Indies Girl
Words: Julein Swistz Barbadian singer Shontelle proves there’s more to the music of the Caribbean than dancehall With her Hollywood looks and New Yorkstyle lyrics, you’d be forgiven for thinking that 23-year-old R&B singer-songwriter, Shontelle Layne is American. She is managed by the New York-based production duo, Carl Sturken and Evan Rogers – who have [...]
Words: Julein Swistz
Barbadian singer Shontelle proves there’s more to the music of the Caribbean than dancehall
With her Hollywood looks and New Yorkstyle lyrics, you’d be forgiven for thinking that 23-year-old R&B singer-songwriter, Shontelle Layne is American. She is managed by the New York-based production duo, Carl Sturken and Evan Rogers – who have also worked with her countrywoman Rihanna, as well as Christina Aguilera and N’Sync – and much of her debut album, Shontelligence, was recorded in the US. Yet this Barbados native says that she is one of the many Caribbean recording artists unwilling to restrict themselves to local musical genres.“We grew up with cable TV and the internet,” she explains in
her Bridgetown-meets-Brooklyn lilt, “so we’ve got more international style. You get influenced by other cultures, and sort of absorb it. Caribbean music and fashion all blossomed around 2000.”
Though she first found fame writing the 2005 hit, Roll It Gal, for the Barbadian ‘Soca Queen’ Alison Hinds, Shontelle says she saw this as the means to an end: “If you wanted to gain attention [in Barbados], you had to go write soca.”
However, Shontelle’s most recent hit, T-Shirt, owes more to the soulful licks of Mariah or Mary J Blige, than the choppier styles of calypso or reggae. Her hip-hop influenced composition, Battle Cry, appeared on Barack Obama’s campaign compilation album. Alongside Rihanna, Shontelle is proving that singers from the Antilles no longer need to sound like an aural postcard, and can draw from influences beyond their region.
