Dancehall Artists Wasp And Wahs At Odds Over Similar Sounding Names

Dancehall artist Wasp has come upon an unexpected problem at this stage in his career — another artist, Wahs, whose name sounds the same albeit with a different spelling.

Being the first artist with the name Wasp, one can see why there would be some concern on his part about a name overlap.  On the other hand Wahs, a young artist who has just entered the fray seems determined to stick with his chosen name which seems to be causing a bit of friction between the two Dancehall artists. Wahs is fresh on the scene with tracks like DM Full Up and Yeng Badness. Both of his buzzing tracks feature his biological brother Intence, who is arguably one of the hottest deejays in the Dancehall space at the moment.

How do they resolve this problem?

For starters, the two artists appeared for interviews with OnStage with host Winford Williams last weekend. Wahs, the younger of the two artists, was interviewed first and spoke about the issue.

In his interview, Wahs credits his mother and him being mischievous for the name and has no plans to change his name.

“When mi a grow up enuh mi mada always tell mi ‘you a wah likkle rude ute’ that’s why she call mi Wahs, cuz she seh mi used to gi bare trouble, run up and dung, fling stone after people an dem ting deh,” he said.

“Mi nah cause nuh problem (regarding the name issue) right now still enuh, because nuff ppl know mi as Wahs, memba mi instagram famous before mi become an artist.”

However, he did tell Winford was that he has added D.M Boss to his title, making his name Wahs The D.M Boss.

No doubt that addition would have created further distinctions between both artists however was that change satisfying to Wasp the elder artist?

Mr. Williams next welcomed Wasp on the show to give his take on the matter. Wasp, of course, led with the fact that he was here first and that he already has classics in the Dancehall space (i.e, Unfair Officer and Cry Fi Di Utes).

“Well the thing is this you know Wasp is an established artist you know, 2009 mi do a song name nuh lock of the sound officer (Unfair Officer) which is a number 1 song , was one of the biggest song in dancehall, u zimmie wi follow up dat wid “Cry Fi Di Utes” den we guh “Hot Like Fire”, den mi have a song name “Tek Weh Bwoy Gyal and Return har Back”, there are so much song weh ppl can identify and know seh alright a Wasp dis him wul heap a song weh popular wah connect to di ppl dem, to me right now a jus one Wasp, U zimmie.”

Wasp added that Wahs should embrace the D.M Boss portion of his name. “If him add da moniker deh to it, I think him just use that, dm boss cuz it easy fi identify D.M Boss ”

“Dm Boss sound good but a one Wasp, straight,” he said.