in almost fourteen parishes but mainly in St. Elizabeth where he attended St. Elizabeth Technical High...Says he started singing from the minute he was born (while other babies cry)...Visioned Rastafari in 1976...Says it is man who creates God in their image and likeness...Pencil slim, freed, singled, and disentageled, a six foot vegetartian, believing that all food shouldt be eaten live - (uncooked)...Writes and arranges all his own music...Considers himself an (He)artist, not an entertainer...Writes plays and poetry and acts...Records on Mogho Naba, Taxi and Island labels...Aims to shake up Earth with his music...Ini Kamoze cools out in the hill around Spanish Town...Well, what else do you want to know?

Ini Kamoze began his career in 1983 with "Trouble Yuh a Trouble Mi". Since then he has always been moving at his own cool pace, setting lyrical fashions rather than following them. Late in 1992, Ini and his longtime friend Sipoh, linked up with Salaam Remi, a gifted young New York DJ who has blazed a trail of schorching reggae-hip hop remixes. "Here Comes the Hotstepper," the multi-warhead bomb Remi and Ini had dropped, blew up way bigger than anything either had ever done before, simultaneously ruling the pop and R&B charts and setting off a six label war for the lyrical gangster. The song's success proves once and for all that you can't have too many hooks: the "Heartbeat" rhythm track, the Na-nana-na-na" chorus of "Land of 1,000 Dances," the sing-along murderer chant used by reggae lyricists from Lady Ann up to Shabba. But then again, one voice still got to make them all work. <br><br>

Ini feels that reggae music contain a whole heap of elements. So it is easy for reggae artists to cross over. He has always been good at breaking down barriers. His original "Hotstepper" has become a classic in the dancehall.