When singer Jah Cure was released from prison minutes after 5:00 am on Saturday, the first thing he did was stare at the sky. "I looked up to the heavens and give Jah thanks for freedom," the singer said, "because you can't know the value of freedom until you lose it."

He smiled as he mentioned that the last hours behind bars were probably the longest.
Born Siccature Alcock, Jah Cure, who for the last eight years was an inmate at the Tower Street Adult Correctional facility in Kingston on a rape conviction, spoke to the media and entertainment aficionados on Saturday evening inside the Hilton Kingston Hotel's Jonkoonu Lounge.

Jah Cure and his mother, Panceta Campbell, listen to his publicist, Alison Young (centre) before the start of Saturday night's news conference at the Hilton Kingston Hotel called to mark the singer's release from prison. (Photos: Joseph Wellington)

Minutes before the press conference began, the singer, wearing all-white, entered the premises with his mother Panceta Campbell by his side and a throng of supporters behind him. The reggae performer's management team coincided the release of his new single My Life with his triumphant reintroduction to the "free world".

His newfound freedom would have been celebrated by way of the much anticipated Cure Fest scheduled for August 24, however, because of the proximity to the national election date, the concert was postponed until October when he plays at the James Bond Beach.

For Jah Cure though, every disappointment is for a good.
"I have more time to do some more promotion (for the concert)... we jus' cyaan' wait 'til election done so we can party," he said.
Despite the anticipation for the concert and subsequently, the numerous petitions advocating his release, there are those who maintain that he should never again taste freedom.

Deejay Spragga Benz (standing) greets his friend Jah Cure at Saturday night's news conference organised to mark Jah Cure's release from prison.

"He that is without sin should cast the first stone," Jah Cure said, drawing on the biblical story in an effort to silence his naysayers.
During the months leading up to his release, this reporter noticed that several posters bearing the singer's image and mounted to promote Cure Fest were vandalised, some even defaced with the word 'rapist'. Of this, the singer maintained that he has no proof of such actions and that some of the posters even disappeared because fans wanted to take his image into their homes.

But controversy has always been a feature of this promising star.
"True Reflection caused a lot of controversy," he added, noting that it was not necessarily personal experience but more of a metaphor for life as an inmate.

His time in prison, he said, is something that has afforded him a wealth of experience that he planned on manifesting as poignant songs. He plans also to give back to the Rehabilitation Through Music programme which nurtured him as an incarcerated artiste, as well as doing more work with his "musical father" Beres Hammond.

But Hammond isn't the only entertainer to support the singer's career. Also at Saturday night's news conference was fellow Rastafari harbinger, Spragga Benz, who expressed joy at his friend's release.

"The big man deh a road... words cyaan' express it," Spragga said. "Give thanks to the most high, we know seh all those hard lessons will be interpreted as hard lyrics."
Jah Cure's beaming mother, who appeared to have tears streaming down her face at one point, also expressed gladness at the day she had been 'longing for' since eight years ago.

"I'm feeling so happy ...it's like I'm in a dream," she said, adding that she was grateful for having her son returned to her alive.
And what of his muse whom he told through song to wait for him?
"That's private," he said, the room now in laughter.
Though he admitted that an album and a book are in the works, he maintained that the details at present are sketchy. His immediate plan, he said, was to enjoy his freedom one day at a time.
"I performed pretty-well (musically) from prison, so imagine what it will be like now that I'm free," he said.

The singer, who enjoyed popularity from behind bars for the better part of the last four years, has several hits, including Longing For, True Reflection, Woman, I Love You and Build Great Man.

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