Dancehall star now dazzles

NEW YORK -- Dancehall star Sean Paul looks almost taken aback by the shiny new piece of jewelry around his neck.

His initials, dangling from a long diamond-studded chain, are encrusted with enough of the sparkling stones to make any member of the urban music bling-bling brigade happy. But Paul seems more curious than ecstatic over his first gemstone acquisition -- and somewhat surprised by its heft.

"I don't really have any emotional significance to jewelry," the 30-year-old Jamaican-born Sean Paul Henriques said. "It's good for shows. . . . I've reached a stage where I can do it."

That he has. Paul is being hailed as a crossover sensation, the man who will introduce U.S. audiences to the Jamaican musical style known as dancehall reggae.

"Get Busy" is the No. 3 single on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and his sophomore album, "Dutty Rock," released last November on the Atlantic label, has gone platinum, with the help of the first single, "Gimme the Light."

He's become a popular hip-hop and R&B collaborator, working with artists such as Busta Rhymes, Jay-Z, the Neptunes and Blu Cantrell.

Paul started his musical career in the late 1990s in his native Jamaica, where he still lives. He began with more overtly socially conscious rhymes. Paul made the transition to the lady-friendly party music he's now doing when it became clear that's what audiences wanted.

"Where my career needed to go forward instead of slowing down, I just saw that and said, 'OK, I need to work on this girl stuff for a while.' But I do have stuff to say and it will come out," he said.

1: How is dancehall different from traditional reggae?

Paul: It's more upbeat. It's definitely more of a club music, however, the same language, the same kind of protest music. It encompasses not only what reggae is, but also what hip-hop is, so it's in between.

2: Do you feel any pressure to be successful?

Paul: There's never pressure on me because I'm just doing this day by day. So when people didn't notice me, I knew what I was doing, and when people noticed me, I still know what I'm doing. So they put no pressure on me, because I know what I'm doing to get this work done and be out there.

3: Will you bridge out to other styles?

Paul: I will definitely on my albums be remaining strictly dancehall because that's the music I do, that's the music Sean Paul does. But when I do cameos like with Blu Cantrell, that song's not dancehall, it's R&B hip-hop style.

4: What would you be doing if you weren't doing this?

Paul: I don't know. I took my whole after-school years just like day by day. When I was in school (in Jamaica) doing hotel management, I wasn't like, 'Oh, I can see myself doing this or doing that.' I really don't know. In a couple of years I want to still be in the music business; I'll start to produce.

5: You've been successful for several years. Why wait until now to buy a fancy jewelry piece?

Paul: This bling now is just like a status. I sold 500,000, I feel good about that, I'm more secure in that vibe so I've done it.

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