YAKSTA BUILDING ‘ST MARY EMPIRE’
As a proud and active ambassador for St Mary, Yaksta is laying the foundation to invest in and develop his native parish.
He has already formed two record labels, Bush Music and WussMuzikk, and is looking to establish a music collective, the St Mary Empire, to provide a visible platform for youngsters.
While dancehall has had music cliques like The Alliance and Portmore Empire, Yaksta is not discouraged by the pattern of such groups only lasting for some time.
“The concept of a seed is that it becomes a tree and that tree makes branches,” Yaksta told
THE WEEKEND STAR. “You can never actually have a cub as a cub forever. If you’re actually doing business, you do business for a particular time, maybe four or five years. People want to branch out. People often forget that and, just like love, when you meet somebody now and the love is fresh and you have the best correlations, eventually you grow apart because you did your purpose. Maybe you were supposed to bring an individual through a particular period. So nothing is permanent in life unless you compromise the actual time you have here.”
He is now part of a legacy of musical talent from St Mary and wants to use his platform to not just launch businesses, but bring awareness to the parish’s rich culture.
“I want to make people acknowledge St Mary because, oftentimes it’s a parish that many people overlook over the years, and really and truly St Mary is the forerunner for a lot of great stars. You have Beres Hammond, Panhead, Munga, the fire man [Capleton], same way Tanya Stephens, Lady Saw. So many big names and I’m just the youngest of the whole pack now. It’s my turn until somebody else takes over.”
GEARING UP
With his 2021 Ambition hit catapulting him to mainstream audiences, Yaksta is gearing up to make his debut on major stages like Best of the Best Music Fest in Miami, Florida, next month, and Reggae Sumfest in Montego Bay, St James, in July.
“My calendar looks very crazy. Certain shows, mi haffi turn down because I know, with a little impediment weh mi have inna mi back, mi haffi be careful so I don’t hurt myself because I’m a very energetic person when it comes on to the stage. So I don’t want to work myself to exhaustion either. We have England coming as well, France, Germany, Japan, and Canada too,” he said.