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The smell of home can hit harder than a photo, and for Karen Young it starts with Guyana: wooden houses, warm air, family rituals, and the kind of sensory memory you carry even after moving to Brooklyn as a child. We talk with Karen, founder of Oui The People, about being American by birth and Guyanese by heart, and how that dual identity becomes the foundation for a body care and fine fragrance brand that feels intimate, specific, and real.

We get into the leap from a psychology degree to a decade in fashion, then into beauty at Estée Lauder, and finally into entrepreneurship. Karen shares the unglamorous middle: testing ideas, building products piece by piece, and literally hauling orders in big bags to the post office before work. Her first hero product is shaving, inspired by the safety razors she watched her uncles use, and built to address irritation, ingrowns, and hyperpigmentation. From there, scent becomes the language that ties performance to emotion.

The deeper conversation is about storytelling and representation in fragrance. Karen explains why “Caribbean fragrance” can’t just mean coconut and pineapple, and how notes like driftwood, sea air, wet earth, palm leaves, and wood can sit confidently in luxury fragrance. We also talk brand awareness, retail pressure, Sephora growth, and the moment things shifted when she finally showed up on camera to tell the story herself. If you love niche fragrance, body care rituals, and founder-led beauty brands, press play, then subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a review so more listeners can find the show.

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We catch up on the biggest reggae and dancehall moments driving the culture forward, from arena milestones to legacy reunions and festival conversations that demand more respect. I also share the albums I have on repeat and why intentional full projects feel like a real shift right now.

• Masicka’s Barclays Center performance as a full circle career moment
• Vybz Kartel and Mavado reuniting and the power of catalog on stage
• Reggae Jam’s controversial art installation and the exploitation debate
• The need to distinguish reggae from dancehall in how events are marketed
• New albums from Yaksta, Dre Island, Buju Banton, D’yani, Kelissa, Runkus, and Masicka

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Reggae is one of Jamaica’s greatest cultural exports, but the way we tell its story often leaves women blurred out or pushed into the margins. In this Breadfruit Media crossover episode with Strictly Facts I speak with Alexandria to unpack her dissertation on women in reggae and the questions that drove seven years of research: why are women so often reduced to footnotes, and what does that erase from our understanding of Jamaican music history?

We get specific about power in the reggae industry and what “gendered labour” looks like in real life: who controls rhythms, who collects wealth, and how intimidation around songwriting credit and royalties can shrink a career over time. We also name the hard parts that rarely make it into glossy retrospectives, including sexual harassment, the unequal burden of childcare when industry partnerships become families, and the legal realities of copyright in Jamaica. Along the way, we spotlight the difference between quick recognition and lasting impact, from Sister Nancy’s rare royalties breakthrough to what a moment like Koffee’s Grammy win can and cannot do for women across the genre.

Then we shift into the craft of documenting a history that wasn’t properly filed. Alexandria talks archival research in Kingston, what’s missing from institutional folders, and why oral history interviews with living artists matter. We also explore how women mentor each other across generations, how respectability politics and Rastafari-adjacent norms shape performance and perception, and why today’s wave of women in reggae is best understood through the foundation built by those who came before.

If you care about reggae, women in music, or the business of cultural recognition, press play, subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review with the name of a woman in reggae you think deserves deeper documentation.

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Produced by Breadfruit Media