A favourite of Jamaican news-sites - especially the Jamaica Star - and Dancehall blogs, the controversial deejay has rarely spend a moment out of the spotlight in the past twelve months, although she has featured even more prominently since the start of 2010 following her dismissal from Vybz Kartel’s Portmore Empire crew shortly after Sting last year. Due to her outrageous personal opinions and thirst for “lyrical war” she is certainly a hot topic to say the least and despite what her critics repeatedly claim she doesn’t appear to be going anywhere anytime soon.
When talking to her the internal conflict between Lisa Hyper and Felecia Gooden becomes immediately clear; whilst some questions are clearly answered by the loud, outspoken and at times rather “boasy” stage persona, as the interview progresses an at times giggly Felecia does surface to put in her own two cents too. Many seem to forget with her larger than life personality, ever-controversial image and flamboyant outfits that she is after all just a 21-year-old girl, who seems to genuinely have an incredible passion for what she does.
Rise to Recognition
After achieving her “big buss” in early 2009 with the success of the Kartel-assisted collaboration ‘Come Whine fi Me’ – thanks largely in part to the use of raunchy, semi-nude promotional images for the track – Lisa Hyper started to gain recognition in the Dancehall world. Looking at her singles, such as ‘Man Short,’ ‘Bill,’ ‘Stop Chat’ and ‘Champion Bubbler’ and her presence within the scene, it would be unfair to deny that she has come a long way in just one short year. In credit to her, many would have probably looked at being dismissed from the Empire as a huge career hurdle but she seems to have taken it all in her stride regardless of her critics, who admittedly are many.
As with many controversial deejays, Lisa Hyper is certainly not free of criticism or negative press, especially due to her raunchy image – not helped by the leak of the infamous ‘x-rated’ photo last November – and her views on bleaching. Whether or not you are in the public eye, all that bad attention has to be a lot for a young woman to handle? Au contraire according to Lisa, who merely giggles before responding, “I don’t make it affect me. What you need to do is just stay far from the negative things when certain things happen and stay on positive things, stay around things that make you happy.” She then adds pragmatically, “it can’t be a bad thing because everything sells; bad controversy, good controversy, everything sells.”
No Regrets: Embracing Controversy
Does she have any regrets about her image, her so-called ‘conduct’ or any of the singles she made during her stint pon di Gaza? She just adds honestly “no, no, no I don’t regret anything.” Not even her comments about bleaching, which has long been associated with Colonial undertones and assumptions of negative self-image.
“Well it doesn’t really matter to me, everybody have their free will to do what they want to do and I did the song for fun,” she explains bluntly. “I do it and you have a whole heap of people do it. Some hide it, some don’t hide it but I choose not to hide it.” She then adds, “They say bleaching gives you skin cancer but a lot of people smoke and smoking gives you lung cancer also. So you need to stop listening to what people do and live your own life.”
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The Importance of Independence
When asked about whether she feels that this is a more important message to convey to young women, she actually launches into an admittedly rather unexpected monologue about the subject. “When you’re independent and have your own things and don’t have to depend on anybody, you have a higher sense of esteem and once you have your own things and you don’t have to depend on nobody then you don’t really have a care in the world but fi make that money and take care of your family and take care of people you love,” she explains passionately.
“So certain things that would bother you when you are not independent won’t bother you and as I said, you’re going to have a high-self esteem and you’re going to be more confident in yourself. I think the most important thing, love yourself, high self-esteem, confidence you know?”
Too Real To Be Hype?
Whilst that is without a doubt the logic of a carefree 21-year-old, she actually makes a valid point about the necessity to just be yourself, which perhaps in a different context would be a rather positive message and would probably be taken in a slightly better light. “I want people to love me for me; I don’t need to be a pretender,” she explains. “I chose to tell the truth, you understand? I just want people to love me for me and that’s why the people love me because them just get the realness of Lisa Hyper.”
This strong, confident and independent attitude often comes across in her less clash-centric material, especially singles like the Gaza Kim collaboration ‘Bill’ and ‘Man Short.’ Unsurprisingly, she does not blame Dancehall lyrics for the degradation of women, rather considering it more a means of expressing these qualities, simply stating, “Dancehall is not degrading, people who don’t like Dancehall would say that about Dancehall.”
In fact, despite the criticism that seems to follow her every move, Lisa Hyper seems to be not only embracing but using the very controversy that has plagued her career to help advance it. Whether or not you agree with the messages she seems to advocate, it must be said that she is arguably the strongest voice for young women within the Dancehall scene; after all in a community where women are often seen as passive and secondary to their male counterparts, surely the self-assured and outspoken presence of Lisa Hyper is long overdue.
Original Interview by Hannah O'Connor
Hannah O'Connor - With several years of experience, gaining a reputation as one of the hardest working and more creative young writers in hip hop ...
