Contributed - The back cover of Bryan Art's album to be released this summer.

Debut album 'Bryan Art 20Ten' for summer release

 

Bryan Art has a full slate of promotions lined up for his debut album 'Bray Art 20Ten', set for release on June 1. That includes music videos, interviews and a strong Internet presence.

However, Art is not leaving out heading "into the streets" in the flesh to plug the 16-track set, which includes Get It, Murder Them a Play (featuring Queen Ifrica), Rock and Come In, Somewhere, Second Class (with Hawkeye), the acoustic track Taxi, Anyway (which he describes as "a raw track, just me and a guitar"), Sweeter Love, Ready or Not and Beautiful.

dance and sing

He says that "I find going on the street is even easier. You used to think that songs like mine would not fit in, but I can go to a dance and sing at 3 a.m. We go dance and find that even inna hours when the almshouse a gwaan, the people still listen to we," Art said.

He had that experience recently at a dance named Chicken Back Wednesdays, held in Spanish Town, St Catherine. While he waited to perform, it got later and later until he was called "in the heart of the almshouse; we almost give up". He did not have any fear about performing, though, "'cause me notice a little trend a gwaan". So he says "me never feel no way", even though he did not get to hold the microphone until 3:30 a.m.

He says that a few years ago a singer would not be welcomed after midnight and it was strictly dancehall. However, he says that "I realise that some things like Rising Stars where people sit in them yard, in them living room, and see people a do songs", there has been a change in music appreciation. And, in terms of the music that is being created, he hears chords and syncopation, as well as "a new one drop that is half one drop and half R&B".

"A few years ago, the music had to be very skeletal, just rhythm. It was just 100 per cent rhythm. Now a wider variety of music is being played in the dancehall, wider than a few years ago," Art said.

Art speaks from a background as both musician and singer, having been trained in the guitar at the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts. He played in the band that supported Luciano up to 1997, then up to 2000 was band leader for G**** Roots, the backing unit for Bushman, which he co-founded with Rupert McKenzie.

However, he stopped his band work when he decided to divert his career path.

"I wanted to focus more on my solo career and I realised that people would not take you that seriously if you were doing that (playing guitar and singing)," he said. "Then, is a kind of move that would remind me each time what I am really about and not to confuse things. I decided I was going to stop all these gigs, focus on this and start thinking like a solo artiste and not a backing-band musician."