VP’S PAT CHIN TO RECEIVE LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD!

PAT Chin, matriarch of Randy’s and VP Records, will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at next month’s A2IM’s Libera Awards.

The event takes place June 25 at Highline Ballroom in New York City. The ‘Lifetime’ is among the top accolades at the Libera Awards, which recognises the year’s top independent music label achievers.

Chin founded VP with her husband Vincent in 1979. They previously operated Randy’s in downtown Kingston.

Vincent Chin died in 2003.

VP is the largest independent distributor of dancehall/reggae. Based in Queens, the company has released numerous albums by dancehall’s elite including Beres Hammond, Beenie Man and Sean Paul.

Last year’s Lifetime Achievement Award went Bruce Iglauer of Chicago blues label, Alligator Records. That company first distributed Mutabaruka’s album, Check It!, in 1983.

The Libera Awards’ board of directors includes some of the most influential people in ‘indie’ music. Among them are Tommy Boy owner/CEO, Tom Silverman; Hopeless Records owner Louis Posen and Concord Music Group president Glen Barros.

— By Howard Campbell