By Claude Mills, Staff Reporter
Today we begin profiles of the nominees for the Gleaner's Man of the Year and winner of the prestigious Honour Award. The nominee in the field of entertainment is Orville 'Shaggy' Burrell.
BORN ORVILLE Richard Burrell on October 22, 1968, Shaggy grew up in the island of Jamaica, before migrating to Flatbush, Brooklyn in his teens. He was raised in Flatbush, and got the nickname 'Shaggy' from the loveable, cowardly character in the popular 'Scooby Doo' cartoons. In high school, he started deejaying and discovered his unique bass voice, and recorded a few initial efforts, and soon tasted a bit of dancehall success with the song, Big Up and 'Mampie', both hard-core Shaggy dancehall tracks, hit #1 on the New York reggae charts.
At that time, he hung out with a bunch of other dancehall enthusiasts such as the New York-based DJ Red Foxx, but after a frustrating year of trying to find more work, Shaggy finally joined the U.S. Marines in 1988.
When he finished high school, he decided to join the Marines and served in the Gulf War. While stationed at Camp Le Jeune in North Carolina, Shaggy often made road trips to do recordings in a small New York studio; at some of these recording sessions, he would still be dressed in uniform. From these early efforts, the remake of the early reggae classic, Oh Carolina was born and the song received great play in Jamaica and in England and announced Shaggy's arrival to the world with a bona fide chart success.
The song, Oh Carolina, was a cover of the mid-60s early reggae smash originally done by the Ffolkes Brothers for Prince Buster.
Shortly thereafter, Robert Livingston became Shaggy's manager and sent the recording to England where the record was handled by Greensleeves. However, during that time, there was turmoil in the Middle East, and Shaggy was sent to Kuwait along with thousands of US servicemen, where he stayed during the successful Desert Storm campaign. Following his discharge from the Marines, Shaggy returned to New York to resume his music career.
After Oh Carolina sold 600,000 copies in England, Shaggy signed to Virgin Records for a eyebrow-raising 1.2 million pounds sterling, and a successful promotion of the song in Sweden, Holland, and Germany began in earnest.
The song was eventually released in North America where it also made a strong showing, particularly in Canada.
Shaggy's international success began with the 1993 release of 'Pure Pleasure', his debut album. It featured Oh Carolina, which would go on to become one of the biggest hit singles in U.K. pop history, and went on to top the charts in nine other countries.
Shaggy left them breathless and hungry for his unique musical abilities all over Europe on his debut world tour that year.
However, Shaggy was just getting started. With the 1995 release of Boombastic, Shaggy connected with U.S. audiences with a bunch of musical gems that defined his unique sound.
The platinum-certified album won the 1996 Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album, while the title track shattered boundaries at radio, topping Billboard's Reggae, R&B and Rap charts. It also became the #1 selling single and hit #3 on Billboard's Hot 100 Singles Chart. Shaggy's European success continued as Boombastic topped charts across the continent.
Along with the smash hit Boombastic, the album also featured a lively update of "Summertime" and a sensational version of the Ken Boothe classic The Train Is Coming, featured in the film Money Train.
In September 1996, soon after finishing his globetrotting 95/96 world tour, Shaggy was back in the studio working on his third album, Midnite Lover, which was released in 1997. By then, Shaggy's diverse pop, reggae, R&B, and worldbeat audience had been solidly established, and he was sailing along.
However, the deejay's career would take a brief detour when his label, Virgin, dropped him after Midnite Lover failed to follow the impressive performances of his debut and sophomore efforts.
Shaggy took the setback in stride and promised to return. Just three months later, he did so with a vengeance as his combination with Janet Jackson, Love Me Love Me became a huge seller. Since then, he has contributed songs to several notable soundtracks, including Speed II, Jungle To Jungle, and of course How Stella Got Her Groove Back.
Later, he inked a deal with MCA, and began working on the album, Hot Shots.
The lead single from the album, Dance and Shout failed to spark, but the subsequent single, a snazzy joint entitled It Wasn't Me was about to launch the deejay's career to stratospheric heights.
The year ended on a bittersweet note for the deejay when a teenaged girl in Nairobi, Kenya, committed suicide on New Year's Eve, after her parents denied her permission to attend a concert featuring dancehall/hip-hop DJ Shaggy. According to an issue of the Billboard magazine, Maureen Wanjeri swallowed an overdose of anti-malaria tablets, after her mother strongly opposed her attending 'The Shaggy Showdown,' which played to a packed house of over 1,000 fans at Club Carnivore in Nairobi on December 31.
The dawn of the new millennium heralded Shaggy's rise to pop superstardom. The ex-Marine in February 2001 joined an elite list of Jamaican artistes who have hit the top of the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.
The single It Wasn't Me featuring Ricardo 'Rik Rok' Ducent hit the No. 1 spot in the February 3 edition of the Billboard magazine.
After 14 weeks on the chart the single moved from No. 2 to the coveted top spot replacing Independent Woman Part I, by Destiny's Child, joining reggae artistes such as Ini Kamoze (Here Comes the Hotstepper), Carl Douglas (Kung Fu Fighting) and Maxi Priest (Close To You).
MCA Records has now signed a distribution deal with the Big Yard Music Group, a label he and manager Robert Livingston founded.
Under the terms of the distribution deal, Big Yard/MCA will soon release albums by red hot singers Rik Rok and Rayvon, both of whom played critical roles in the global success of the singles mentioned earlier.
Over the last couple of months, Shaggy has hit the international touring circuit, giving the artiste a chance to get reacquainted with his fans, and to enlist an armada of new ones as well.
During the year, Shaggy was nominated for seven Billboard Awards the most ever for any MCA Records artist. The nominations were for Artist Of The Year, Male Artist Of The Year, Album Of The Year, Album Artist Of The Year, Male Album Artist Of The Year, Male Hot 100 Singles Artist- R&B, and Male Hot 100 Singles Artist Hip Hop Album
Shaggy also performed the single, It Wasn't Me on the show, which aired on Fox.
He has also been nominated in the American Music Award categories of Favourite Male Artist - Pop/Rock- Favourite Artist - Rap/Hip Hop. The show airs live on January 9, 2002 on ABC. Shaggy is also scheduled to perform on the show. In the meantime, Shaggy has been involved in various other endeavours including charity, most notably the Bustamante Hospital for Children. He is very involved in the hospital donating US$28,000 earlier this year to purchase a life-saving unit for the hospital.
Shaggy filmed an upcoming Christmas Holiday Gap commercial on Saturday, October 13, in LA. The commercial was directed by well known video director Paul Hunter and will feature Shaggy. Music for the commercial is the classic Supertramp Give A Little Bit.
Joining Mister Luvah Luvah on this seasonal spectacular were Seal, Sean Lennon, Sheryl Crow, Macy Gray, India Irie, Dwight Yoakam, and Alanis Morrisette.
Through it all, hobnobbing with famous people, Shaggy remains the same affable character despite his mind-blowing success.
He continues to give back to the land of his birth. In August, Shaggy gave a personal endorsement of Jamaica as a tourist destination. The Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB) arranged a satellite television media tour to some 20 television stations throughout the USA, including ABC, CBS, NBC and the Fox networks, using Strawberry Hill as a spectacular backdrop.
Through it all, Shaggy remains, well, Shaggy.
During an interview with a Gleaner reporter a few years ago, he recalled his days as a child when he spent many after-school hours at the North Street offices of this newspaper while waiting for his mother to finish work.
"I used to run the swivel chairs like cars, look at the latest Leandro drawings and spend time in then Editor Hector Wynter's office," he mused to the reporter.
While the superstar is light-years from those swivel-chair running days, Shaggy's heart remains true to his roots, his simple beginnings and to his country. He is a true son of the Jamaican soil.
