Quotes from Shaggy

I like that raw energy that I get from an audience.

India is a great place.

The biggest thing I take away from the Army is that work ethic and being able to focus and put your eyes on a goal.

I'm inspired by day to day life, things that people go through, things that make people tick. Everybody has a story, so you try to put stories into songs and try to make it as entertaining as possible.

You got to understand: when you go into a record company and give them a something that doesn't sound like what's on the radio, it's hard to sell it.

When magic happens, it just happens, brother.

The thing about Shaggy's records are those records are very timeless.

I'm no stranger to making timeless music.

I cleaned many a toilet.

After I made 'Oh Carolina' in the 1990s, the record company wanted me to copy that sound, and I refused.

Reggae is a culture. It's easy, laid-back.

I'm one of those artists that nobody ever sees coming. We started with Virgin in 1993. If you look at the climate of that time in reggae and you were to pick the top five people that'd have a shot at having mainstream success, I was nowhere in that equation at all.

I've seen the harshest of reggae purists come give me my props because I've been at it for so long... They've seen me come from the hardest of hard-core dancehall to where I am, and they've heard my music change through the years. Some might not agree, but they respect.

The reggae fraternity is a small fraternity.

If you listen to all my earlier stuff, it wasn't 'authentic reggae,' so to speak.

I have mixed feelings about Napster. I like what it can do for an unsigned band. It can help them sell 10,000 records. But for an established artist, there's already so much piracy around. They need to regulate it.

The greatest thing about me is I have always been able to reinvent. We have done that about three or four times with my sound.

You've always got to try and reinvent yourself.

I like having big hooks and big records and sing-a-longs.

I have a festival called Shaggy and Friends, which is a charity event to raise funds for a hospital.

When I was doing 'Hot Shot,' I didn't even have an album deal.

We're fortunate to have had success, not just in America but worldwide.

If you look at my track record, there was nothing on radio that sounded like 'Oh Carolina,' 'Mr Bombastic' when they came out.

I've never been one that really won with major-name collaborators. You take, for instance, 'Angel' with Rayvon. 'It Wasn't Me' was with Rikrok. Nobody knew who those guys were.