LU: What’s the plan as it concerns new music? Is there an album in the works?
JR: We drop two mixtape deliberately to kind of introduce the works. You know, like a little flavour you know, what’s happening, what we are doing. We just wanted to give the people a taste, little by little. You don’t really want to overdose them but right now them kind of ready for the album. So we in the studio working and we probably have about four albums already. Everyday is another song. So what happen, as I say, we reach to a stage where we just fine tuning and putting together the pieces of the puzzles that we think should be this first chapter in I an I life.
LU: Do you stick to a particular routine as preparation for music creation?
JR: In our off days and on days we rise with the prayer man and a scriptures or three to kind of get in that right zone. We find a little secret too, meditating in the shower is a great thing, I realize, that makes your mind clear. Even just to feel the water, because a lot of people bathe but don’t really feel the water. Like a man go in the sun and him just say it hot him [but] don’t really feel the energy. Some people in the rain and say them getting wet but don’t really feel the rain. So I realize I have a little timeframe and it might slow me up and sometimes it make me late for where I’m going, but I say in the shower you feel the water and it make your brain feel the water and your mind is kinda clear and you give thanks.
LU: Is there someone you look up to in the music industry for mentorship?
JR: Uncle Fattis, the great Fattis Burrell, was one of the greatest influences on me. Cause him never yet late, him early. Him definitely was the one who taught me a lot about direction, selection of words and where you aim. And then you have man like Uncle Stephen, Stephen Marley. You have man like Junior Gong, who is a mentor. You have man like Uncle Chinna [Earl “Chinna” Smith], who for me isn’t just a musical mentor he is a life guru or life czar because he’s a man with so much wisdom. Even my friends and everything inspires me, but those specific people, musically, is who I go to.
LU: Thich Nhat Hanh once said, “Our own life has to be our message”. What would you say is Jesse Royal’s message?
JR: Compassion, equality, caring, sharing, love; sometimes tough and sometimes soft. But that is my life and we live clean, let your works be seen, as Peter Tosh says. The music I sing, the food I cook, the love I make, the breath that I take, everything that I do circle around that. Is not like I sing the music, and then I going to try to be something else. No, the music comes from the heart so that means that we have to get our structure in line first. So those things are key to me, man. That’s the core of everything which is you. How you living on the earth and how you deal with people, how you handle situations, what you say when you say it, what you do when you do it. All of those things is just what we have to take heed to, and his majesty is our example. And we know that we are royalty so we have to act that way. But is not a royalty with no robe and anything. Royalty means we eat the freshest of fruits, we show the most love. We richer than even money itself. I hope I answered your question.
