All fliers via Large Up Agency
Donna-Claire is the Jesus Lazardo of the literary world.
Music culture is born from being outside. Whether it’s the birth of hip-hop or underground basement punk shows, the art progresses alongside the collision of bodies with bodies. The ephemera attached to those moments and parties is a time capsule of a better era–one before the doom scroll was a condition of being.
From the late 1970s to the ’90s, if you wanted to find the best party spot in your respective city, you were out on the streets trawling for handmade flyers and posters advertising the best a music scene had to offer. In his new art book, Art of Dancehall, pioneer Walshy Fire catalogs the beauty of these DIY party flyers as they shaped the rise of dancehall from Jamaica to NYC, Tokyo, and London. The Jamaican-American DJ, curator, and Major Lazer member has spent the past 13 years spotlighting reggae and dancehall music for American audiences, and this new art book is another push to catalog the dancehall’s rich history.
Art of Dancehall preserves a dynamic music scene in amber. In an era of microwaved content and AI-generation, this book harkens back to the importance of working with wax, a microphone, and a printing press.“People will look at their old photos or grandparents’ photos, and realize they lived in a moment that is completely the opposite of the moment now,” Walshy fire says. “And these moments need to be highlighted, boosted, and put on an altar because they will never happen again.”
We spoke with Walshy Fire about his new art book, the selection process for the flyers and posters, and the importance of capturing DIY spirit in a world dominated by AI slop.
What inspired you to curate and assemble the book? What was the deciding factor in what flyers that you decided to choose?
Walshy Fire: Basically, I was going through my own collection in my garage and, after spending hours looking at each one and feeling that nostalgia, I thought other people would feel this nostalgia too. I met Shepard Fairey and told him the idea. He immediately linked me with Rizzoli on an email chain, and the book had started and was on its way. As far as deciding what flyers to put in, I chose by going for visually significant artwork or extremely impactful moments. King Addies vs Earth Ruler at Biltmore Ballroom is not that impressive of a flyer, visually, but it was such an impactful moment for the culture. That’s a clash that people still talk about to this day. Lee Major from Earth Ruler is one of the collectors whose collections we had access to, and he tells the story in the book. It’s a white and blue flyer, with squares and some circles but this clash was SUCH an iconic moment, it has to go in the book. Those were the two criteria that I used to dwindle everything down.
What do you think these flyers say about the value of human originality, localized community, and creative vision in contrast to the copy and paste AI simulacra that have become de rigueur over the last few years?
Walshy Fire: The book is mostly flyers from the ’80s and ’90s. There was probably zero aspect of life then that didn’t have the human touch as part of it. Comparing decades is difficult, thinking things should stay the same is difficult. The positive you get out of it is the value of the ’80s and ’90s things increases because no one will do it anymore. This way of doing things by hand will no longer be a part of the future. So these relics that people have in their basement or their garage will have value added. People will look at their old photos or grandparents’ photos, and realize they lived in a moment that is completely the opposite of the moment now. And these moments need to be highlighted, boosted, and put on an altar because they will never happen again. Is there community now? Yeah, but it’s not the same. I have options for many communities now. You do not have to focus on just one. If I was in the dancehall community back then, I probably wasn’t even in the hip-hop community. There would have been a strict divide.
Can you tell us anything about the following flyers?
KRS and Shabba (1992 in Toronto)
Walshy Fire: This is from a time when Shabba Ranks was crossing dancehall over into the mainstream with songs like “Mr. Loverman.” Dancehall was the biggest it ever had been, and he was the top dog. You couldn’t get any bigger at that time than getting parodied on “In Living Color.”
Shabba was basically mixed in with hip-hop at that time, and he worked with a lot of rappers. KRS was maybe the first, though, and definitely the biggest linkup. KRS was always bigging up dancehall, too, from BDP “Criminal Minded” days. He was one of the first ones to do that, too.
A KRS and Shabba show together at that time would have been big. And in Canada? Massive. Hip-hop in Canada has always been blending with dancehall. They were on it early. And you got Guinness as a sponsor, Mad Cobra when he was still Cobra, Richie Stephens. Come on, man. Absolutely massive.
