Spice Is World Music Views’ Performer of the Year for 2025

Some performers entertain. Others transform space, memory, and mood. In 2025, Spice did all three — reaffirming her position not only as Queen of Dancehall by reputation, but as the year’s most commanding live performer in any genre.

Her ascent has been long and deliberate, but this year felt seismic. Her solo shows remained sharp, immersive and fearlessly playful. Yet it was her presence alongside Vybz Kartel during his global return that underlined the full extent of her artistry. When Kartel stepped onto the US stage at the Barclays Center in New York for the first time in 20 years, the moment already carried historic weight. Then Spice appeared.

During that first performance back, as Kartel pushed through vocal challenges in the chilly New York spring and the weight of history hung over the night, Spice joined him onstage for “Romping Shop” and a medley of hits. The shift was instant. The crowd surged. His delivery steadied and their chemistry brought back his voice— a feminine force stitching strength through masculinity. The moment deepened by her past chants of “Free Worl’ Boss,” now answered by history itself.

Spice’s performances throughout the year are anchored by raunchy male and female playful rituals never lose their charge. Her dancers move with precision and provocation. Her staging often features the infamous bed or sheet, with men from the audience invited — and frequently humbled — under her playful command. Nothing about these elements feels recycled. They evolve.

Her visual language is unmistakable: costumes that celebrate her figure, fabrics that cling and gleam, and that signature blue hair — shifting beneath the lights like a living flame. She doesn’t simply dress the stage. She inhabits it, a gladiator in heels, glitter and resolve.

Queen Of The Dancehall Spice and Vybz Kartel at Reggae Fest Baltimore July 26, 2025

What makes Spice singular is her spontaneity. She reads a crowd in real time, balancing sensuality with humour, dominance with mischief, femininity with ferocity. Across the Caribbean diaspora she is Queen, but in the wider world, she sets a bar few dare to approach.

Shaggy, Spice, Sean Paul on the set of Go Down Deh

Commercial success ran parallel in 2025, with “Go Down Deh,” alongside Shaggy and Sean Paul, continuing to rack up vast streaming numbers and reinforcing her crossover power without diluting her identity. The song earned a Gold certification in France.

Spice, a grammy nominated deejay, is not merely the life of dancehall. She is its pulse — its audacity, its colour, its spark. And in 2025, the stage did not just belong to her. It bowed.