Damage hits World Billboard charts

Montego Bay-based producer Dwayne Parkinson, more popularly known as Damage, is beating a drum for more Jamaican musicians to broaden their horizon and collaborate with foreign acts in a bid to build on the mainstream attention that the Jamaican cultural form is getting.

Damage, CEO of Damage Musiq, produced a song titled Mama Stories on Shatta Wale's album, Reign, which debuted at No. 6 on the Billboard world chart.

"Shatta Wale is a dancehall artiste, and we made a connection from Jamaica to Africa, and he flew to Jamaica, and we did some work in the studio. And to see it and create this history, it is really amazing," Damage told The STAR.

"He (Shatta Wale) premiered it on Mother's Day for a prominent politician, who is his mother, and the song just blew up from there, and the rest was history. He called me and told me that the song was number one in Ghana and he was gonna make sure that the song was on the album and he is going to come back to Jamaica for us to do more work," he added.

Damage said that working with overseas acts who are eager to do dancehall and reggae will help the music.

"It is important that we work with them because they are tapping into our culture and we can make the culture mainstream by connecting internationally," said Damage, who has worked with entertainers such as Tommy Lee, Masicka and Shane.

Damage hopes to work with the likes of Rihanna, Vybz Kartel and Damian Marley in the future.