Songs can speak to traditional Vodou themes such as spying and betraying, feeling lost or estranged, the need for judgement and justice, or the urge to reconnect with an ancestral homeland.
When Jean-Claude Duvalier fled the country, a widespread dechoukaj uprooted the most oppressive elements of the former regime and attempted to separate the Vodou religion from its entanglements with the government.
Unable to do so beyond a limited extent under the Duvaliers, musicians adopted traditional Vodou folk music rhythms, lyrics, and instrumentation into a new sound that incorporated elements of rock and roll and jazz.
[5] First performed during the 1992 Carnival in Port-au-Prince, just months after the presidency of Jean-Bertrand Aristide was overthrown by a military coup d'etat, RAM began regularly playing a song entitled "Fèy", the Creole word for "leaf".
By the summer of 1992, playing or singing the song was banned under military authority, and band founder Richard Morse was subjected to death threats from the regime.