---
title: "Shaggy Was a F&*^ing Marine?!"
date: "2017-07-10"
modified: "2017-07-10"
authors:
  - name: "Adam Weinstein"
    link: "https://taskandpurpose.com/authors/adamweinstein/"
url: "https://taskandpurpose.com/news/reggae-shaggy-was-a-fing-marine/"
categories:
  - "Culture"
  - "Entertainment"
---

# Shaggy Was a F&\*^ing Marine?!

![](<https://taskandpurpose.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/19041315-1.jpg>)

Actually, call him *Lance Cpl.* Boombastic.

Here at Task & Purpose, we keep track of all the important news feeds: downrange news, service news, Shaggy news. So we were all over [this morning’s Marine Corps Times announcement](<https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/articles/singer-and-marine-vet-shaggy-to-perform-for-troops-in-japan>) that Shaggy, he of the late-’90s dank ragga beats, is taking his international tour to three U.S. installations in Japan later this month.

The headline for their story: “Singer and Marine vet Shaggy to perform for troops in Japan.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6W5pq4bIzIw

Somehow, in the two decades since his music got me to second base on a Virginia Beach dance floor during weekend liberty, I failed to learn that Shaggy was a fucking Marine.

This dancehall legend — whose hits include “It Wasn’t Me” and “Go Fuck Yourself” and who believes the way to defeat ISIS is to “[bag some Jamaican weed and distribute it](<https://www.miaminewtimes.com/music/shaggy-shares-his-strategy-for-defeating-isis-7731392>)” to the evildoers — was, in fact, an artilleryman with the 5th Battalion, 10th Marines out of Lejeune, and he deployed to Saudi Arabia for Desert Shield and Storm in 1991.

Get yourself some Shaggy facts, [courtesy of Military Times](<https://www.militarytimes.com/story/entertainment/2015/07/07/shaggy-isis-reggae-marine-corps-veteran/29824449/>):

*Not quite the model Marine — he was busted down in rank twice — he was better known for his colorful cadence calling and already had hit a single before he left active duty.*

*"The highest rank I got was lance corporal. My big problem was being AWOL. I was driving up to New York every weekend to do music," he told Military Times in a 2011 feature story. "Sometimes I got back late. And I'm a guy with a big mouth, and I mouthed off a lot. So, you know, things like that will get you busted."*

Anyway, if you’re on Hansen, Atsugi, or Iwakuni later this month and want to catch Mr. Lover Lover singing about all the things Master Sar’nt says you oughtn’t do, [check out the details here](<https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/articles/singer-and-marine-vet-shaggy-to-perform-for-troops-in-japan>).

That still gives you a couple of weeks to get comfortable with certain facts. For example, though [he swears that “Boombastic” definitely “has nothing to do with the Marine Corps,”](<https://www.miaminewtimes.com/music/shaggy-shares-his-strategy-for-defeating-isis-7731392>) Shaggy was, in fact, a fucking Marine, and your worldview must adjust to this new reality.

**WATCH MORE:**