After establishing themselves as dancehall artists from the Unity soundsystem in the 1980s, the Ragga Twins switched direction in the early 1990s, combining into a duo after signing to Shut Up & Dance's label.
The Ragga Twins, consisting of brothers David and Trevor Destouche – known as Deman Rockers and Flinty Badman respectively, – began as MCs for Unity, a leading sound system in London.
[5] According to Sherman, the quick work rate contributed to the overall raw sound of the album, which conjures up "the atmospherics of a dark little club, sweat pouring and the walls dripping, the crowd rocking to the soundtrack that the Ragga's let loose".
[5] During production, Shut Up & Dance created instrumental tracks, usually without the presence of the Ragga Twins, who PJ said were "always late" and would often appear in the studio "just in time to put the vocals down".
"[5] Sherman writes that the album touches on social issues, particularly on the opening song, "The Homeless Problem", which features the titular phrase being repeated, and "Illegal Gunshot", on which Badman criticises the emerging "gun-toting bad boy yout" persona in dancehall.
[6] Lambert compared the dark muttering of the phrase in "The Homeless Problem" to the work of Adrian Sherwood's Dub Syndicate, whose similarly tech-heavy sound marked a departure from Jamaican reggae production.
[5] One of the group's reappearing early singles,[8] "Hooligan 69" begins with an unlicensed sample of the intro to Prince's "Let's Go Crazy", and was popular on dancefloors due to its heavy breakbeat and pulsating bassline.
[1] A remix of "Spliffhead" fuses deep reggae with a style reminiscent of early Mantronix,[8] while "Ragga Trip" is highlighted for its B-boy breakbeat and Roland TB-303 acid house bass.
[13] In a contemporary review for Select, Andrew Harrison highlighted the "weird" sound of the material, and commented that the "Ragga Twins are hit-and-miss exponents of the club 12-inch, so it's for the best that Reggae Owes Me Money is more of a greatest hits package than a genuine debut."
He did however feel that the Ragga Twins' "ragga-House" style was more difficult to digest in album form than on twelve-inch singles, describing the record as "[v]ery hardcore indeed, and sometimes enough to make producers SUAD themselves sound mainstream.
"[6] In his article for Melody Maker, Lambert wrote that: "The recognisable dancehall antecedents of Flinty and Demon's vocals, cut up to fit Shut Up and Dance's rewrite-the-book hip hop style, is the most convincing and thought-provoking reggae fusion yet.
"[17] Joe Patrin of Pitchfork wrote that "the Ragga Twins' 1990-92 output, which comprised the majority of their career work until their mid-aughts comeback, lacks the 150+ BPM pace and "Amen" break-chopping most obviously identified with the [jungle] genre by 1994.
"[4] In 2012, Fact ranked it at number 49 in their list of "The 100 Best Albums of the 1990s", describing it as a "magmatic fondue of acid house, breakbeat and dancehall that could only have existed at the dawn of the 90s" and adding that, unlike Silver Bullet, the Ragga Twins mastered the blend.
[3] In 2008, Soul Jazz Records released the compilation Ragga Twins Step Out, which includes all the songs from Reggae Makes Me Money with the exception of "Hooligan 69", due to Prince refusing the sample.