Toppa Top 9: Kardinal Offishall on the Greatest Jamaican MCs

Words by Kardinal Offishall, as told to Jesse Serwer—

With Jamaica 50 on the horizon and our Trini rappers Toppa Top 10 still stirring debate, we’ve been thinking about how best to large up Jamaica’s great MCs. Rather than just share our own rankings this time, we polled one of those greats, Kardinal Offishall, for his views on the matter while we had him on the line the other day. In no particular order after the first two, here’s hip-hop’s greatest yardies according to Kardi. Read on below, and stay tuned for an extended Top 10  of “honorebel” mentions and MCs you never knew were Jamaican. Soon come.

1. Heavy D

Heavy D would be my number one, rest in peace. Living Large would be the first or second album I actually bought. Heavy D’s whole existence was a huge influence on my career. When I was working with Dave Kelly, he’d tell me stories of back in the day when Heavy would do all the dancehall stuff and conversations they’d have, working with everybody from Buju to Super Cat. Heavy was one of the greats, but aside from that he was a great person. His legacy is untouchable. Above everybody, I respect him the most because he did it with positivity and his whole rep, everything, is clean from top to bottom. That to me is way bigger than anybody that sold 10 million albums. Even though in 2012, there’s only a portion of people who understand how important and influential Heavy D’s career was.

That was a tough one because me and Heavy just started becoming close, as he passed. We had met once or twice over the years before but we had actually started to become bredren. The last text I have in my phone from Heavy is one saying, “Kardi, I want to executive produce your album.” And I was like,”cool just link up and see wahgwaan.” That was a couple weeks before he passed.

2. The Notorious B.I.G.

Biggie would be number two. He is someone I would have loved to work with because I feel like, if I would of had the chance to work with Biggie, I would have brought the yaad out in him. That would have been my mission. The same way when I did the “Ol’ Time Killin” remix with Busta Rhymes. That’s what I would have tried to bring out in Biggie.

3.Busta Rhymes

Busta is Busta—you don’t even have to really go into it.

4. Slick Rick

Slick Rick! From the Bally shoes to the gold chains to the Kangol, the whole nine yards. When I first came out with my first major release, people compared me to Slick Rick only because I used to wear the furry Kangols and gold chains all the time. “La-Di-Da-Di” might have been the first song I really knew all the words to, from top to bottom. I knew he was from London but I didn’t even know he was a yardie ’til much later. Slick Rick, to this day, is one of those people who can carry himself with finesse and class and wear a suit in the grimiest of all grimy places. I respect that—that’s a real Jamaican thing. While hip-hop was trying to be grimy, dancehall artists wore the flashiest of clothes. I rate Slick Rick for his lyrics and his style and all of that, but I also rate Slick Rick for repping the culture. Even though he wasn’t overt with it, we all knew what it was.

5. Special Ed

Special Ed for sure—he was monumental when he came out. That whole [Youngest in Charge] album, I literally scratched that album on the turntables into the ground until I had to buy another one.

6. Chubb Rock

I love Chubb rock, the one album was maddd—big up to Chubb Rock.

7. Just-Ice

I didn’t know Just-Ice was Jamaican but if his people are from Jamaica, that’s what it is. It’s like what Bounty said to me the first time I performed in Jamaica, we did Delano’s Revenge in Kingston, he said, “the man is of Jamaican parentage so we own a percentage.” That might be where KRS got a lot of his [Jamaican style] from, because those him and Just-Ice were bredrins, they used to par heavy in those times.

8. Pete Rock

Pete Rock other than being a producer, he was an MC as well—He’s up there.

9. Kardinal Offishall

[Editor’s Note: Kardinal did not list himself as one of the great Jamaican MCs for the purposes of this article, but we took the liberty of using some of his commentary from yesterday’s “Heds and Dreds” interview to illustrate his qualifications].
In terms of hip-hop, anybody that has had any longevity has not been a one-dimensional MC. Nobody… And that’s kind of where I’ve always been…In terms of the dancehall rude boy thing, that’s just me, who I am as a person. I have been blessed with the opportunity to live in whatever world that I feel at the time. Everyday is not a Jordans-and-T-shirt day, you know? Sometimes, if I’m in a crazy, remote, international location, you might feel you’re fly like Slick Rick, and throw on your suits, and your gold chain and your Ballys or Clarks… For me, music definitely reflects life, and I am blessed to be able to live in a lot of different worlds, and do it well. When I first linked Akon, he told me like that’s the reason I am drawn to you—because you can murder anything. It doesn’t matter whether you’re on a Lady Gaga remix, or rocking with Spragga Benz. That’s been a blessing to me.

Honorebel Mention

Do Grand Puba and KRS get the honorary Jamaican status? Although Grand Puba to my knowledge wasn’t Jamaican he also was a person who brought in that style. You know there are people who were not Jamaican but definitely big upped the Jamaican culture more than a lot of Jamaicans themselves. Phife from Tribe Called Quest—he always repped the culture. There’s a lot MC’s that rep the culture but aren’t West Indians. I didn’t even know but I think LL Cool J’s grandmother is from Barbados. There’s a lot of those in there.