Today we close our interview series with Beres Hammond, whose 'Moment' will be at the National Indoor Sports Centre on Sunday, December 30. We have been through his very early stages, singing as 'Cudjoe' at school in St. Mary, through to working with Harold Butler on One Step Ahead, setting up his Harmony House outfit and recording Groovy Little Thing, leaving the music business for three years then returning to hit it big at Penthouse Records. Now, he looks forward to another album and back a bit at his musical life.

Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer

While songs like Rockaway and One Dance have carved out a place in popular culture, a Beres Hammond album is not a few good songs padded with fluff. He tells The Gleaner that "when you put out an album, everybody find a song on it for themselves. This one a go make your day, so you put it on repeat. Everybody find a song for themselves on the album, which is good."

Although he is well known for love songs, Beres Hammond counts Putting Up Resistance among his material that speaks to coping with the gritty side of life and in another song advises "don't watch the crowd, it is their duty to be loud". The more philosophical lives, he says, are "part of life experience. Just like the love songs."

"I wish every day was a love song, but it is not like that ... I don't plan recording. Maybe you have a little experience and subconsciously it is with you," he said.

The notion that everyone finds a song that speaks to them will be put to the test one more time early next year when Hammond releases a full-length, yet untitled set which is now in the mixing stages.

"We have mixed maybe a dozen or more. I am not sure how many are going to be on the CD. We have all the songs to pick from, 20 little bit," he said.

Departure from previous albums

This album marks a departure from previous ones, as Hammond says, "All these songs were done at Harmony House." Previously, most of the work was done at his home studio. "We said we were going to establish this sound," Hammond said of the Burlington Avenue, St. Andrew, Harmony House facility, which has two studios, one with a baby grand piano and set-up for live drums.

Quality is the key and, as Hammond puts it, "Me no know 'bout hit song, but me know 'bout good song. If the song no come across to me, me nah put out that, if it no make me feel good. Me like when me love it."

And he has a wide frame of reference to decide if a song satisfies his musical palate, as Hammond says, "Me listen to all kind of music, especially music of the Caribbean," naming African music and bachata among the bunch.

Of course, he has been to many of the places that the music he listens to comes from and he beams as he says that at many venues where he performs he sees familiar faces, in Jamaica, in the Caribbean and across Europe.

"You say 'damn' to yourself. You feel a little proud. This person has not left me, even to this time. These things give you purpose of being," he said.

"Me just happy people embrace me. It gave me a life I am proud of. Me think them proud of me too, for keeping up the same thing I have been doing over all the years. They know it is not acting. You can't act so long. You will forget your script," Hammond said.

"Them see that thing in me, that me real."