Rita Marley hospitalised
Edwin Countryman Lothan star of the 1982 film Countryman dies.
RIP Prince Buster
Regarded as Jamaica's first international musical legend, Cecil Bustamente Campbell hailed from Kingston,, having been born on Orange Street – now known as the heart and soul of Jamaican ska, rocksteady and reggae. The records that Prince Buster released in the 1960s – such as I Feel the Spirit and Fly Flying Ska – set a blueprint for ska and rocksteady anthems to come and had a profound influence on the UK music scene of the 1970s / 80s – primarily Coventry's 2-Tone ska label, home of The Specials and The Selecter. Madness originally covered Buster's 1963's B-side Madness on the 2-Tone label and recorded a tribute to Campbell called The Prince in 1979. The 1960s were prolific for Campbell not only for the songs released but also for his production work on Oh Carolina by the Folkes Brother in 1960. The year 1964 saw a heavyweight meeting between Campbell and boxer Muhammad Ali, who invited him to attend a Nation of Islam talk in Miami, and in 1967 The Prince had a huge top 40 hit in the UK with the single Al Capone. Campbell returned to the UK charts in 1998 with his song Whine and Grine, which was used in a Levi's advert. Tweets came in from fans and industry figures alike, including DJ Rob Da Bank and reggae mainstay David Rodigan, who said: "It is with great sadness that I have just learned of the death of Jamaica's music icon and pioneer, Prince Buster. A true music legend".
Hopeton Lewis - The Godfather of Rock Steady
Late in 1966, Hopeton Lewis played a significant role in transforming Jamaica's musical landscape with a series of singles that pioneered the new rock steady sound. Over the next decace, he cut a series of superior records for Federal, WIRL, Treasure Isle, Dynamic Sounds and Techniques Records before finally moving into gospel music - a style that was to dominate his output for the remainder of his singing career. To read more about Hopeton's successful and hugely influential career, while enjoying some of his most significant secular recordings, simply click here or on the Artists link at the top of the homepage, then scroll down the alphabetically-ordered list of names until you reach 'Hopeton Lewis'. via trojanrecords.com
10 Things You Didnt Know About Tenor Saw
RIP Tenor Fly
Tenor Fly was a British singer, rapper and freestyler, who rose to prominence in the ragga movement of the early 1990s.
Born Jonathan Sutter, Fly had been a member of Freestylers and has worked as a solo artist. Fly had been active in the music business since 1988, and was best known for his work with other artists, such as Rebel MC, Top Cat, Barrington Levy and Sir Coxson Sound.
Fly died suddenly on 17 June 2016.
Video - John Holt - Ali Baba w/ Version (Treasure Isle)
Winston Holt CD (11 July 1947 – 19 October 2014), better known as John Holt, was a reggae singer and songwriter from Jamaica who first found fame as a member of The Paragons, before establishing himself as a solo artist.
Video - Desmond Dekker - Israelites 1968
Desmond Dekker (16 July 1941 – 25 May 2006) was a Jamaican ska, rocksteady and reggae singer-songwriter and musician. Together with his backing group the Aces (consisting of Wilson James and Easton Barrington Howard), he had one of the earliest international reggae hits with "Israelites" (1968). Other hits include "007 (Shanty Town)" (1967), "It Mek" (1969) and "You Can Get It If You Really Want" (1970).
Video - The Melodians -Rivers of Babylon
The Melodians are a rocksteady band formed in the Greenwich Town area of Kingston, Jamaica, in 1963, by Tony Brevett (born 1949, nephew of The Skatalites bassist, Lloyd Brevett), Brent Dowe and Trevor McNaughton. Renford Cogle assisted with writing and arranging material.
Video - Pat Kelly - I´m coming home
another ska classic from Pat Kelly with some fancy impressions of iconic symbols of the scene.
Vintage Photo
Left to Right: Rads, Leggo, Tappa Zukie, Bunny Lee, Prince Buster, Dennis Alcapone & Jah Shaka, via Jah Shaka.
Steel Pulse
Steel Pulse are a roots reggae musical band, from the Handsworth area of Birmingham, England, which has a large number of Afro-Caribbean, Indian and other Asian migrants. They originally formed at Handsworth Wood Boys School - composed of David Hinds (lead vocals, guitar), Basil Gabbidon (lead guitar, vocals), and Ronald McQueen (bass); along with Basil's brother Colin briefly on drums. Steel Pulse were the first non-Jamaican act to win the Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album.After the band formed in 1975, their debut release, Kibudu, Mansetta And Abuku, arrived on the small independent label Dip, and linked the plight of urban black youth with the image of a greater African homeland. They followed it with Nyah Luv for Anchor. They were initially refused live dates in Caribbean venues in Birmingham due to their Rastafarian beliefs. Aligning themselves closely with the Rock Against Racism organisation and featuring in its first music festival in early 1978, they chose to tour with sympathetic elements of the punk movement, including the Stranglers, XTC etc.: "Punks had a way of enjoying themselves – throw hordes at you, beer, spit at you, that kind of thing". Eventually they found a more natural home in support slots for Burning Spear, which brought them to the attention of Island Records.
Their first release for Island was the Ku Klux Klan 45, a considered tilt at the evils of racism, and one often accompanied by a visual parody of the sect on stage. By this time their ranks had swelled to include Selwyn Brown (keyboards), Steve "Grizzly" Nisbett (drums), Alphonso Martin (vocals, percussion) and Mykaell Riley (vocals). Handsworth Revolution was an accomplished long-playing record and one of the major landmarks in the evolution of British reggae (Executive Producer Pete King). However, despite critical and moderate commercial success over three albums, the relationship with Island Records had soured by the advent of their third album, Caught You (released in the US as Reggae Fever).
The band made their US concert debut at the Mudd Club in New York in 1980. Wiki.
David "Ram Jam" Rodigan
David Rodigan
Also known as
Roddy, Ram Jam ,
David Michael Rodigan MBE (born 24 June 1951) is an English radio DJ who also performs as a disc jockey for his sound system. Known for his selections of reggae and dancehall music, he has played on stations including Radio London, Capital 95.8, Kiss 100, BBC Radio 1Xtra, BBC Radio 2 and BFBS Radio.
Rodigan was born on a military base in Hanover. He attended Gosford Hill School, Kidlington, Oxfordshire.
He has stated that his passion for Jamaican music was initiated by watching Millie Small perform her 1964 hit My Boy Lollipop at the Ready Steady Go! TV show as a school boy. By the age of 15, Rodigan was DJing at school dances and youth clubs. Leaving school in 1970, he spent a year studying economics before leaving to study drama. Despite pursuing an acting career, Rodigan kept his passion for music alive, selling records in Oxford then Putney, before obtaining a job on Radio London in 1978 to alternate with Tony Williams on the Reggae Rockers programme. A year later he was offered a permanent slot at Capital Radio to present Roots Rockers, which ran for 11 years. In 1990 a change in management and music policy at the station led to David leaving to start a new show for Kiss FM when it relaunched that September as London's first legal 24-hour dance music station. He hosted the Sunday night slot from 11pm till midnight until November 2012, when the slot was moved to midnight and he resigned in protest over what he called the "continued marginalisation" of the reggae genre.
Rodigan has clashed established soundsystems like Killamanjaro, Stone Love, Barry G and Bass Odyssey.
He has acted as tour DJ for reggae and dancehall artists including Shinehead. During the 1970s and 1980s, he worked as an actor and appeared in a variety of TV programmes, including a part in the Doctor Who serial, The Mysterious Planet. In 1984 he joined BFBS (British Forces Broadcasting Service) where he broadcast his weekly reggae show for 25 years until 2009. In 2006, Rodigan was added to the Radio Academy hall of fame. Vocal samples of Rodigan can be found on the dubstep track "Hard" by Breakage, on the introductory track of Caspa's 2009 Album Everybody's Talking, Nobody's Listening, and on the intro to Alborosie's debut album "Soul Pirate", and the main vocal of Sukh Knight's "Ganja", plus countless other jungle/drum & bass tracks. Ad-Rock mentions Rodigan by name on the 2011 Beastie Boys track 'Say It'.
Happy Birthday Sugar Minott
(25 May 1956 – 10 July 2010) After working as a selector on the Sound of Silence Keystone sound system, and then his own Gathering of Youth system, he began his singing career as part of The African Brothers in 1969, along with Tony Tuff and Derrick Howard. The group released several singles in the first half of the 1970s on labels such as Micron and their own Ital label, and were an early example of the Rastafari movement's influence on the Jamaican music scene, taking a clear lead from The Abyssinians. After recording "Mysterious Nature" for producer Rupie Edwards, the group recorded 1974's "No Cup No Broke" for Studio One, breaking up shortly after. Minott then teamed up with the producer Clement "Coxsone" Dodd, as studio apprentice at Dodd's Studio One, working as a singer, guitarist and percussionist, and soon began recording his own singles. Minott developed a talent for writing new songs to fit over existing rhythms (which at the time was common when singers performed live, but rare in the studio), often proving more popular than the original songs, pioneering an approach that would be central to the emerging dancehall style.
After a number of moderately successful hits for Studio One, such as "Vanity", "Hang On Natty", "Mr. DC", and "Jah Jah Children", his debut LP Live Loving made his name and increased his popularity, and is regarded as pioneering the dancehall style that would dominate the early 1980s. It was followed in 1979 with a second album, Showcase, which included his singles that had been omitted from the first album.
The Bittersweet album followed, and then the third album of 1979, Ghetto-ology, which saw a return to roots reggae. Roots Lovers (1980) saw a move towards lovers rock, which was a UK hit. He became a bigger star in the UK than in Jamaica, his self-produced "Hard Time Pressure" being a major UK reggae hit in 1980, leading Minott to relocate to the UK, where he became a focus for UK reggae.
Singles such as "Run Come", "Not for Sale", "African Girl", "Lovers Rock", "In a Dis Ya Time", "Africa" and "Make It with You" (with Carroll Thompson) were hits in the years that followed. "Good Thing Going" (a cover of a song originally recorded by Michael Jackson in 1971) was picked up for distribution by RCA and reached Number 4 in the UK Singles Chart in March 1981, leading to an album of the same name. The Herbman Hustling album saw a return to dancehall and roots reggae.Wiki.
Vincent George Forbes
Born in Kingston, Forbes was raised on Wildman Street and attended the Calabar All-Age School.
He began his career as a selector on the Tom the Great Sebastian sound system in the early 1950s, being given a chance after helping Tom Wong to change a tyre on his car. At the time he was known as 'Shine-Shoes Vinny' due to his smart appearance.
After travelling to England in 1954 as a stowaway on a boat from Kingston, he found work as an engine cleaner for British Rail, becoming an electrician two years later. George built his first sound system in 1955 using a second-hand turntable bought from a shop in Edgware Road, a speaker bought for £15 and an amplifier built for £4, soon establishing 'Duke Vin the Tickler's', in Ladbroke Grove, London, the first Jamaican-style sound system in the UK. The sound system played an important part in popularising ska in Britain. He initially played R&B but soon concentrated on Jamaican music - he was supplied with fresh Jamaican releases, including many from Studio One, by the Daddy Peckings shop in West London. Fellow Jamaican Count Suckle soon set up a sound system in the same area, leading to a rivalry between the two and several sound clashes, with Vin involved in the UK's first clash in 1958.
In the 1960s his sound played at top London clubs including The Marquee and The Flamingo.
In the late 1960s he served time in prison after being convicted of pimping, a charge that he denied. On his release he built a larger sound system and bought a house off Harrow Road. One of the tracks that exclusively featured on his sound system was "The Tickler", a track produced by Derrick Harriott that was unavailable elsewhere until it was released in 2006.
In 1973 he was one of the founders of the Notting Hill Carnival, and performed at the event for 37 years, despite suffering a stroke in his later years.
He was the subject of the 2009 documentary film Duke Vin and the Birth of Ska, directed by Gus Berger.
He died in London on 3 November 2012. Via Wiki.
Vintage photos via Vice
Bob Marley dies May 11th 1981
In what would prove to be the next to the last concert of his tragically short life, Bob Marley shared the bill at Madison Square Garden with the hugely popular American funk band The Commodores. With no costumes, no choreography and no set design to speak of, “The reggae star had the majority of his listeners on their feet and in the palm of his hand,” according to New York Times critic Robert Palmer. “After this show of strength, and Mr. Marley’s intense singing and electric stage presence, the Commodores were a letdown.” Only days after his triumphant shows in New York City, Bob Marley collapsed while jogging in Central Park and later received a grim diagnosis: a cancerous growth on an old soccer injury on his big toe had metastasized and spread to Marley’s brain, liver and lungs. Less than eight months later, on May 11, 1981, Bob Marley, the soul and international face of reggae music, died in a Miami, Florida, hospital. He was only 36 years old.
Nesta Robert Marley was born on February 6, 1945, in rural St. Ann Parish, Jamaica, the son of a middle-aged white Jamaican Marine officer and an 18-year-old black Jamaican girl. At the age of nine, Marley moved to Trench Town, a tough West Kingston ghetto where he would meet and befriend Neville “Bunny” Livingston (later Bunny Wailer) and Peter McIntosh (later Peter Tosh) and drop out of school at age 14 to make music. Jamaica at the time was entering a period of incredible musical creativity. As transistor radios became available on an island then served only by a staid, BBC-style national radio station, the music of America suddenly became accessible via stateside radio stations. From a mix of New Orleans-style rhythm and blues and indigenous, African-influenced musical traditions arose first ska, then rock steady—precursor styles to reggae, which did not take shape as a recognizable style of its own until the late 1960s.
Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer performed together as The Wailers throughout this period, coming into their own as a group just as reggae became the dominant sound in Jamaica. Thanks to the international reach of Island Records, the Wailers came to the world’s attention in the early 1970s via their albums Catch a Fire (1972) and Burnin’ (1973). Eric Clapton spread the group’s name even wider by recording a pop-friendly version of “I Shot The Sheriff” from the latter album. With the departure of Tosh and Wailer in 1974, Marley took center stage in the group, and by the late 70s he had turned out a string of albums— Exodus (1977), featuring “Jamming,” “Waiting In Vain” and “One Love/People Get Ready;” Kaya (1978), featuring “Is This Love” and “Sun Is Shining”; and Uprising (1980), featuring “Could You Be Loved” and “Redemption Song.”
While none of the aforementioned songs was anything approaching a hit in the United States during Bob Marley’s lifetime, they constitute a legacy that has only increased his fame in the years since his death on this day in 1981. History.com
Joseph Hill
Joseph Hill was born in 1949 in Linstead, a town in Saint Catherine Parish in the southeast of Jamaica. He was raised in a Christian family and began singing in church at the age of six. Within two years he was making his own musical instruments. After leaving home he came into contact with Rastafarians and adopted the faith.
He began his career in the late 1960s as a percussionist, recording with the Studio One house band the Soul Defenders. He also worked as a sound system deejay, and began performing as a backing vocalist, leading to his singles "Behold the Land" and "Take Me Girl" in the early 1970s. In the early 70s Hill performed with two groups that included future reggae star Glen Washington – C35 Incorporated and Stepping Stone.[citation needed] He performed regularly on the hotel circuit, but had his greatest success with the group Culture.
Hill formed Culture in 1976, and had early success with the prophetic "Two Sevens Clash", predicting apocalypse on 7 July 1977.
During the seventies the group had a string of highly successful singles for producers Joe Gibbs and Sonia Pottinger including the song 'Two Sevens Clash' which made its mark on both Jamaica and the United Kingdom. It was named by Rolling Stone magazine in 2002 as one of the '50 Coolest Records' – the only single artist reggae album to make the list. The group also had a hit with 'Stop Fussing and Fighting', a song that addressed the chaotic political climate of the late 1970s and the attempt on Bob Marley's life.
Joseph Hill and Culture developed a reputation as a performing group after a performance at the 'One Love Peace Concert' in 1978, and was soon regularly touring the United States, Europe and Africa. In recent years the group continued to perform at least one hundred concerts each year – with Hill's wife Pauline performing road manager duties. Hill was a presence on stage – part deejay as he directed his band to reconfigure songs on stage and part teacher as he commented on Jamaican history and current political issues. In his lyrics, Hill often explored how the legacy of slavery continued to have an influence on Jamaican citizens. Yet, what made Culture unique was that Hill always tempered his messages by having a smile on his lips and a dance in his feet. He was never without a good joke at hand.
Hill had received a number of honours; an induction into the Jamaican Reggae Walk of Fame and a 2005 Independence Award presented by the Prime Minister of Jamaica. In 2005 hew received the Culture Shock Bronze Medal in recognition of his contribution to Jamaican music.
As a member of the Rastafari movement, Joseph Hill was a devoted worshipper of emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia. Indeed, Hill's honorific/nickname, "Keeper of Zion Gate" reflects his position as one of reggae's and Rastafari's greatest voices.Wiki.
Jacob Miller
Jacob Miller was known as one of Jamaica's most distinctive vocal stylists, with a trademark vibrato he used to accent his performance.
He was born in Mandeville, Jamaica to Joan Ashman and Desmond Elliot. At the age of eight he moved to Kingston, Jamaica where he grew up with his maternal grandparents. In Kingston, Miller began spending time at popular studios including Clement Dodd’s Studio One. He recorded three songs for Dodd, including "Love is a Message" in 1968, which the Swaby brothers, (Horace, later called Augustus Pablo, and Garth) played at their Rockers Sound System. While the song did not garner much success nor maintain Dodd's attention in Miller, it resulted in Pablo’s sustained interest in Miller.
After the brothers launched their own label in 1972, Pablo recorded a version of "Love is a Message" named "Keep on Knocking" in 1974. In the next year and a half Miller recorded five more songs for Pablo, "Baby I Love You So," "False Rasta," "Who Say Jah No Dread," "Each One Teach One," and "Girl Named Pat", each of which became a Rockers classic with King Tubby dubs on their b-sides. These singles developed Miller’s reputation and ultimately drew Inner Circle to hire him as a replacement lead singer.
Inner Circle was an emerging reggae group made popular playing covers of American Top 40 hits. Band leader Roger Lewis said Jacob Miller was "always happy and jovial. He always made jokes. Everyone liked jokes." Adding Miller as lead singer, the band’s lineup was Roger Lewis on guitar, Ian Lewis on bass, Bernard "Touter" Harvey on keyboards, and Rasheed McKenzie on drums. Coining Miller as Jacob "Killer" Miller, the group continued to build popularity. They signed with Capitol Records in 1976 and released two albums, Reggae Thing and Ready for the World. Their first hit with Jacob Miller was "Tenement Yard", followed by "Tired Fi Lick Weed In a Bush".
While recording, Miller continued pursuing a solo career, recording "Forward Jah Jah Children," "Girl Don’t Com" produced by Gussie Clarke, and "I’m a Natty" produced by Joe Gibbs. He earned second place in Jamaica’s 1976 Festival Song competition with the song "All Night ‘Till Daylight" and produced his first solo album in 1978, Dread Dread. While most of Miller’s solo work were backed by Inner Circle members, his preferred rockers style diverged from the tendency of Inner Circle to experiment with other genres, including pop, soul, funk and disco. The track which has brought him the most lasting recognition is the rockers standard "King Tubby Meets The Rockers Uptown" with Augustus Pablo, a dub of "Baby I Love You So," engineered by King Tubby. Other notable tracks with Augustus Pablo included "Keep on Knocking," "False Rasta" and "Who Say Jah No Dread", all produced by Pablo. The album Who Say Jah No Dread featured two versions of each of these tracks; the original and a dub engineered by King Tubby.
Miller was featured in the film Rockers, alongside many other musicians including Gregory Isaacs, Big Youth and Burning Spear. In the movie, he plays the singer of a hotel house band, (in reality Inner Circle), who are joined on drums by the film's hero, Leroy "Horsemouth" Wallace and play a live version of Inner Circle's hit "Tenement Yard".
In March 1980, Jacob Miller went with Bob Marley and Chris Blackwell to Brazil, to celebrate Island opening new offices in South America. On Sunday, 23 March 1980, Miller was killed in a car accident on Hope Road in Kingston, Jamaica, along with one of his sons. Miller and Inner Circle had been preparing for an American tour with Bob Marley and the Wailers, and the next album, Mixed Up Moods, had been recorded before his death.Wiki.
Tom the Great Sebastian
Tom the Great Sebastian was an early Jamaican sound system started by Tom Wong in 1950, named for a trapeze performer in Barnum and Bailey's circus. The group has been called "the all-time giant of sound systems" and helped launch several notable artists. Count Matchuki is generally credited as Tom's first deejay, before he joined Coxsone Dodd, and Duke Vin was one of Tom's selectors. The sound was also backed by Prince Buster. It was later known as Metromedia.
Tom Wong, half Chinese Jamaican and half African Jamaican, owned a hardware store where he played music and got started in the music business by taking his equipment out to parties. He was "widely regarded as the leading sound system of his day," and helped popularize dancehall music and sound system dance, aided in no small part by powerful amplifiers built by fellow DJ Hedley Jones. In addition to the equipment, his musical selections (many imported directly from the United States) and his originality as a DJ have been credited for his success.
Tom played rhythm and blues loved by the "ghetto folk" and music intended to attract a more upper-class audience, such as merengue and calypso. There are rumors that Duke Reid, a competing sound system operator who started four years after Tom and is credited with bringing gangland-style tactics to dancehall, drove Tom out of the downtown area of Kingston using ruffians from the Brick-O-Wall slum, but Duke Vin insists that Duke and Tom were friends and that Duke's followers never bothered Tom. The closest they came to a sound clash was a set of competing parties in adjacent yards; they never went head-to-head. Tom did, however, move away from the violence of the downtown area to the Silver Slipper club in the more upscale Cross Roads area, a move which did not harm him financially.
Tom the Great Sebastian was the most popular of the first generation of sound systems until the mid-1950s when the "big three" of sound systems rose to popularity: Coxsone Dodd's Downbeat, Duke Reid's The Trojans, and King Edward's Giant. Tom Wong committed suicide in 1971. After his death, the sound system was continued by Lou Gooden, who changed its name to Metromedia, after a record label. In 1976 it was sold again to Haidan "Jimmy Metro" James. Metromedia became one of the most popular sounds of the 1980s, featuring the deejay Peter Metro and selector Sky Juice. The sound system still operates from its Woodford Park base.Wiki.
Ernest Ranglin Retires from Live Performance
After 6 decades in music, Jamaican guitarist Ernest Ranglin has decided to retire from stage shows at the age of 83. As a thank you to his fans he has announced a farewell world tour. He will be joined by Nigerian drummer Tony Allen, UK saxophonist Courtney Pine, US bassist Ira Coleman, UK pianist Alex Wilson and Senegalese singer Cheikh Lo. Ranglin was instrumental in the birth of ska as well as being one of the world’s most respected jazz players.
Confirmed dates include
27.05 Morocco - Rabat/Mawazine
25.06 UK - Glastonbury/Festival
26.06 UK - Canterbury/Marlowe Theatre
27.06 UK - London/Barbican Center
28.06 UK - Basingstoke/The Anvil
01.07 UK - Bristol/Colston Hall
02.07 France - Lyon/Festival Ile Utopie
08.07 Germany - Berlin/Wassermusik Festival @ House of World Cultures
09.07 Slovakia - Pohoda/Pohoda Festival
13.07 Switzerland - Montreux/Montreux Jazz Festival
20.07 Turkey - Istanbul/Jazz Festival
24.07 Japan - Fuji Rock
28.07 Netherlands - Rotterdam/Parkpop
29.07 Germany - Lörrach/Stimmen Festival
30.07 Austria - Krems/Glatt & Verkehrt
21.08 Norway - Oslo/Mela Festival
31.08 France - Paris/La Vilette Jazz
03.09 Finland - Helsinki/Helsinki Festival
Story By Angus Taylor
The Skatalites
The Skatalites are a ska band from Jamaica. They played initially between 1963 and 1965, and recorded many of their best known songs in the period, including "Guns of Navarone." They also played on records by Prince Buster and backed many other Jamaican artists who recorded during that period. They reformed in 1983 and have played together ever since.
The founders of the Skatalites were Tommy McCook (died 1998), Rolando Alphonso (died 1998), Lester Sterling, Lloyd Brevett (died 2012), Lloyd Knibb (died 2011), Don Drummond (died 1969), Jah Jerry Haynes (died 2007), Jackie Mittoo (died 1990), Johnny Moore (died 2008) and Jackie Opel (died 1970). These ten musicians started to play together from 1955, when Kingston's recording studios started to develop. Tommy McCook was the first member of the band to record, though not for commercial release: he played with Don Hitchman's Group in 1953. Archie Lindo asked Hitchman to play a few tunes for his pioneer radio station, "ZQI", on their new equipment. Soon after that, sound system pioneer Stanley Motta began to operate his studio, where he recorded calypso and mento that were released on 78's. Rolando Alphonso was one of the first to record with him, probably in 1954.
Though McCook was the first in the band to record, he did not participate in the recording sessions with the other nine musicians. He left Jamaica in 1954 for a jazz gig at the Zanzibar Club in Nassau, Bahamas. He returned to Jamaica in June 1962, and began playing regular jazz sessions around Kingston.
Record producer Coxsone Dodd searched for jazz players around Kingston and was impressed by McCook's playing. Tommy McCook heard some ska, but initially resisted Dodd's offers to record and to lead a studio group, because he was a committed jazzman. In 1962 Dodd released I Cover The Waterfront (Port-O-Jam) with Roland Alphonso and Don Drummond, who did the solo and brass sections. In 1963 he released Jazz Jamaica From the Workshop (Port-O-Jam/Studio One), on which McCook played for the first time since returning to Jamaica. Don Drummond has two tunes on Jazz Jamaica and McCook has one, "The Answer".
Lee "Scratch" Perry, Reggae Pioneer, Set to Burn the Mother Down
Story by Hilary Harty...Lee "Scratch" Perry is eccentric. Not like your rich uncle who exclusively wears periwinkle blue track suits to brunch every Sunday. No, Perry's eccentricities are more organic than that, rooted in decades of building the foundation of what we now know as reggae and dub music.
Born Rainford Hugh Perry, the 80-year-old Kendal, Jamaica native has managed to do something few musicians get to do during their careers: Pioneer a new sound, produce monumental tracks that propel it to soaring heights and then burn said sound to the ground.
Back in the early '70s, after over 15 years of working in the newly christened reggae industry, Perry built a recording studio in the backyard of his Kingston, Jamaica home that would ultimately change the future of the movement. The infamous Black Ark Studios was, for all intents and purposes, a Rasta shack that slowly seeped smoke from under its feeble walls whilst the thumping of deep dub beats permeated throughout its surroundings. The four-walled palace of pot helped shape the careers of legendary reggae sound-masters like The Heptones, Junior Byles, Max Romeo, Augustus Pablo and most notably, Bob Marley and the Wailers. Perry was behind the board for all of these sessions, using his inherent skills to overdub various layers of music while creating a unique sound which would eventually evolve into dub.
Perry's style was so influential and one-of-a-kind that musicians like Paul McCartney and The Clash traveled to Jamaica to seek his musical wisdom. Some of his more notable production techniques included burying a drum at the bottom of a palm tree to get a more bass-ed sound, employing the vocal stylings of crying babies on his tracks and surrounding his boards with things like chicken wire, broken bottles and cutlery. All of these effects contributed to the success and legacy of the Black Ark studio and Perry.
But by the end of the decade, Perry was disenchanted with the once profound empire he had built. Citing stress from the constant rigmarole of having to turn his creativity on and off, Perry felt that the vibe and spirit of the studio had changed. Rumors were afoot at the time that prominent Jamaican gangsters and politicos were trying to cheat him of every last dime. Others say that Perry's sometimes flamboyant and outlandish behavior contributed to his downfall. Whatever the case may be, Perry eventually burned the studio down less than a decade after he had built it. And he burned down another one in late 2015, except this time it was an accidental fire started by a candle left unnoticed.
While the Grammy-winning sound-smith may have had worse luck with fires than most of us will have with sunburns in our lives, you can't feel bad for the man. His legacy is one that will carry on long after his last dub performance leaves you feeling oh-so irie and high-re.
Known as the "godfather of dub" by many, a documentary called The Upsetter (his infamous nickname), detailing the life of Perry, was theatrically released after a successful showcase at SXSW in 2008. In it, you see a man who had a desire to leave a cannabis-shaped footprint on the music industry from an early age, a man who many might say is crazy, but is never lazy and, most importantly, a man who has learned to embrace and accept change while still keeping his peripheral eye on his past life.
The most impressive thing about Perry, however, is that he's still writing, recording and performing. Most musicians who were active at a time when Led Zeppelin and The Who were still putting out their bests are either resolutely docile or are enjoying the fruits of their past labors. These days, you can find Perry performing with the Subatomic Sound System and using his chops to influence a myriad of newer electronic musicians. The candle that lit his musical career, purpose and dub roots has never burnt out, and it's inarguably Lee "Scratch" Perry's creative fire that has been the most important one to spark in his lifetime.
Lee “Scratch” Perry & Subatomic Sound System 40th Anniversary Super Ape Tour
$20
6pm Fri, April 29
Paper Tiger
2410 N. St. Mary’s St.
Lord Flea takes own brand of Calypso abroad
While Lord Kitchener was promoting the Trinidadian style of calypso music in the United Kingdom (UK) in the early 1950s, Jamaicans were busy at home creating their own brand of calypso which became known as mento.
It was a vibrant danceable rhythm that contained elements of rich Jamaican folk music interwoven with African melodies brought to the Caribbean by African slaves. This musical concoction was further enhanced by the inclusion of the European dance rhythm called Quadrille, brought to the islands by slave owners.
Kitchener may have been the first to take calypso into international waters, but the Jamaican calypsonian, Norman Byfield Thomas, better known as Lord Flea, also played a signficant role in helping to popularise the genre abroad. Whereas Kitchener made his mark in the United Kingdom, Flea was credited with helping to start the calypso craze in the United States and was mainly responsible for popularising the Jamaican calypso style there. His style was mento, but was marketed in the US as calypso, as many Americans weren't familiar with the name 'Mento'.
On the local scene, Lord Flea and his calypsonians originally gained increasing popularity at local nightclubs like Adastra, Success, and Desperanza, a nightclub situated close to his Regent Street residence in West Kingston (where he was born) between 1932 and 1934. Flea recorded a few songs then with local businessmen Ken Khouri and Alec Durie, before being spotted at one of his performances by the American club owner, Bill Saxon, who was in the island searching for talent to work at his Florida venue.
The guitarist/singer/composer was originally offered a six-month contract to work with Saxon in the mid-1950s. Flea took full advantage of the opportunity by creating a calypso firestorm in the United States, establishing new house records with his band, Lord Flea and his calypsonians. The exciting aggregation, which included Count Spoon on drums and spoon; Prince Charles on timballi and tumba percussions; Fish Ray - one of the earliest exponents of the walking bass technique that succeeded the rhumba box; Pork Chops on banjo; and Flea himself on vocals/guitar, created ecstatic scenes at places like The Eden Rock Hotel, The Club Calypso, The Grey's Inn, The Dunes in Las Vegas and New York's Jamaica Room.
A February 1957 review by Billboard stated that "Flea has a dynamic drive" and that his calypso album - Swinging Calypso, produced "attention-grabbing sides which can stir action at all levels".
The 1950s calypso craze was extended into the movie world when Flea and his calypsonians appeared in two full-length movies in 1957 - Calypso Joe and Bop Girl goes Calypso, in which the 'Bop Girl' mentioned in the title, was persuaded to adopt the calypso style and abandon her previous Rock and Roll leanings. In the process, Flea established himself as Jamaica's first international superstar, ahead of Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff, Desmond Dekker, Peter Tosh and others.
An exciting guitarist, a humorous writer of current happenings and a clever tongue-in-cheek exponent of rhythmic rhyme, Flea created calypsos that went to the heart of the Jamaican psyche. His landmark album, Swinging Calypso, done for the larger-than-life Capitol Records in 1957 was historic. It was the first by a Jamaican, and one of few Jamaicans, who had the privilege of being recorded by the monumental establishment.
Capitol Records viewed him then, as the answer to RCA's Harry Belafonte. On the track, Mister Give Me the Rent, from the Swinging Calypso album, Flea highlights the age-old problem between tenants and landlords. He spoke about an unreasonable landlady who offered poor accommodation - something common to tenants at the time - and one who is
"Too rude - in my affairs she likes to intrude".
No chair, no table.
This convenience is terrible.
And on the other part
no hotwater to take a bath.
In the night I sleep like a rabbit.
A dirty sheet off of a blanket
and she have the audacity to tell me I'm living in luxury".
On the track, Calypso Bee-Bop, Flea gives credit to the song and to several jazz greats like Stan Kenton, Lionel Hampton, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie, as he sang:
"This Bee-Bop music is really terrific.
I nearly went crazy, when I hear the records of Gillespie.
It really enchanted me, just to hear him play anthropology".
Although not indicating in which direction, it is understood, as Flea urges man to:
"Run, run, run, when you see a pretty woman.
When a man is in love it is so pitiful.
A woman will cover her face with wool.
Love is the common enemy,
the moon and stars is artillery.
When they attack you there is no retreat.
You won't lose your heart if you use your feet".
Some wise words taken from track number four (side 2) of the album Swinging Calypso, and titled, Pretty Woman, which was originally recorded by the legendary Edmundo Ross and his orchestra. The other two recordings of note from the album - both Flea's compositions, were Naughty Little Flea and The Monkey. The former was extensively covered, the most popular being done by the African singing queen, Mariam Makeba and Harry Belafonte. The latter saw Flea singing about the animal's habit of following him around and copying some of his actions:
"When I put on shoes, monkey wear shoes too.
I don't know what to say the monkey won't do".
Other cuts from the album were equally popular, along with others he did locally for Calypsodisc, Calypsotime, and Times record labels.
Thomas was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease - a malignant disease of the lymphatic tissues, and admitted to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, Florida where, (according to his daughter Cathie Way-Giddarie) he died in May 1959 at the tender age of 27.
Thomas' funeral procession was, at the time, the longest ever seen in Miami-Dade County.
Story via Jamaican Gleaner
RIP Lord Tanamo
LORD Tanamo, a former member of the legendary Skatalites band, died Tuesday in Toronto, Canada. He was 82.Born in Kingston and raised in Denham Town in the West of the city, Gordon was influenced by Lord Kitchener, who lived in Jamaica in the 1940s. His interest in music began at an early age when he heard a rumba box being played by local musician Cecil Lawes. He went on to perform locally as a teenager, singing calypsos accompanied by Lawes, and began performing in hotels in the early 1950s.
He first recorded for Kingston businessman and sound system operator Stanley Motta, and later recorded with a backing band that included Theophilus Beckford and Ernest Ranglin. His early hits included "Blues Have Got Me Down" (1960) for producer Emil Shallit.
Peter Tosh
Peter Tosh, OM (born Winston Hubert McIntosh; 19 October 1944 – 11 September 1987) was a Jamaican reggae musician. Along with Bob Marley and Bunny Wailer, he was one of the core members of the band The Wailers (1963–1974), after which he established himself as a successful solo artist and a promoter of Rastafari. He was murdered in 1987 during a home invasion.
Tosh was born in Westmoreland Jamaica,the nation's westernmost parish. When McIntosh was fifteen, his aunt died and he moved to Trench Town in Kingston, Jamaica. He first picked up a guitar by watching a man in the country play a song that captivated him. He watched the man play the same song for half a day, memorizing everything his fingers were doing. He then picked up the guitar and played the song back to the man. The man then asked McIntosh who had taught him to play; McIntosh told him that he had.During the early 1960s Tosh met Robert Nesta Marley (Bob Marley) and Neville O'Reilly Livingston (Bunny Wailer) and went to vocal teacher Joe Higgs, who gave out free vocal lessons to young people, in hopes to form a new band. He then changed his name to become Peter Tosh and the trio started singing together in 1962. Higgs taught the trio to harmonize and while developing their music, they would often play on the street corners of Trenchtown.[3]
The Pioneers
The Pioneers were formed in 1962 by brothers Sydney and Derrick Crooks, and their friend Winston Hewitt. Their early recordings "Good Nanny" and "I'll Never Come Running Back to You" were self-produced at the Treasure Isle studio using money lent to the Crooks brothers by their mother and appeared on Ken Lack's Caltone label.
Several other singles followed, none of them hits, before Hewitt emigrated to Canada in 1966. Hewitt was replaced for around a year by former Heptone Glen Adams.
The Pioneers' early singles were not successful, and Sydney began promoting concerts, while Derrick took up a job with the Alcoa bauxite company. The group broke up in mid-1967.
Reggae legend Jimmy Riley passes away
Reggae legend Jimmy Riley passed away at midnight ET, surrounded by family, after a long and brave battle with cancer. an indelible contributor to Jamaica's legendary 60’s era of music, and an essential part of Jamaica’s legacy of legendary vocalists, and sweet harmonies as a member of both The Uniques and The Techniques. our condolences to his loving family, especially Jimmy’s son, brilliant reggae singer Tarrus Riley- who brought his dad on stage with him for his final public performance last year in New York City’s Central Park- while he was on the 'Catch a Fire Tour' organized by The Marley family. We will always miss Jimmy’s voice, his smile and genuine warmth. rest peacefully, Jimmy Riley via SirusFm TheJoint.
Martin James Ziggy Norman Riley also known as Jimmy Riley was born in Jonestown, Kingston, Jamaica on 22 May 1954, Riley grew up in the city's Waterhouse district and attended Kingston Senior School along with Slim Smith. When Smith had success in The Techniques, Riley hung around with the group hoping to join, but was limited to carrying things for them and helping out with harmonies. He decided to form his own group, The Sensations, along with Cornell Campbell, Buster Riley (brother of The Techniques' Winston Riley), and Aaron "Dego" Davis. The Sensations had a successful audition for producer Arthur "Duke" Reid, and the group had mid-1960s success with "Everyday is Just a Holiday" and "Those Guys". On leaving the group in 1967, Riley joined Smith and Lloyd Charmers in the re-formed Uniques, having huge success with songs such as "Watch This Sound" and "My Conversation".RIP
Happy Birthday Lee "Scratch" Perry
Not much information about Perry's early life is known. He was born into poverty, and later moved to Kingston, Jamaica to pursue music. It is here where he apprenticed at Studio One and worked various other jobs until ultimately going off on his own to pursue his own musical interests.Perry's musical career began in the late 1950s as a record seller for Clement Coxsone Dodd's sound system. As his sometimes turbulent relationship with Dodd developed, he found himself performing a variety of important tasks at Dodd's Studio One hit factory, going on to record nearly thirty songs for the label.Disagreements between the pair due to personality and financial conflicts led him to leave the studio and seek new musical outlets. He soon found a new home at Joe Gibbs's Amalgamated Records.
Freddie McGregor
Freddie McGregor is one of reggae’s most durable and soulful singers, with an incredibly steady career that started all the way back in the ’60s, when he was just seven years old. Since then, he’s spanned nearly every stylistic shift in Jamaican music, from ska and rocksteady to Rastafarian roots reggae to lovers rock (his particular specialty) to dabblings in dancehall, ragga, and dub. Not just a singer, he wrote some of his own material, and grew into an accomplished producer as well. McGregor’s heyday was the early ’80s, when he released several high-quality albums and reached the peak of his popularity in Jamaica and England. However, he remained a strong presence on the reggae scene well into the new millennium.
McGregor was born in Clarendon, Jamaica on June 27, 1956. At age seven, he started singing backup for a local ska harmony duo called the Clarendonians (naturally, with the nickname of Little Freddie McGregor). the Clarendonians recorded for producer Clement “Coxsone” Dodd’s legendary Studio One label for a time, and when they split in the mid-’60s, McGregor teamed up with ex-member Ernest “Fitzroy” Wilson to form a new duo, Freddie and Fitzroy. They recorded several single sides, including “Why Did You Do It” and “Do Good and Good Will Follow You.” McGregor stayed at Studio One for much of the ’70s, working as a session drummer and backup singer while developing his own vocal style, which owed much to smooth, Philadelphia-style soul. He sang lead for groups like Generation Gap and Soul Syndicate, and also recorded off and on as a solo act during the ’70s, though always in the singles medium. During this period, he began writing some of his own material, including songs like “Go Away Pretty Woman,” “Tomorrow Is Like Today,” and “What Difference Does It Make.”
HAPPY BIRTHDAY HORACE ANDY
TODAY IS HORACE ANDY'S DAY - BORN FEBR.19 1951
Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Hinds recorded his first single, "This is a Black Man's Country," in 1967 for producer Phil Pratt.[1] "This is a Black Man's Country" failed to make an impact, and it wouldn't be until 1970 that he achieved a breakthrough. After unsuccessfully auditioning at Coxsone Dodd's Studio One as a duo along with Frank Melody, he successfully auditioned on his own a few days later.[1] Dodd decided Hinds should record as Horace Andy, partly to capitalise on the popularity of Bob Andy, and partly to avoid comparisons with his cousin, Justin Hinds, with whom his singing style at the time showed a resemblance.[1] "Got To Be Sure", the song he had auditioned with, became his first release for Studio One. The following two years saw the release of further singles such as "See a Man's Face", "Night Owl", "Fever", and "Mr. Bassie". One of Andy's most enduring songs, "Skylarking", first appeared on Dodd's Jamaica Today compilation album, but after proving a sound system success, it was released as a single, going on to top the Jamaican chart.[1] The next few years saw Andy regularly in the reggae charts with further singles for Dodd such as "Something on My Mind", "Love of a Woman", "Just Say Who", and "Every Tongue Shall Tell", as well as singles for other producers such as "Lonely Woman" (for Derrick Harriott), "Girl I Love You" (Ernest and Joseph Hoo Kim), "Love You to Want Me" and "Delilah" (Gussie Clarke), and "Get Wise", "Feel Good", and "Money Money" for Phil Pratt. Andy had a second Jamaican number one single in 1973 with "Children of Israel".[1] Andy's most successful association with a producer, however, was with Bunny Lee in the middle part of the 1970s. This era produced a series of singles now regarded as classics such as a re-recorded "Skylarking", "Just Say Who", "Don't Try To Use Me", "You Are My Angel", "Zion Gate", "I've Got to Get Away", and a new version of "Something on My Mind".
LEE PERRY 40 YEARS SUPER APE TOUR
40YEARS SUPER APE TOUR
LOVE AND FUN
£€€ $UPA APE PERRY
18.3 METZ ---------- FRANCE
19.3 ANTWERP ----- BELGIUM
20.3 PARIS ----------- FRANCE
21.3 BARCELONA - SPAIN
22.3 BiLBAO --------- SPAIN
23.3 BERLIN --------- GERMANY
24.3 MUNICH -------- GERMANY
25.3 LILLE ------------ FRANCE
26.3 DORTMUND--- GERMANY
27.3 DARMSTADT - GERMANY
31.3 MARSEILLE -- FRANCE
TICKETS
http://www.bandsintown.com/Lee%22scratch%22Perry
RARE 1978 REGGAE ROOTS STYLE DJ SOUND SYSTEM
RARE 1978) REGGAE ROOTS STYLE DJ SOUND SYSTEM
Posted by Leandro Almeida on Tuesday, May 5, 2015
Bob Marley - Roots, Rock, Reggae
Music Video By Bob Marley Performing Roots, Rock, Reggae
from the album Rastaman Vibration
Studio album by Bob Marley & The Wailers
Released (30 April 1976)
Recorded (Harry J. Studios, Joe Gibbs Studio, Kingston, Jamaica, late 1975–early 1976)
Label Island
Tuff Gong (reissue)
Producer Bob Marley & The Wailers
Rastaman Vibration is a reggae album by Bob Marley & The Wailers released on 30 April 1976. The album was a great success in the USA, becoming the first (and only) Bob Marley release to reach the top 10 on the Billboard 200 charts (peaking at number 8), in addition to releasing Marley's most popular US single "Roots, Rock, Reggae," the only Marley single to reach the Billboard Hot 100 charts, peaking at No. 51. Synthesizers are featured prominently on this album, adding a breezy embellishment to otherwise hard-driving songs with strong elements of rock guitar. This is one of the three Wailers solo albums released in 1976, along with Blackheart Man by Bunny Wailer and Legalize It by Peter Tosh.
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