In 2010, the Jim Screechie rhythm became a massive production for the Equiknoxx Music label. It spawned the hit singles Jim Screechie by Spice, Jack Hammer by Aidonia, and For the Girls by RDX.

Producer Derrick Coffie was the man behind the label, and the success of the project opened several doors for his career in music production.

But after the death of one of his close friends, Coffie’s passion for producing music faded.

Today, Coffie is the information and technology manager at one of the country’s top financial conglomerates.

The Jamaica Observer caught up with him during Sunday’s Carnival road march in New Kingston and he shared his reasons for ditching the hustle and bustle of the music business for corporate Jamaica.

“It [leaving music] wasn’t a decision per se, I was going through a difficult time in the aftermath of my dear friend’s passing and, in that time, I became self-destructive in a way. If you recall, I was hosting television shows and emceeing major events while at the peak of my musical career and when J.O.E [recording artiste] passed away, it’s like I hit a brick wall. The passion and the drive to pursue any of those things died slowly thereafter. I stepped away to heal and focused on what’s important — my family,” Coffie reasoned.

J.O.E. or Lil Joe was an emerging reggae artiste who died after suffering an aneurysm on February 7, 2011.

Asked if the business of music became too overwhelming, he responded, “The challenges were what any and every business owner/operator can fathom, especially operating in a Third-World economy. But I was never the type to focus on the obstruction but, instead, the solution.”

He continued, “I lost the drive to do it, what a lot of people don’t know is that I always had a 9-5 job. I would work my day job, go to the studio, promote my music, then be back at work for 9:00 am the following day. All of that was driven by a love for what I was doing and the belief that I could impact the music industry positively. So, my stepping away had nothing to do with challenges because I know God have mi back.”

Coffie explained that his foray into information technology (IT) didn’t come overnight.

“It started in high school. I remember when it was time for CXC, all my friends took months to do their IT SBA [school-based assessment project], and I did mine in a weekend,” he recalled.

He told the Observer that his first job was with Columbus Communications (rebranded as Flow).

“I started out in their Network Operations Center and, after two years, I was a training supervisor, where I had the responsibility of training the entire staff in all things technical,” said Coffie.

He spent his formative years in Portmore and attended Wolmer’s Boys’ School, then later University of Technology, Jamaica.

“I always had roots in music, both my parents loved to sing and play music. I used to enter JCDC [Jamaica Cultural Development Commission] competitions as early as primary school. I started looking to forge a career in music as an investment. I figured that if I invested in the thing I’m passionate about doing then I would be successful eventually. So, I contacted my friends from high school who I knew had a similar mindset and we kicked on from there,” Coffie explained.

The first song that he produced was Dem Game Deh by newcomer C4.

“Some of my more popular rhythm projects were mostly the ‘daggering songs’ that didn’t make mainstream popularity, particularly based on the ban of daggering music. But in the dancehall itself they were on fire. We had the Sky Daggering Rhythm, Swagger Dagger Rhythm, Cobba Cobba Rhythm [being played in the popular TikTok trend “put yuh back in it”] and, of course, Jim Screechie was probably the biggest of all the compilation projects,” said Coffie.

He said the success of the Jim Screechie rhythm opened doors for him as a producer, as well as gave rise to opportunities such as being a judge on the popular Digicel Rising Stars.

Coffie still does music when he feels the urge, but it’s more of a hobby now.

“I never really left the music per se, but I did leave the business of music. I still make music to this day. I don’t make music expecting to be paid for it however; I just do it for fun. I will work anonymously on a project and release it under an alias just to see the people’s response to it. The last time I did a major release like that was back in 2018,” he said.

He spoke about the current state of Jamaican music.

“The music is fine; culturally we always connected better with stories of hardship and pain because, as a people, we’ve become so familiar with those sentiments. Nowadays, from where I sit, I see the younger artistes detailing aspects of their reality via song. Then there’s some person in some regulatory office looking at a screen or adding up some numbers and trying to make some correlation to the music and current events. My wish is that they would stop trying to police the music so hard and use that same energy to police the children a little better. I wish the veterans of the game would lend advice without sounding so condescending to the younger generation and free themselves from the shackles of the old “pay yuh dues” mentality. Just give them the information based on your experience and watch them evolve the music to keep in sync with world trends,” said Coffie.