Back in 2018, I authored a Throwback Thursday article about the Jamaican roots reggae group, Culture, where I reminisced about an experience that I had had during my college years while participating in a program called Semester at Sea. I had lived on a ship for about 100 days, taking classes and sailing around the world. Departing from Vancouver, Canada, the ship made stops in Japan, Taiwan, China, Malaysia, India, Kenya, South Africa, Brazil and Venezuela.

At the time, I had been a budding reggae fan, but that trip elevated my passion for the music due to several reasons. First, many of my fellow students aboard the ship came from California, where, even back then, reggae music was much more prominent than in my home state of New Jersey.  My shipmates exposed me to reggae artists and songs I had not heard yet at the time, usually through  mixed tapes that we traded.

Secondly, my worldwide travels enlightened me, to my surprise at the time, that reggae was loved in every corner of the earth. I found fellow fans in Asia, Africa, and South America. I encountered reggae music in Kobe, Japan and in Caracas, Venezuela. I sang Culture songs while walking down the street with a Rastaman in Capetown. I jammed to Alpha Blondy on a wharf in Salvador, Bahia. I ate chapatis and drank Kingfisher beer to the sounds of Steel Pulse on Kovalam Beach on the southern tip of India.

Therefore, I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when a reggae artist named Lion-I from a city named Shillong in India inquired about Rootfire premiering this music video. Then again, coming across reggae fans from far-flung places is not the same as connecting with reggae artists from obscure locations.  

 And where is this Shillong place anyway? As I mentioned, I’ve actually been to India. I know of the major cities, such as Bombay (Mumbai), Bangalore (Bengaluru), Hyderabad, Dehli, and Jaipur, but I had never heard of Shillong before. Curious, I looked it up and was amazed to find that it is located in a remote section of Northeastern India between Bhutan, Bangladesh and Myanmar that, quite frankly, I didn’t even know existed.

According to Isaac Kharbteng who goes by the name of “Lion-I” and was born and raised in Shillong, the city is tucked away in the hills of the state of Meghalaya, home to over 500,00 people of three major indigenous tribes of India, including the Khasi, the Jaintia and the Garo people. The area around the city is known for its beautiful natural scenery, landscape, and waterfalls, and their region is connected to mainland India by a thin strip of land that runs between Bhutan and Bangladesh called “The Chicken’s Neck.”

Culturally, Lion-I said that Shillong is quite progressive and they “have a big family, massive and kru, artists and Rastafari people practicing and living Rasta livity/spirituality and also promoting reggae music.”  Continuing, he told me that they have a “big” reggae community in India, with many artists and reggae bands, selectors, emcees and over four sound systems. “I should say Goa has a major reggae scene because that’s where the link up for all the reggae family from India and many other countries come together,” he specified.  “In fact, we have an annual reggae festival called Goa Sunsplash where many big names in the reggae scene have performed too, including Macka B, Anthony B and Queen Omega, just to name a few.”

In fact, Lion-I himself has performed at Goa Sunsplash. “It was nice to be able to perform at a massive reggae festival and connect with other artists like Queen Omega, General Levy and reggae artists from other nations,” he said.

Lion-I came from a family of musicians, including his grandfather, mom, aunts and uncles.  He started singing at a very early age at church and also at elementary school and started playing the guitar by the age of nine.

Reggae music came into his life via his mother and her friends. “They would listen and jam to Bob Marley, UB40, Inner Circle, just to name a few. I was a kid back then, and I started grooving right away. I was six years old when I was on stage dancing to ‘One Love’ during a Bob Marley tribute. I never stopped listening to reggae ever since, and I surely got my friends and relatives listening to reggae music and the message in the music.”

Lion-I naturally cites Bob Marley as his greatest influence but said, “Growing up as a Rasta youth wasn’t easy. It was hard to find someone who thinks and feels the same, and Bob surely understood what the upcoming generation was going through, the happenings in the world, the challenges humanity faces, the social injustice, and how much he advocated one love, peace, unity, respect for all regardless of race, creed, religion or color.”

It is these very ideals that Lion-I sings about in his inspirational song, “Make A Difference,” the video for which we premiere today on Rootfire.  The enjoyable, upbeat tune came about when the artist was asked by Bluejay Hankins, the founder of Okanogan County, Washington-based Sick Donkey Records, to sing over a riddim produced by the label in conjunction with a Jamaican reggae outfit called Dubtronic Kru.

Lion-I sings:

Come together, we can make it work

Nurture nature and protect Mama Earth

We gotta heal the people and change the world

Our humanity is dying, we got to rebirth

Teach the children how to love

No more hatred, no more wars

Give them a lift. something’s got to give

Life is the greatest gift of all

The video was shot and directed by Dolrichjoy Nongbri in the backwoods of Shillong as well as in different locations around the city. We see Lion-I walking and singing through a heavily wooded forest amidst towering trees interspersed with shots of young people playing basketball and posing for the camera and holding signs that say“One Love,” “One World,” and “One People.”  According to Lion-I, “The people you see in the video are the youths we know and met in different parts of the city, whom we approach to help spread the message.”

With a Rasta singer from Northeastern India, a production crew from Jamaica and a label from the Pacific Northwest of the United States, this entire work further demonstrates that reggae has cultivated a global community.