Maxi Priest

Maxi Priest was born in the London borough of Lewisham and named Max Elliott. Maxi Priest songs, like Loving You Is Easy, become very popular and trendy online with a great number of streaming and downloads on Boomplay.

One of ten children, he wasn't always involved in music. In fact, it was his work as a carpenter that led him to his musical destiny. In the early eighties, he was hired on to build speaker boxes for a local reggae sound system, Saxon. This association led to Priest occasionally taking over the microphone during live dancehall sessions.

His musical future was confirmed in 1984, when he and Paul " Barry Boom" Robinson produced "Mi God Mi King." Sung by Philip Levi, the track was groundbreaking in that it was the first UK reggae song to hit number one in Jamaica. Encouraged by this success, Priest went on to form a band of his own, Caution.

Career
He collaborated with Robinson, who helped produce Priest's first album You're Safe. Produced on the Virgin subsidiary label, Ten, the traditional reggae album yielded three popular singles. The next year, Priest followed up with an album called Intentions, which was a more commercially appealing set of songs. With this album, Maxi finally broke through on the UK charts, as his cover of Van Morrison's "Crazy Love" made an appearance there.

But international fame would come the following year, when Priest released his self-titled album. Reggae fans were enamored with the socially aware and reggae-spun tracks like "Marcus" and "How Can We Ease the Pain." But he also drew a mainstream audience with covers of "Some Guys Have All the Luck" and the Cat Stevens' classic "Wild World." Though Priest was allegedly reluctant to record the latter song, it ended up being the one track on the album to bring him the most attention.

But no song more identifies Priest than his 1990 chart-topping hit, "Close To You" off his album, Bonafide. With help from superstar band, Soul II Soul, this album became one of Priest's best-selling. He followed up with a 1991 release of "Best of Me," which was a collection of his bigger hits. This, too, found popularity with a wide variety of audiences.

Not so with Fe Real, a comparative failure for this artist who was now accustomed to big success. Marked by an R&B smoothness, the album was among his worst-selling. Priest himself acknowledges the lack of sales and offered an explanation to Billboard, "With Fe Real, [there was] too much dictation around me, people telling me what I should and shouldn't do. It came out a bit too polished."

This frustration at his lack of creative control may be what led Priest to start his own label in 1993, called Dugout Records. By converting the basement of his Lewisham home into a preproduction studio, Priest provided a place where local artists could record and get exposure. Musicians from the soul music scene, as well as unknown reggae, rap and jungle genres got their start in this studio.

Continuing his successful career with Ten/Virgin Records, Priest released Man with the Fun in 1996. Again, he was back on top. Billboard said that in "That Girl," one of the album's hit singles, Priest "has rarely sounded so relaxed and sexy." They would later praise the rest of the album as being fueled by "spiritual raptness." Ebony magazine had this to say about Man With the Fun: "The album is a good blend of slow jams and uptempo songs, and all are infused with Maxi Priest's infectious, breezy rhythm."

Clearly, Priest was doing something right. Perhaps even more than his artistic accomplishments, Priest has gained credit for bringing the underground sound of reggae to a mainstream audience. Sadi, host of Reggae Dancehall Show on a San Francisco radio station, told Billboard why he loved Man With the Fun, "This is explosive. It's the best thing for crossover radio across the country right now... now is the time for him to become the Jamaican crossover in America."

Priest did just that, and it grabbed him a spot on the 1997 soundtrack to the comedy film Jungle 2 Jungle. On this compilation, he performed "It Starts in the Heart," which prompted Billboard to note that the recording showed how "Priest's voice seems to get more soulful with each recording... the song becomes an anthem suitable for airplay on AC (Adult Contemporary) and Top 40 radio."

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Maxi Priest Songs/ Selective Works
• You're Safe, Ten/Virgin Records, 1985.
• Intentions, Virgin Records, 1986.
• Maxi Priest, Virgin Records, 1987.
• Bonafide, Virgin Records, 1990.
• Best of Me, Virgin Records, 1991 Fe Real, Virgin Records, 1992.
• Man With The Fun, Virgin Records, 1996.
• Soundtracks Jungle 2 Jungle, Walt Disney, 1997

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