Bounty Killer said he was a student to the crossover artists who came before him who were doing dancehall music in the early 90s. He said as his popularity grew, he went searching for collaborations along with his then manager Johnny Wonder to find a way to break into the US market.
“From I was coming up I look up to Shabba Rankin, I was watching the Shabba Rankin and the KRS1, the Shine Head, Heavy D and Buju Banton,” he said.
Speaking with the BBC’s Seani B on Brukout for a recent interview in the U.K., Bounty explained how he got popular through many collaborations with hip hop artists and producers in the US.
1992-1995 were the most successful years for dancehall music on the Billboard chart and by the time Bounty came around in 1996, the popularity had dwindled a little. Along with Beenie Man, Bounty was seen as the next chapter in dancehall music.
“Our music wasn’t so popular overseas in the 90s, so we think that we would have to collaborate and then hip hop is similar to ours,” he recalls. He added that Hip Hop a ‘cousin of dancehall,’ so he drew close to the New York grown genre as he tried to take his brand of hardcore dancehall across states.
“I went to New York in 1996 and I was producing my first album “My Experience” and it was Johnny Wonder now who grew up in the hip hop world, and he was the one managing me at the time and he knew I had the idea of wanting to collaborate.”
‘My Xperience’ released in 1996 on VP Records/TVT Records in Bounty’s most successful album with features from Wu-Tang rapper Reakwon, Busta Rhymes, The Fugees, Barrington Levy, Anthony Red Rose, Beenie Man, Dennis Brown, Ritchie Stephens and Jeru Damaja. The album has sold 154,000 units in the U.S. including 141,000 pure copies and 17 million on-demand streams as of November 6, 2023 according to data supplied to WMV by Luminate.
My Xperience peaked at No. 145 on the Billboard 200 albums chart and spent 6 months on the Billboard Reggae Billboard Reggae Albums chart, peaking at No. 1 for 16 weeks. It also climbed to No. 27 on the U.S. Billboard R&B/Hip Hop Albums Chart as well as No. 6 on the US Heatseekers chart.
Bounty explained that he never knew that Busta Rhymes was of Jamaican descent at the time, but he had heard his line “One Blood everybody like Junior Reid” from the song Woo Hah! from Rhymes debut album “The Coming”.
“All the man seh is ‘Junior Reid, so him a big we up so me rate him,” Bounty said. It was with that awareness that he went searching for Busta. “Johnny Wonder make the link and him find Busta Rhymes and we end up do the song with Busta Rhymes.” The song the did was “Change Like the Weather” produced by legendary hip hop producer Eric Sermon with Junior Reid.
Bounty Killer’s most popular song is “Hip Hopera” featuring The Fugees from the album. He said he was never charged for the feature as Wyclef and the other members of the group were excited to cut the track after he went in search of Lauryn Hill in New Jersey.
“Them time deh me never know bout Fugees the group, it was Lauryn because she come Inna the movie, Johnny Wonder a tell me bout her and seh we want to do a collaboration with she too. And I am willing to do all these collaborations because I am excited to get on the Hip Hop scene. So we go over Jersey to go look for Lauryn, then we buck up Wyclef and a him a them man weh run the reggae ting Inna the group. So him decide it have to be a Fugees song with all three members of the group. The man was so excited, they never even charge me to do that song,” he added. Confirming that VP Records could only afford to pay $40,000 and the money was used to pay for the studio session.
Hip Hopera was his first song to make it on the Billboard Hot 100, debuting at No. 81 the week of March 15, 1997. It is Bounty’s third highest career charting single and second highest as lead artist. The song remained on the Hot 100 for 5 weeks.
Bounty boasted that he is the only artist with Fugees as a featured artist, “I am the only artist who has the whole Fugees group on a song,” he said. However, he may be the only dancehall artist but the top selling group was featured on Cypress Hill’s 1996 song Boom Biddy Bye Bye.
Still he is one of dancehall’s most noted underground figures in the US and he is grateful for the people who helped to make it happen. “Big up to Wyclef, big up to Pras and big up to Lauryn Hill,” he said.
