Sly Dunbar (henceforth: Sly) died for (Western) common standards quite young at 73 years of age, yet he reached an older age than another known Reggae drummer Lincoln “Style” Scott, dying at only 58 (in 2015). Or of Sly’s bass-playing steady companion Robbie Shakespeare, dying in December 2021, at the age of 68.
Always sad when a person passes away, influential on some people’s or even many people’s lives. The latter is the case with Sly Dunbar, often dubbed as one of the “architects” of Reggae, helping to shape it. The sadness of mourning relates to the previous feeling of “taking someone for granted”, while appreciating the presence as living among us.
Death, especially when unexpected and relatively young, always comes as a negative interruption. People who had close and more distant (professional) relationships with Sly, in these days close after his passing, have written several tributes, obituaries, or biographies, emphasizing his importance for Reggae, and sad loss.
PROLIFIC
Sly was in fact one of the most times recorded Reggae musicians, contributing with drums to many, some say around 200.000(!) Reggae songs, especially since the later 1970s, also as producer, such as for Black Uhuru and Ini Kamoze. As drummer, Sly thus played drums on countless songs by all the big names in Reggae: Gregory Isaacs, Mighty Diamonds, Wailing Souls, Junior Delgado, Dennis Brown, Black Uhuru, Gladiators, Peter Tosh, Viceroys.. too many to mention, and spread all over Reggae, maybe less with bands or artists having their own “steady” drummer (as Carlton Barrett was for Bob Marley, Burning Spear had long another steady drummer), or worked more with session bands like the Roots Radics - with other (also great) session drummers, like Style Scott, or with Santa Davis, or Leroy “Horsemouth” Wallace.
These other drummers tend to have an own, mostly recognizable style, I find. Somewhat generalizing: Carlton Barrett perfected the smooth “one drop” rhythm with the Wailers, Santa Davis included African and Latin flourishes in his drumming, Style Scott hit the snare hard and played “metronomic”, while Horsemouth included relatively many (drum) side and rim(click) additions .
I find a specific “own” style of Sly, however at first more difficult to recognize. He was certainly influential, and had his own approach and style, yet it was often “subtly” there. Perhaps because he was so prolific and spread throughout Reggae, Sly’s style became more difficult to distinguish, having partly shaped Reggae, after all.
CHANNEL ONE
Of course, Sly was also important for my personal experience of Reggae, even for my developing taste, also because he was very prolific as session drummer as well, especially for the Channel One label since around 1975, one that I am more or less a fan of. It had that early “Rockers” sound, and the “clarity” of the “per instrument” sound gave another feel than (the also great) Studio One recordings, having a more amalgamated, “drowned” sound due to older technology.
Older, yet prestigious, as Studio One received the equipment from the famed Motown label in the US. Cool, but several instruments had to be recorded at the same time at Studio One, at the cost of specific clarity of each instrument, not least the drum. At Channel One instruments began to be recorded separately, and clearer sounding. It was since then also that the snare accent on the 3 (of 4/4) became clearer.
Channel One started in the Later 1970s, around the time Sly began drumming for recordings, having recorded before already with e.g. Niney Holness and Bunny Lee. Before this, he played already with bass player Robbie Shakespeare in the “club circuit”, and in tourist areas in Jamaica. His earliest recording was, by the way, for Lee Perry’s Upsetters label when he was only about 12, recommended to Perry by Ansel Collins.
Not much use repeating here what’s said on his Wikipedia page, or elsewhere and in recent tributes. I only will select in this post just some aspect of Sly’s musical biography with regard to the “recognizability” of his drumming style. Preferably aspects not well-known to the wider public, from more obscure or specialized sources.
On later Channel One recordings, Sly became quite prominent within that clarity of sound, since the Late 1970s. His drumming style was deemed innovative, experimental, but also – in a sense – “commanding”, shaping the song along the vocal part. Sly said in an interview for the ‘Modern Drummer’ magazine (August 2012) that beyond just playing drums, he was also “performing”, while listening to the whole song.
ROCKERS
Important additions by Sly contributed – quite known – to the Rockers sound, and derived Steppers sounds: the earliest precursors – with the Rub-a-Dub Style – to early Dancehall music. It added a bass drum on the One of each (4/4) bar, and sometimes on each beat, making it more “militant” or “military”.
From this developed later Dancehall riddims as originally a “faster” Rockers riddim – a higher BPM -, mostly a matter of a speedier tempo, but also accents, notably digital accents in modern Dancehall, thus by-passing live drummers. Still, Sly originally created the Rockers sound largely, with extra bass drum on the One (alongside the standard accent on Three), becoming a period a popular sound, with Gregory Isaacs’ Night Nurse being an example that is best known, though in my opinion many Rockers songs from the period (say, around 1980) are better than that one, even by Isaacs himself.
Sly’s “co-performing” explains something of his drumming style, but what I as said struggle a bit with is: what exactly was Sly’s own drumming style? I enjoyed it, sure, but only sometimes I delved into deep analysis or detailed description of it, often regarding a specific song.
This implies that I find that style hard to recognize. Sly’s drumming seemed however commanding, but also adaptive, to the songs, changing thus accents or styles. That makes his style more difficult to recognize.. at once..
INFLUENCES
Sly named as his influences various drummers, from Philadelphia Soul and other US Black music, to Ska (Ska drummer Lloyd Knibb), other US and Jamaican drummers, yet.. he also studied African music, to learn about shaping a danceable groove. He likes “groove”, Sly said in the 2012 Modern Drummer interview. In this sense, I think this meant that he did not do many (interchanging) fills, which he says in the same interview, choosing to focus on the nuances within the maintained flow. (you dig?, haha).
Another Reggae drummer I paid tribute to on this blog, Style Scott, when he just passed away in February, 2015 (blog post of that month), had some distinct characteristics in his style. What’s interesting, is that Scott learned drumming (partly) by watching/copying Sly’s drumming, as he said in interviews. While Sly said he learned in part from earlier Jamaican drummers, like Lloyd Knibb, Carlton Barret, Santa Davis, a.o. Generation after generation..
Style Scott’s drumming style was very tight and metronomic, with relatively hard hits on the snare, and – as some find – “slower” than other Reggae drummers . Variations on main patterns/grooves were there, certainly, but standing out all the more within his “tight” (and slower) style.
That’s maybe a clear difference with Sly’s style; of course also tight enough, but with more nuances within patterns, and perhaps more flexible than Style Scott’s style. That combination of “tight” and “flexible” fits Reggae well, rooted in both “straight” Central-African rhythms, as of “swing” based US music (Jazz, R&B).
AND ROBBIE
I wrote something about the “Sly and Robbie” sound in a blog post of mine, namely about bass player Robbie Shakespeare’s passing in 2021. I included Sly in this, but focused in that post more on Robbie.
That’s another problem with recognizing Sly’s style: he was most known as part of a well-known “rhythm tandem” with Robbie Shakespeare, often seeming inseparable. They combined well, but also influenced each other, as Robbie’s bass lines were often relatively “melodic” and full, interrelating with Sly’s drum choices.
SYNTH
Sly & Robbie clicked well musically, grew together musically since quite early in their career (meeting in 1972), creating a solid, groovy sound, sometimes slightly funky, over time modernizing the previous Early Rockers era in Jamaican Reggae music (1976-1983), with added synth drums and other “modernities”. Especially in later Sly & Robbie (1982 and later) contributions or productions, such as for Black Uhuru (albums like Chill Out), or their own albums, the synth tom recurred regularly, becoming another typical feature of Sly’s style, distinguishing him with that experimenting from other Jamaican drummers, less using synth drums/sounds. Also the Sly & Robbie-produced (and of course –played) “hit” of sorts, Herbman Hustling by Sugar Minott, - from around 1985 - had these modern, synth aspects, while still recognizable as Sly & Robbie.
The groove was after all always tight and strong, and somewhat commanding, though, modern additions or not.
Therefore, it’s often easy to remember bass lines from Sly and Robbie-played songs, like Ini Kamoze's 1984 song Wings With Me (later transformed into a “sing over” Riddim instrumental Rootsman, such as for Chronixx’s “club hit” Here Comes Trouble), or e.g. England Be Nice. Or on several Black Uhuru songs. Strong steady rhythms from a coordinated bass-drum duo, the Sly & Robbie bass-drum tandem.
Still, Sly’s contribution to that is not easy to discern, but there and influential, both in steady and nuanced aspects of “the groove”.
JAMAICAN REGGAE DRUMMING
Not least important – certainly in Reggae – Sly’s use of the hi-hat and other cymbals should be honorary mentioned as at least helping to define the specific Jamaican Reggae sound, hard to copy abroad. The hi-hat is important in that, alongside the snare or rim accent, but more drummers, even before Sly and at Studio One, had interesting, engaging hi-hat patterns, adding both syncope/polyrhythm and danceability: Winston Grennan, Leroy “Horsemouth” Wallace, Santa Davis, and Carlton Barrett. That was just the Jamaican Reggae drumming “tradition”, you can say, those hi-hat accents.
CRASH CYMBAL
Sly at least continued that Jamaican drumming style, but rather than expanding on it, he “tightened” the hi-hat patterns, sometimes restricted them a bit, but this tighter structure had as goal an important contribution of Sly to Reggae drumming: the crash cymbal, and its use.
Both the hi-hat and crash cymbal are crucial in Reggae drumming, too essential to neglect. Yet, according to some sources, it was Sly who decided to use the crash cymbal "peak/high-point" more effectively, at the end of a cycle, usually signaling the Chorus after it. He normalized this.
Maybe it’s also good to say that Sly not only “performs” the song along with the artist/singer, but also “structures” the song. He drummed “tight”, not in the sense of “metronomic” (applying a bit to Style Scott’s drumming), but rather in the sense of “structure”, orderliness, making a song more appealing throughout, its dramatic development, etcetera.
ABROAD AND BEYOND
The Jamaican drumming style with roles for hi-hat and crash cymbal, besides the drums/toms, is hard to copy abroad. Some at least try, Reggae bands in the Netherlands, Britain, Germany, France, and US, but often in a simplified manner, not per se “bad”, but not of the Jamaican standard, or benchmark. “Textbook lesson” hi-hat triplets are played often by drummers in Europe and US, but as such can become boring throughout a song, and an added “polyrhythm” (in hi-hat variations) can improve the mood. Less stiff, more African. Nicely rounded off at the end of verses, at the right moment, with a Crash cymbal to announce the Chorus the rhythm goes into. Like a “peak” upon possession by some spirit, followed by dancing in a trance, as in some African folk belief traditions.
Clearly, this is an African retention, still practiced in Vodou, Santería, Kumina, and in parts of Africa itself.
Many Rastafari adherents, however, condemn “Vodou”-like religions as backward, or even evil, witchcraft. Sly sympathized with the Rastafari movement, though he did not say much about it, but that’s his right. Anyway, the Rastafari combine a Biblical focus with a focus on Africa, also culturally. “Possession” in the literal sense (Shango, Yemayá, or Papa Legba/Ellegua – as in Santería and Vodou), is only replaced by a metaphorical “possession” now with music and rhythm, but also by a feeling within. The “Soul” of sufferers singing (James Brown defined “soul” as the word “can’t”). In other words: real music.
The drum and rhythm participate in that, as part of Sly’s “co-performing” and “structuring” style.
Somewhere in all this I now wrote, a specific “Sly” style of drumming can be recognized or discerned.
CONCLUDING
All I know is that he drummed on many great Reggae albums and songs I enjoyed, many that I have listened and danced to as Reggae fan. Many, many great songs. It influenced me – when I drummed on my own compositions, for instance – in many ways, I myself don’t fully realize. I practiced (trap) drumming on songs Sly drummed on, that also, though not exclusively.
When I drum a Rockers pattern (e.g. for an own recording), or use the “climactic” crash cymbal for a song, I know it’s part of Sly’s legacy.
That wider, influential legacy – perhaps subtle, yet present –, in shaping Reggae and drumming, - is something to be proud of, significant for all Reggae fans, and what I thank Sly for.
That legacy remains..
