By Nicholas Jason Lopez
Hailed as a true Rastaman that fights for peace and love with his music, Hosny Bronx has been regarded by many to be the “New Power Of International Reggae Music” and is an artist of international fame.
Bronx’s first album ‘Radical Fighters,’ released via Media7/Label Jahmin Records, reached the top of France and England’s reggae charts and featured musicians from The Wailers. He released two albums afterwards, ‘Unité Universelle’ and ‘Rasta Rebel.’
He has already performed in many concerts and festivals around France, Europe and Africa. Songs from his latest release, 2018’s ‘New Moment,’ have received worldwide airplay from more than 3,000 radio stations around the United States, South America, Jamaica, Europe and Asia. A man who wears many hats, the singer, composer and author handled all instruments, lead and backing vocals, arrangements and production on ‘New Moment.’ It was mixed and mastered between Kingston, Jamaica, New York City (The Mastering Palace), London and Paris.
The Music Bugle recently had the opportunity to talk to Bronx about his music, future plans and more.
Music Bugle – What is the impact of reggae music to you?
Hosny Bronx – The impact of reggae music today in this world is still strong, because reggae doesn’t exist only in summer. Reggae is not just a party music just to dance, smoke joints and feel high. It’s also a fight music. It exists in winter, summer, all the time, the whole year and until the end of time, every second, every minute, but there are people who use reggae music and divert it to their advantage when they are not Rasta and ridicule our music by having found a good nugget. They see it only as “fun,” but they are wrong because the people return to the sources of music, to the roots. The reggae they know no longer resembles the one that led them to the pure roots in which they bathed. Even if there is festive music, reggae is mostly a fight music – a music of Rasta Tradition. It’s a music of interior construction, of advancement for oneself and for humanity. It’s a Rastaman music – a music to save all people from themselves. It’s a music that allows to give mental strength, which strengthens human intelligence and brings purity in itself to fight the suffering of people in this world and the incomprehension that comes from Babylon system. That’s what reggae music is. It has an impact in the world. Unfortunately today, reggae is held by many people who work at Babylon system. It’s held by these people who use it to enrich themselves on the backs of the True Rastas and the Rastas are always poorly paid in the concerts and for the albums they create for the peoples of Jah. There are also the real authentic Rastas who are ordinary people who are not necessarily in music, but who are just as important in the cycle of life. Today, even if there are real Rastas in reggae music, many are not only in music, they are in other places, They do other things, but even them I’m sure today are also disappointed by the Rastafari movement in the world that no longer represents them, you know what I mean? It’s become a strange place for some people and it’s become a bit of a mess. I hope that with the grace of Jah, everything becomes readable for everyone.
Music Bugle – Could you describe the process of putting together your album ‘New Moment’?
Hosny Bronx – The editing process for ‘New Moment’ was a long one. I had to work hard, very hard. I did everything on my own. I wrote everything and played all the instruments. It was a difficult challenge to overcome and I set everything up. I’m lead vocals and I also do all the backing vocals on my voice. I admit that it’s a long work of creation and composition, then I go to the studio to record the track little-by-little, because I have no financial means to complete an album entirely. I produce everything myself. I also manage the promotion with my team and I handle everything. You can imagine all the work I do from morning ’til evening.
Music Bugle – What do you feel is your most meaningful song/set of lyrics?
Hosny Bronx – All my songs have a meaning, not one more than the other. Sincerely, they all have something to say, one as much as the other. It’s true that there are tracks that are really significant, like “Free Child,” “Lost in the Memories,” “Earth and Us” or “New Moment,” some of the flagship tracks of my album. I confess some have important meanings for me in my music. They represent my life, what I feel in this world, how I see things, how the world has become hard with us people who suffer in this world. It takes someone who also suffers to say it, who feels this injustice stuck to our skin, this way of treating us and believing that we will lower our heads like most of our elders, but fortunately for us, many elders did not accept the situation they lived in the 1960s. We have evolved, but are experiencing the same thing: rejection, contempt, hatred, disregard for our human rights. Babylon does not want our evolution because they make believe and make us believe that we are like that and that we must accept what they want to impose on us, their ideas that make our people regress and they have succeeded in convincing many of our fellow, but we will not accept their blocked ideas that they pass from father to son and from mother to daughter through time, the idea of making millions of people believe that they are more important than we are. It’s crazy actually – these people end up thinking it and believing it. This is the poison that disturbs the minds of all and ends up being a big misunderstanding on this Earth and my music is there to bring together all these people. We want to be and live together and not live apart. We must love and accept each other as human beings. Some of these men come from this old world and are for the most part, old people who do everything to broaden ideas from the past and try to pass this idea on to the young people of our time without knowing the impact it will create for the future. The misfortune of millions of families is unacceptable. Their thoughts have no place in today’s world. These people are hurting humanity by behaving this way and preventing people from living their lives. Everyone has the right to go where they want on this Earth. The Earth belongs to the human race, not to people who believe that everything belongs to them. Moreover, it is consciously wanted because they were raised like this to devalue our people. I hope that God will open their hearts and show them the true path of redemption.
Music Bugle – Where is your favorite place to play?
Hosny Bronx – I like to compose and create my music at home, but my favorite place to play my music is the studio. I love to be in the studio because I record my tracks. It’s concrete. The studio is the place I prefer and where I feel the best in music. That’s my favorite part.
Music Bugle – What are your future plans?
Hosny Bronx – For the moment, I’m working on my new album and I will soon record the first track in studio, which will be in previewed on my site. At the same time, I continue the promotion of my album ‘New Moment’ with my team. We are much solicited by the print press, radio and I’m in talks for an international tour. I also work on various projects and it would be good for me if a record company or a big producer came to produce me. With a serious business, it would help me a lot and it would do me a lot of good.
Music Bugle – Who would you call your biggest musical influences?
Hosny Bronx – My greatest musical influences come from my childhood in the ghetto. All the American Black music, funk, soul, hip-hop, R&B, jazz, blues, but also of course and especially, the pure Jamaican roots reggae music.
Music Bugle – When would you say was the exact moment that made you want to become a musician?
Hosny Bronx – It was during my childhood that I began to want to become a musician and singer. In the ghetto, there’s nothing to do. Everything is done to keep you out of everything. We’re rejected by everybody because we grew up different from everybody else. We were listening to a lot of good sounds in the ghetto. Music had become essentially a mother figure who comforted us with our hard and miserable lives. It really made me want to become a musician. I listened to and watched with the greats of my ghetto, the Rastamens, all the videos of Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and various artists for whole nights, only good sounds, sounds that made us crazy. That’s how my desire came. I started to play bass and guitar here and there that belonged to some friends. One day, I got my first bass, then my guitar, then drums, a keyboard, all different instruments and that’s how I started. When I was little, I watched a lot of video shows, great Jamaican, American artists. It really made me want to play and especially sing and to do this in my life because I had no life or future in the ghetto and so music changed me and saved me.
Music Bugle – What do you feel you haven’t accomplished yet?
Hosny Bronx – There are a lot of things I haven’t accomplished – saving my family and saving a lot of people in this world with my music, but unfortunately, that’s not the case right now. I didn’t build orphanages, hospitals or schools. I didn’t help kids and their parents rebuild their destroyed homes because I’m not rich. I really wish I could accomplish this and help a lot of people on this Earth. I’m frustrated I can’t help my family already, so I don’t see how I can help others. My music helps me mentally. I will save others if I can. I’m very disappointed that I didn’t do all this, that I couldn’t build all this on this Earth. It’s more than frustrating not to be able to accomplish all this and to see all this suffering and if I suffer because I come from the ghetto, there is always a greater suffering than the other. This pain that I see on Earth is beyond comprehension. It hurts me so much. It doesn’t do me any good inside myself. It hurts me and it doesn’t rise the human race. I’m very disappointed that I didn’t do that, but I hope one day, my music will really help me build this. It’s very important for me to renovate orphanages with my money, to help families who can’t go on vacation, to send them to a lot of places in the world because the poor only see the world on television and of course, to help a lot of people in the ghettos, to do a lot of things for them, for people everywhere, that’s my goal.
Music Bugle – For you, what are some differences between recording in a studio and playing onstage?
Hosny Bronx – There’s a big difference between playing on stage and playing in the studio. Even in principle, both are live. On stage, it’s another vibe. Playing in front of people and it is tasty to give a superb vibe to people who want to feel the force of Jah. Playing his music on stage is intoxicating with love between people and the artist and you have no right to make a mistake, whereas in the studio, you can play again if you’re wrong. You can come back to an idea. We record we rerecord. You’re with your team, with your engineer. It’s cool and different. On stage, it’s different. It’s really necessary to work and repeat before arriving on stage to be at the top, to be strong. Today, the audience is ruthless, so it’s better to work well before going there. I strongly advise it.
Music Bugle – What’s the most frustrating thing about today’s music industry and can it be fixed?
Hosny Bronx – The most frustrating thing about the current music industry is that it refers to the Internet, which is something that really exceeds me, because it refers to the number of views of a clip or a guy who plays on Youtube, arrives overnight, makes a sound and it has five million views, so that’s it. It’s good and we take it, but where is his artistic background? What did he do before? It’s like you’re gonna take a guy who’s made a sculpture and wants to look like a good sculptor, when you don’t even know if he’s good. A real sculptor takes years and years to become a good sculptor. It’s like a good painter. It’s the same thing in music. You can’t take a guy who comes in and makes a buzz on the internet. You have to say no. An artist builds his work. It perfects. He has to have an artistic knowledge. He has to be strong. He has to make a crazy sound. Sometimes, there are good artists who come in, it’s true, but they choose a former known artist to judge a work that is born. It’s not possible to be in this system that is ruthless for real artists. Music is not a handkerchief that you throw away when you use it and it’s the same system that record companies use today. Previously, the profession was more human and that’s too bad because the record companies used this to enslave all the singers, to impose on them the way they want to work them and not that of the artists. This is what is really distressing in record companies. They no longer understand anything. They are overwhelmed because everyone thinks they are a singer. They are no longer related to artistic reality and the artistic part is important for emotion. They are related to financial services. That’s what is unfortunate. Today, we will first look for the financial curves for the artist. This is a shock, a brutal exit from the world where he is. Understanding this has become difficult. If the artist doesn’t earn a lot of money, he is rejected as if he were a company, while the artist is sensitive, fragile and he needs to be surrounded. He needs a sensitivity as external as his own. That’s what being an artist is, so if record companies don’t have that artistic side and that sensitive side, even though it’s 2020, all the people who are in record companies need to understand that they can’t go on like this. I think that by signing artists with the thoughts of their childhood, their names can remain in the legend of the disk. That is what should be remembered. It’s more important and I’m not talking about me. I’m talking about any artist on this Earth who can bring something very big to the record company, not just fame, but also the financial side. It can make a lot of money for the record company and have a human discourse with it, but it’s also necessary to understand the system in which we live today. This system destroys artists more than it builds them.
