Leftside is a talented Jamaican drummer, keyboardist and up-and-coming producer with an interesting musical presentation. The creator of extraordinary riddims, which combine the classic roots of reggae and modern innovations.
Childhood and youth of Craig Parks
Leftside is a stage name with an interesting origin story. The guy's real name is Craig Parks. He was born on June 15, 1978 to legendary bassist Lloyd Parks.
He studied at the Ardennes High School in Kingston and from an early age was interested in music. The father often took his son to the rehearsals of his group We the People Band, where Craig was especially impressed by the drummer Devon Richards.
When the boy was 6 years old, he built his first own drum kit from supermarket boxes. It was from this moment that the successful path of Craig Parks began.
The beginning of Leftside's success
As a teenager, along with his siblings, Parks played in a band called Duplicate. But due to school work, they only made a few tracks.
In 1996, together with his father, he began to accompany such world reggae musicians as Dennis Brown and John Hott as a drummer.
A year earlier, Leftside got a job as a selector in the famous Kingston company Syndicate Disco. The company became famous thanks to Z. Hording, S. Paul and A. Cooper.
After some time, Zachary and Arif noticed Craig's unique ability to scratch with his left hand. Thus, the alias Leftside was born. Parks explained the unusual method of work by the fact that his left hand “scratches the rhythm” better than his right.
While Greig was fond of old school dance and dancehall direction, older brother Noel Parks noticed his talent, success and gave Leftside his drum system.
Dancehall - "breakthrough"
In 1997, Craig began collaborating with veteran producer Cardell "Scutta" Burrell and recorded riddims under the Kings Of Kings label.
His debut and already successful works were: Double Jeopardy Riddim and Chiney Gal Riddim. Cecile recorded Changez on them, and Sizzla released the single Up the Chalwan.
But the most successful was Martial Arts, under which Sizzla wrote Karate, and Bounty Killer wrote Look Good. Thanks to this, Craig became popular not only in Jamaica, but also in the USA and England.
New project Pacemakers
Leftiside & Esco created their new project Pacemakers and since 2001 have been working as producers and artists. But Craig collaborated with other labels in parallel, Sizzla released Kings Of Kings, worked for Stone Love, Q45 and Elephant Man.
Parks played on the legendary tracks Tall Up Tall Up and Bad Man A Bad Man.
His performances on Ellie's hits Pon Di River Pon Di Bank Signal Di Plane and his work on the tracks of the two-disc ghetto dictionary Bounty Killer (2002) led him to international fame.
A year later, he worked on the multi-platinum disc Sean Paul The Trinity, and the successful album Wayn Wolder No Holding Back took 2nd position on the Billboard chart.
In 2005, Leftside & Esco released the songs Stay Far and Wine Up Pon Haar and became recognizable among dancehall favorites.
Popular Single Truck Een Yuh
Their joint humorous-sexy single Truck Een Yuh Belly lasted about 9 weeks in the Jamaican charts, and the tops of Trinidad, Canada and England literally “exploded”.
At the end of a long creative break in 2007, Leftside released the track More Punany. The successful single became popular not only in Jamaica, but also reached the heights of the dancehall chart in Italy.
The song "More Punany" got into the rotation of hip-hop radio stations in New York, thanks to which, in 2008, Craig organized the release of his debut collection and signed a contract in New York with Sequence Records.
Not wanting to stop there, Leftside wanted to reach new heights and developed himself as a producer by collaborating with artists Keida and Syon.
In 2014, Parks was invited to Germany to perform at the I Love Hip Hop Show. In the spring of the same year, during a musical tour of the same country and Holland, 10 bright shows took place.
And in the fall, he performed in the same European countries with the Reade to Party tour. In the Copenhagen club, Donkey Club performed hits: Jet Blue, Super Model Chick and Want Yuh Body Flip.
Then there were riddims in demand in the Caribbean and Europe: Hot Winter, Dem Time Deh, Drop Drawers and Cry Fi Yuh, released under their own label Keep Left Records LLC. And Dream Chaser, Dem-A-Worry, Sexy Ladies, Fresh Prince of Uptown, Phat Punani, Super Model Chick, Ghetto Gyal Wine and Want Yuh Body remix with Sean Paul.
Craig Parks about his work
He believes that the success of the dancehall direction was achieved thanks to the support of his brother and father. The chosen path of a musical artist helps in development and contributes to gaining international recognition.
The manufacturer market is crowded, and Leftside is unique in that it doesn't aim to change it. In his works, he retains the formula of Jamaican music, which has long attracted the audience of other countries.
The only thing that is not subject to is new equipment that outputs new sounds. But he tries to make them simple and pure, so his riddims don't leave parties where the works of others have long disappeared.
