Mehkadon has ‘no bad blood’ with ‘haters’
Rising star talks about career, Shenseea comparison
Law graduate now turned dancehall artiste, Mehkadon, said the hatred her naysayers project unto her serve as a great motivation because she is confident that they do believe in her musical talent.
In an exclusive interview with
THE STAR,
the up-andcoming artiste said some of the hateful comments sometimes brightens her day.
“If mi go in a comment section and dem a comment bad bout me, mi kinda find it funny and if me don’t get no comment mi feel a way. Cause mi a seh ‘weh dem deh? How dem nuh come a hate pon mi picture?’
So it doesn’t [bother] me at all because everybody have haters, even the great of the greats so it’s nothing new [and] I’m a very happy person,” a bubbly Mehkadon stated. She said that she remains motivated by creating music, and is inspired by the experiences of others who have been ‘dragged through the mud’ and became successful.
“Yuh know seh mi nuh think dem doubt me, I think they actually believe in me a lot,” she laughed. “Yuh have people weh post every day and they don’t find the time to comment and be negative under their post because they don’t care about dem. So I honestly think they care about me and they honestly believe seh mi got it [because] I think I’m a very likeable person. So [there’s] no bad blood against dem, just gwaan watch and yuh soon hop pon di train,” a confident Mehkadon expressed.
In regards to the popular criticisms about her being ‘pretty and talentless as Shenseea’, the Pretty Devil singer replied: “I think Shenseea is very talented so dem comparing me to Shenseea, I think that’s a wonderful thing because
I love [her]. [She] is beautiful, educated and successful so, thank you.”.
The London-born, Jamaica-raised 23-year-old, who grew up with her older brother, said her “badness”, as expressed in her hardcore dancehall sound, is inspired from her rapport with her male relatives.
“I grew up in the country [St Mary] and mi and mi cousin dem always a freestyle pon di ends, and when I freestyle it always come out as that. Even though dem seh mi too pretty and it nuh suit me, I honestly think that it does because imagine yuh jus see a nice girl come a smile and den ‘bam bam bam’,” she illustrated with pointed fingers for effect.
“I’ve always wanted to do music. Ever since I was young, my dream was to be a lawyer and an artiste, so it was all a plan. Even though I’d put out freestyle songs from high school days, I wasn’t really serious about music because I wanted to get my law degree first, because with music you never know. Today yuh hot and tomorrow yuh flop. So I wanted a plan ‘B’. So after I graduated and got my law degree, I said I wanna give music my all and see how it goes,” the first class honouree added.
The artiste, whose given name is Tamika Cunninghan-Broderick, has been in the industry since 2021, and said she has no regrets and is excited about the future as she plans to start producing more music.
“I’ve been dropping [music] but I wasn’t consistent enough but I will be consistent now, so you’ll be getting like a song every month. But it has been a very wonderful journey,” she said, adding that her long-term goal in music is to win a Grammy.