Notes

‘Ring the Alarm.’ Tenor Saw, a pioneer of dancehall reggae, was killed in 1988 at the age of only 21 by a hit-and-run in Houston, Texas. In this 1985 track, he became one of the original “singjays”—DJs who sing over instrumental music tracks, or “riddims”—using the backing track “Stalag 17,” which artists in reggae, reggaeton (reggae’s Panamanian / Latin American variant), punk, and hip-hop have since sampled for hundreds of derivative tracks.

What’s dancehall reggae?

—Brendan Hasenstab