Jamaican vocalist Protoje, whose approach to reggae revival draws more deeply from roots traditions than many of his peers, achieved independent breakthrough in 2011 via his first full-length release, The Seven Year Itch, and the accompanying single “Rasta Love” that included a feature from Ky-Mani Marley. Additional successful tracks soon broadened his reach as a global reggae figure, while later projects such as the 2020 album In Search of Lost Time and 2022’s Third Time’s the Charm incorporated greater rap and hip-hop textures.
Given the name Oje Ken Ollivierre at birth, he grew up surrounded by music: his mother, Lorna Bennett, had already notched a 1972 hit with her reggae adaptation of “Breakfast in Bed,” and his father, Mike Ollivierre, performed calypso as a native of Saint Vincent. Protoje’s earliest output, the 2005 mixtape Lyrical Overdose, Vol. 1, leaned openly toward hip-hop, yet he gradually steered his work toward a reggae and roots direction alongside his cousin, producer Don Corleon. Beginning with the 2009 single “Arguments,” he maintained a consistent flow of releases that paved the way for his 2011 debut album, The Seven Year Itch. The track “Rasta Love” featuring Ky-Mani Marley emerged as an international success from that project, raising his profile as an emerging talent. After issuing the 2012 mixtape This Is Protoje, he returned with his second album, 2013’s The 8 Year Affair, which spawned the hit “Kingston Be Wise” and registered on charts across Europe and the United States.
His third album, 2015’s Ancient Future, marked his commercial breakthrough; two weeks after its arrival the set reached the summit of the Billboard reggae chart, aided by the Chronixx collaboration “Who Knows.” In June 2016 the five-song EP Royalty Free (Side B) appeared as a free download on the artist’s birthday. Rejoining forces with producer Winta James and once more enlisting Chronixx for “No Guarantee,” Protoje released his fourth album, 2018’s A Matter of Time, initiating a sequence of reflective projects organized around the theme of time. The informal trilogy continued with the widely praised fifth album, In Search of Lost Time, in 2020; guest contributions from Popcaan, Koffee, Lila Iké, and American rapper Wiz Khalifa accompanied a sharper focus on social and political themes. The concluding chapter arrived in 2022 with Third Time’s the Charm.
