Pursuit Magazine
Winter 2002
BY MICHAEL DOJC

It looks like today’s going to be another lucky day without doubt, Mr. Boombastic is happy to be on the flipside of an annoying case of food poisoning; better yet, he was fortunate enough to cop some quality zzzs last night {and this morning, too}—a luxury that his packed itinerary, which is tighter than hot pants painted on Christina Aguilera, only rarely allows. And now, sunglasses in hand, the 34-year-old Jamaican-born, Brooklyn-bred singer who, in another lifetime, used to be known as Orville Richard Burrell, is ready to rasta’n’roll.

“Mike what’s up, what’s the dilly?” he greets me, characteristically chipper. The cheer’s due partly to getting that much-needed sleep and partly due to a massively success of a sold out show in Toronto which bodes well for the new album, too.

“Hopefully we’ll get a lot of sales and I can get the record company off my back.” With 2000’s Hotshot selling like Krispy Kremes on a cops night out on the strength of cross-format radio gold “Angel” and “It wasn’t me,” Shaggy’s going to need plenty of providence to equal or top that kind of success, and get the label monkey out of his newly floofed up fro.

A decade in the dancehall ready reggae game, Shaggy is confident his luck will win out. He felt similar performance anxiety after being dropped by Virgin records following 1997’s hitless Midnite Lover. Save today, when his trademark gravelly growl is sounding more groggy than sexy, Shaggy gets lucky quite often.

Though Shaggy is quick to deny any attempt at a double entendre in the new album’s title (as in listen and you’ll get it on), at least on a subconscious level, Shaggy definitely had his own sexual proficiency in mind when picking out the name.

“I didn’t call the album Lucky Day in the sense that you got to get ‘lucky’” he explains. “The album is entitled Lucky Day because of the title track which basically says, they don’t call me Mr. Lovah because I like ice cream/ I’m Mr. Lover because I fulfill dreams/ When last your man made you moan and scream/It’s your lucky day,” Shaggy freestyles.

“It’s a cocky assed statement to comeback with after selling 10 million records,” he admits.

Smug, yes, but refreshingly minus the chauvinist sloganeering we’ve come to expect from the Shagmeister who is often accused of sexism in his lyrics, most notoriously for encouraging men to be lying, cheating scum on “It wasn’t me”. There are plenty of female empowerment raps on this record like “Strength of a Woman” where Shaggy ruminates about whether God is a woman, and “Full Control” where he gives love to “sophisticated” and “independent” women.

“Lucky Day is pro-woman, it is definitely about women and the effect that they’ve had on my life and on my career and the fact that they should be celebrated because frankly what’s there not to celebrate?”

Could there be a feminist side to the man who once sang about the joys of “creeping with the girl next door,” and “banging on the bathroom floor?”

“I’m a very macho individual, but I’m in touch with my [feminine side] as far as understanding what women go through. I put myself in their shoes as much as I can because I think we all need to do that to be better people.”

It’s hard to imagine Shaggy as a one-woman kind of guy but that’s the story he’s sticking to lately.

“I’m with one woman right now. What are you trying to say?” says Shaggy, striking a defensive tone when I pose the question, before lightening the mood on a dime by joking, “just one at a time,” and cracking up into a series of baritone heh heh heh’s. It’s this outrageous sense of humor that Shaggy says is his biggest draw with women

“Chicks find me funny. Some say it’s the voice, but I just think that it’s because I’m bluntly honest,” says Shaggy who is more guarded about his actual relationships than you would figure judging by the player persona he co-opts on television.

“I’m a family man, I got two kids that I love very much. My two boys are my world. I try very hard to spend as much time with them as I can,” Shaggy does offer.

And Shaggy reveals that in his relationships with women he’s a very attentive lover. “I’m Mr. touchy feely, I like to hug, I like to cuddle and you know I give a woman a lot of attention, that’s why my woman loves me so much.”

Romance is also always on the Shaggy ‘do list’. “I go from doing surprise birthday parties to buying flowers and jewelry, and horse and buggy rides. I do all kinds of shit,” he says.