Dancehall deejay Flourgon — born in the kinetic crucible of 1970s Jamaica — stamped his mark on Jamaican music in the 1980s and early ’90s.
“Greetings in the name of the Most High,” he said at the start of a recent interview with World Music Views. “Give thanks… to all my fans and all my musical friends around the world.”
Flourgon’s pioneering work, developed alongside producers like Steely & Clevie and Winston Riley, helped reshape the genre’s sonic architecture. Now, he finds himself reflecting on a career built largely on singles, with the release of only one album. “My career was mostly hustle,” he said. “All of my producers… they just want a one-off or a two-song… So my career was mostly hustle.”
Flourgon’s beginnings trace back to Red Hills Road in Kingston, a place where music and theatre developed in Jamaica. “It’s one big community… more like the uptown side, you know… but it’s a ghetto town,” he said. “My upbringing was very rough… but we have a lot of love.”
Raised in a Christian household by a “very hardworking” mother, he learned discipline early. Music, however, pulled him outward — into sound systems, street clashes, and eventually the emerging digital dancehall movement of the 1980s.
Competition, he recalls, was relentless.
“With the competition, it makes you put in more work,” he said. “Every deejay want kill me — musically.”
Among his most enduring contributions is the 1988 recording “We Run Things,” a track that would eventually bring him his highest payday. Yet its creation, he remembers, was uncertain — he did not like the track at first, until the producer and his friends encouraged him to leave it as it was.
“When I sing that song… me never like it,” he said. “But then it release and the first time me go Stone Love and hear it… me say, ‘wicked and ready.’”
Miley Cyrus later used elements of the song for her 2013 track “We Can’t Stop.” Flourgon said he first heard the song while in New York, and several lawyers initially turned him down, refusing to pursue the case. However, after further research in 2018, he found lawyers Stephen Drummond, Esq. and JoAnn Squillace, who filed a copyright lawsuit that same year against Miley Cyrus and RCA Records over similarities to his signature phrase.
The case was settled in 2020. While public speculation inflated the outcome, Flourgon told WMV that “it wasn’t life-changing money” that he received. “But… the first thing me buy is a house out of it… The house name is ‘We Run Things.’”
He pauses, then adds with quiet insistence: “We Run Things write pon the gate… that house there… it cannot sell.” He says his children have been instructed not to put the house up for sale under any circumstances.
As for the undisclosed settlement, he speaks with pride about taking on a major label and achieving some form of outcome. “To fight them people there is nothing easy,” he said, adding that he did not get everything he thought he deserved, but “I still have to give thanks.”
Miley’s We Can’t Stop was co-written by R. City’s Theron and Timothy from the U.S. Virgin Islands who Flourgon suspects were the ones who inspired the inclusion of his phrasing. The song has surpassed 1 billion streams on Spotify and the same on YouTube. It is certified 8x Platinum in the US for sales and streams surpassing 8 million units.
With all its success Flourgon says he knows that he was not fairly compensated although he accepted the settlement.
“Me feel like me nuh get justice, but me still haffi give thanks. Me nuh get justice so fair. But me still haffi give thanks. Me respect Miley fi use me song because there is so much song in the world, and them use my own.”
Clash, Legacy
In 1988, at the storied stage show Sting, Flourgon clashed with Ninjaman — a moment etched into dancehall lore. That same year, he stood on the brink of being crowned Deejay of the Year.
“I really want to win… that was the star on the crown,” he said. But a disqualification during the clash still lingers. “Until now it pained me,” as he reflected on the night he used a curse word onstage.
Still, the mythology of Flourgon has only grown. He speaks with pride of mentoring younger artists, including Buju Banton.
“Yeah man, I was his teacher,” he said. “I used to tell him to sing and introduce him to producers.”
A Career Without Albums — Until Now
Unlike many of his peers, Flourgon never built a catalog of albums, relying instead on singles — the currency of dancehall’s golden era.
“I never have nobody to really guide me,” he said. “If I would start this from before… I think I would be a greater artist.”
That omission, however, is now being corrected.
For the first time in his four-decade career, Flourgon is preparing a full-length project — an album he describes as both reflective and restorative.
“This album… is like a story,” he said. “When I play it… everything just come like a story.”
The project will blend reggae, love songs and gospel influences, the latter a tribute to his mother.
“My mother was a prayer warrior,” he said. “So I have to make sure I lay a good foundation.”
The working title: Enemies.
“It’s something that can bless people’s souls,” he added.
