The summer simmers with a Caribbean beat

The summer song -- think Nelly’s “Hot in Herre” circa ’02 or Beyonce’s “Crazy in Love” from last year -- is a tradition: It stows two months of hot, hazy vitality in one exuberant party anthem.

But last summer launched a pop tradition that complements the summer song: the summer beat, a single rhythm heard on two or more songs and imported from -- where else? -- Jamaica, land of eternal summer.

The trend began with the infectious series of hand-claps that was last year’s “Diwali” rhythm -- a long-legged entity that proved much could be milked from a single beat: Sean Paul (“Get Busy”), Wayne Wonder (“No Letting Go”) and Lumidee (“Uh-Oh [Never Leave Me]”) recorded hit songs over it.

The second annual summer beat, currently ensconced on your radio and unlikely to expire any time soon, is shaping up to be a year-old reggae rhythm called “Coolie Dance.”

It is, most notably, the thumping beat behind “Move Ya Body,” that stick of bubblegum pop by Natalie and Nicole Albino, 18-year-old twins known as Nina Sky. Their vapid, alluring jingle is climbing pop charts and has “summer song” written all over it. It references the heat, the club and an oh-so-cheesy ‘80s tune by Lisa Lisa & the Cult Jam (“Can you feel the beat within my heart / Can you feel my love shine through the dark”).

The beat goes on -- Elephant Man’s latest single, “Jook Gal (Wine, Wine),” featuring Kiprich, the Youngbloodz and Twista, is also recorded over the “Coolie Dance” beat -- and on. Including the Elephant Man and Nina Sky tracks, “Coolie Dance” is at the heart of four radio hits, two full-length albums and one copyright infringement case.

The rhythm’s saga began early last year, when Jamaican dancehall producer Cordel “Scatta” Burrell discovered a sound on his drum machine that he describes as “tom-tom beats.” He fashioned them into a rhythm, accented by faint bursts of foreign-sounding chants. It brought to mind “Indians in a drum circle,” so he named his rhythm after the people of India: “Coolie,” born as an anti-Asian slur, is a common slang term in Jamaica, where its derogatory connotations can be muddled by its casual use.

Since dancehall producers typically invite a slew of artists to record individual songs over the same beat, Burrell’s “Coolie Dance” repertoire featured tracks by a range of reggae acts, from the fire-tongued Bounty Killer to the teen-friendly quartet T.O.K. The string of songs found success on Caribbean radio and attracted attention from a reggae record label: London-based Greensleeves Records, which released a compilation of “Coolie Dance” tracks in the U.S. last summer.

“Coolie Dance,” though, had legs. Even after its radio run, Jamaican artists approached Burrell to record second or third tracks over what had become, locally, a blockbuster beat. Sean Paul showed up to record his first “Coolie Dance” song. And Burrell accrued enough new tracks for a second “Coolie Dance” compilation, consisting of new songs over the same “Coolie Dance” rhythm and released in the U.S. last December by Greensleeves’ competitor, VP Records, under the title “Coolie Skank.”

Like “Diwali,” “Coolie Dance” proved that simplicity is the soul of a successful beat. “It has one main sound that grabs your attention,” Burrell says by phone from his Kingston studio. “I could imagine standing in the roadside and a car drives by, playing my riddim, and all you hear is that drum -- so you remember it. I knew ‘Coolie Dance’ would be big.”

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Infringement allegation

First to export “Coolie Dance” to U.S. airwaves was Mr. Vegas’ R&B-tinged; single “Pull Up,” which Burrell produced exclusively for that reggae artist’s forthcoming Delicious Vinyl/Interscope album. Last fall the song topped U.S. reggae charts, became a club anthem in the South and found mainstream radio rotation.

“Pull Up” earned two high-profile fans: Lil Jon and his TVT Records protege, Cuban rapper Pitbull. They liked the song enough to record their own version of it. The track, with its crude Spanish slang title, soon supplanted “Pull Up” on the Billboard charts and featured Pitbull’s Spanish raps, un-cleared samples from the original “Pull Up” master and a chorus reminiscent of Mr. Vegas’ original.

So reminiscent that Delicious Vinyl slapped TVT Records with a copyright infringement suit. The lawsuit, Delicious Vinyl owner Mike Ross says, is moving toward a settlement deal that calls for a compromise track -- likely to be another “Coolie Dance” hit, a soon-to-be-released remix of “Pull Up” featuring Mr. Vegas, Pitbull and Lil Jon. (TVT Records declined to comment.)

“All the ‘Coolie Dance’ songs -- Nina Sky’s, Elephant Man’s, Vegas’, Pitbull’s -- they feed off and promote each other,” says Joel Chin, A&R; representative at VP Records.

In reggae-friendly cities such as New York and Miami, radio DJs play the “Coolie Dance” songs in true dancehall style: back to back, their shared rhythm uninterrupted.

Such a style showcases the creative challenge unique to dancehall, in which a range of artists are handed identical raw material -- a single beat -- and asked to find distinct takes on it.

Other DJs spin a single “Coolie Dance” hit -- usually “Move Ya Body.” The single, which earned Nina Sky a deal with Universal Records, has become to the “Coolie Dance” what one-hit wonder Lumidee’s “Uh-Oh (Never Leave Me)” was to “Diwali”: a mildly irksome yet irresistible ditty that rides a successful reggae rhythm to chart success.