Top things to know
- Roots singer Jahmark and his band The Soulshakers have released a ska song titled No Sorry fi Maga Dog.
- Jahmark said the song is based on a traditional Jamaican proverb and was inspired by hearing the word 'MAGA' frequently in America.
- The track was produced by Mike Irwin of Roughsounds Studio in Redondo Beach, California.
- Jahmark, born in Kingston, formed The Soul Shakers in the 1980s and has lived in Southern California since the early 1990s.
- The song was timed around Jamaica's independence observance on August 6.
Roots singer Jahmark has released a new ska single, No Sorry fi Maga Dog, a track he says draws on a traditional Jamaican proverb and the frequency of the word “MAGA” in the United States. The song, recorded with his band The Soulshakers, was timed to coincide with Jamaica’s independence observance on August 6.
In an interview, Jahmark explained the song’s inspiration. “The song is based on that ol’ time Jamaican proverb that every Jamaican know ‘bout. ‘If yuh sorry fi maga dog him a guh tun round bite you,” he said. “Being in America, we hear the word MAGA nuff and every time I hear it, my mind goes straight to that maga dog proverb made even more popular in the ‘60s and ‘70s by brother Peter Tosh.”
The track was produced by Mike Irwin of Roughsounds Studio in Redondo Beach, California. According to the account, Jahmark deliberately chose the traditional horn-hooked ska sound associated with The Skatalites rather than the rock-ska fusion common among Southern California acts. “All that early music have a special place inna mi heart and soul from that time to this time,” he said. “So many of the artistes who became huge reggae icons started off as ska artistes in the ‘60s, from Bob (Marley) and Peter, to Toots, Desmond Dekker and Jimmy Cliff. I listened to all that early music as a yute, so it’s just one of the many Jamaican genres that just natural inna mi!”
Born in Kingston, Jahmark formed The Soul Shakers there during the 1980s. The group had a stint in Japan before settling in Southern California in the early 1990s. Their biggest hit song, Happiness, was released in 2019. Ska has maintained a strong following in Southern California, where the veteran artiste has lived for many years.
The release places Jahmark among Jamaican artistes who have carried the island’s early popular music forms into diaspora audiences. The song’s title and lyrical premise tie a folk saying about misplaced pity to a contemporary political acronym heard frequently in American public life, though the track itself is framed as a ska record rooted in the 1960s Jamaican sound.
Details on the song’s full track listing, distribution and any accompanying video were not included in the available account. It was not immediately clear whether the single would receive radio promotion in Jamaica or the wider Caribbean.