Fantan Mojah : reflections

Jamaican Reggae artist Fantan Mojah’s recent passing (14th of July, 2026) is one that I relatively strongly “felt”. It was moreover premature because he was only 49 years old, in fact a few years younger than me. Recently he was dealing with heart condition problems, that was known. Still, relatively young, and a pity.

REGGAE CLUB HITS

I know several of his songs, well-known in Reggae scenes all over the world, including some “Reggae club hits” such as Hungry, Only Jah Love, Stronger, Murderer, and especially Rasta Got Soul, and further some collaboration tunes, such as Dem Nuh Build Great Man (with Jah Cure). I heard them in Amsterdam (Netherlands), where I live.

With such hits at dances or in clubs, Fantan Mojah made quite a name of himself as artist among Reggae fans internationally, as a representative of the “New Roots” current, often with Bobo Ashanti affiliations, like Capleton, Sizzla, Anthony B. and others..

The ‘Bobo Ashanti’ are one of the “mansions” (branches/subgroups) within the Rastafari movement, known as relatively strict and disciplined. Prince Emmanuel Charles Edwards played a founding role in it in 1958. Other Rastafari adherents in Jamaica belonged to the oldest Nyabinghi order (since the 1930s), or the more liberal Twelve Tribes (founded in 1968, by Vernon Gad). Members of these separate “mansions” – as they are called biblically – all have influenced Reggae music and its lyrics, especially since the 1970s.

NEW ROOTS

The new “conscious Reggae current” (“New Roots”) since the 1990s was for some reason relatively strongly influenced by members of the Bobo Ashanti mansion within the Rastafari movement, including thus Fantan Mojah whose debut single Hungry was released in 2004.

As Rastafari sympathizer – and lover of conscious Reggae music – I appreciated this new Roots Reggae current by the likes of Sizzla, Capleton, Anthony B, and others, and enjoyed their music, and could agree with the lyrics (mostly).

I still wondered, though, why specifically this Bobo Ashanti branch/mansion within Rastafari became so influential in this later stage. I heard suddenly references to Prince Emmanuel I in newer Reggae, more than in older Reggae, wondering who that was.

Soon I found out, of course, that Prince Emmanuel was the influential founder of the Bobo Ashanti mansion in 1958, a mansion I little by little got to learn more about, due to a curiosity triggered by these newer Reggae artists. A bit older than the Twelve Tribes of Israel mansion (founded in 1968), but newer than the “organic” or “original” Rastafari movement represented by the Nyabinghi order.

RASTAFARI MANSIONS

Even if in some sense divisive within the movement, the history and time-frame behind these Rastafari mansions is interesting. Nyabinghi – known for the heart-beat drumming – arose more or less organically with Rastafari as movement itself in Jamaica (since the 1930s), the Bobo Ashanti was as said founded by Prince Emmanuel in 1958, and 10 years later, in 1968, the Twelve Tribes of Israel mansion was founded by Vernon Carrington (Gad). The latter was thus founded in the “hippy”, “flower power” time in the Western world, but I am not sure whether this reached Jamaica.

There have been travel between Jamaica and the US (migration, tourism, touring, seasonal work) at that time too, of course, as well as mass international media, but either way: there are for some reason similarities in Twelve Tribes views with what people consider “flower power”: progressive, “left-wing”, open- and free-minded, equality across races and gender, but also differences. The Twelve Tribes associated itself also with Biblical Christianity, albeit in a very free way. The “hippies” in the West (Europe, US, etc.) – on the other hand – tended to follow such Flower Power movement precisely because they left behind that Christian, small-minded doctrine of their parents or teachers (be it Protestant and Catholic). There are still some parallels, as also among Protestants and Catholics there arose people who maintained that faith but in a looser, hippy-like way, such as in the Netherlands where I grew up. Some left more conservative, religious (protestant, catholic) political parties for one with more progressive, left-wing views, mixing it somehow. Also the concert venue Paradiso in Amsterdam was – as still visible inside it - once a Church (of a relatively liberal protestant order), but changed in that Flower Power era since the late 1960s, even selling marijuana/weed inside. Sign of the times.

I myself adhere to Rastafari tenets in my own personal way, so do not get stuck in tribal, or divisive thinking: the organic history and the drumming and natural living focus of the old Nyabinghi order appealed to me most, also because it mostly lacked a strict hierarchy. Twelve Tribes had appealing aspects (open-minded progressive, socialist thinking) – at least to me, because of my background - , but also some side-paths I was less interested in (astrology etc.). But to each his own.

BOBO ASHANTI

What ticked me off at first when I learned about the Bobo Ashanti/Shanty mansion, now, was its strict nature, including separation of the sexes, hierarchy (with priests), and taking the Bible too literally, to the point where it loses its deeper sense (in my humble opinion). This translates into sometimes irrational life rules, some limiting/degrading females, we already know too well from other world “religions” (Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, etc.). Conservatism with no sense, to put it in some way. The uneasy relationship between men and women - wanting to separate them, or keeping women subservient - also seemed not really intelligent or mature to me, giving evidence of either male insecurity, or sexual frustration, which maybe some good psychological counseling can help resolve.

The (scholarly) article ‘Rastawoman as rebel: case studies in Jamaica’, written by Imani M. Tafari-Ama, part of the collective volume ‘Chanting down Babylon : the Rastafari reader’ , published in 1998, says specifically about Bobo Ashanti (quoting Tafari-Ama):

“The House of Rastafari is divided into many mansions {……] Patriarchal dogmas all encountered in all realms, and one exists with them – or in spite of – them. One mansion that most clearly organizes around differentiation of roles is the Bobo Shanti […] where gender differentiations, especially as they relate to sexuality, are pronounced”..

BIBLE

Some Rastafari adherents I know found the Twelve Tribes “too Christian”, but the Bobo Shanty are no less Biblically based, even taking more literal its texts. This can even be seen as a unwitting Eurocentric aspect as when Protestantism arose, with the founder Martin Luther in Wittenberg, Germany in 1517, and after spread throughout especially Northwestern Europe, the focus on the “literal” Biblical text was emphasized by Luther, with book printing available, now to be read by each believer. This was Luther’s response to the (in his view) “corruption” by Catholicism’s “intermediaries” (priests, cardinals, the pope, etc.) interpreting it for the masses (often illiterate), but the Bible texts were by the early Protestants often taken very literal and authoritarian, in line with vested interests. This ruined Protestantism’s “free-thinking”, individualistic potential from the start; individualism seemed only valued for material well-being (making money, allowing interest on loans, etc.).

According to Max Weber, Protestant values historically enabled eventually what we call “capitalism”, but unfortunately (religious-wise) not really “free thinking”, but more a moral sense of superiority just for knowing what is said in the Bible.

When Britain colonized Jamaica (capturing it on the Spaniards in 1655), Britain was already a proud Protestant nation, and this (unwittingly) influenced also the Afro-Jamaicans, up to the Rastafari movement, as it – as Mutabaruka pointed out – had to be based (first in the 1930s) on something they knew: e.g. British Christianity as colonial legacy in Jamaica. This is thus even noticeable within such “literal” Biblical influence in Bobo Shanty, who otherwise are Africa-focussed, and call for Black separatism, and living apart from Western Babylon. Ironic, but historically explainable, as so many contradictory issues.

My personal opinion is that the Bible is mostly not to be taken literally, but metaphorically – alongside other perhaps useful writings, world wide -, that all individuals (whatever gender, race, class, o.o.) are equal despite Babylon system's interests, and that Jah lives within each individual, that we should live healthy lives in balance with nature, and that Marcus Garvey and Haile Selassie are pivotal figures in the Rastafari movement, and Africa – and its history - as continent important.

Mostly these aspects seemed shared among all the mentioned “mansions”/branches within Rastafari, so I did not really bother aligning myself with one in particular.

Still, some chose to, including recent and earlier Reggae artists. Bob Marley was associated by some with Twelve Tribes, but neither he seemed to pick consequently any preferred mansion. Dennis Brown the artist also was associated with the Twelve Tribes (in a concrete manner too, community work, etcetera), but seemed to be quite loose too.

TRUE ARTISTS

Maybe the psychological conundrum is that interesting (musical) artists have to have strong, unique personalities – and Reggae luckily knew many of those – which is hard to combine with tribal “group” thinking, with set rules and hierarchies for belonging. Or living as too "disciplined" for that matter. True artists think free.

Rastafari tends after all to value “thinking for oneself” too, as also sung by Burning Spear (on e.g. It Is Good). Burning Spear is also one of those artists who mentions the Twelve Tribes in his lyrics here and there (his “hit” Columbus, for example), but further seems loose and “above” such divisions.

Fantan Mojah thus came to prominence in the Reggae world a bit after Bobo Shanty-adherents Sizzla and Capleton, who came with conscious Reggae since the 1990s, and like them, Fantan certainly had good songs, and a distinctive, intriguing voice, capable of transmitting both militant and more “soulful” messages. He (like Sizzla and others) surrounded himself with Jamaican Reggae musicians who knew how to play it, or sang on extant, but good and timeless “riddims” (instrumentals).

An interesting difference is that Fantan Mojah did not engage much in (digital) Dancehall, as his precursors Sizzla and Capleton partly did more, remaining mostly in the Reggae realm, only in some later songs.

I did not really notice much of the Bobo Shanty vibe I spoke about in his songs, in the sense of making his songs different from e.g. artists without that alliance, apart from mentioning Prince Emmanuel I, as Fantan Mojah does in some songs. Several songs of Fantan Mojah are truly spiritual in a broader Rastafari sense, for instance, others broader militant.

MARCUS GARVEY

AI (advanced Google as I see it) claims that the Bobo Ashanti place Marcus Garvey at a higher level than the other mansions, just praising Selassie. Bobo Ashanti claim to uphold a trinity of Haile Selassie, Marcus Garvey, and Prince Emmanuel . This has doubtful aspects.

I heard Marcus Garvey being mentioned and respected in several Rastafari-inspired Reggae artists (Burning Spear!), also by non-Bobo Ashanti. That Prince Emmanuel takes the liberty to place himself in the company of two great, revered figures by Rastas - and to be equally revered - seemed a bit an ego trip to me, and not very modest. This puts me a bit off, as it reeks of a “cult” around a self-aggrandizing person.

This, combined with a hierarchy, (male-led!) separation of sexes, and some women-unfriendly practices – considering menstruating women as “impure” and therefore to be separated from men – further made me take some distance to it, sticking to the old Nyabinghi order of Rastafari, developed as organically as nature itself, combining it perhaps with selected “progressive/hippy-like” ideas (as also in Twelve Tribes) fitting my personal (family) background, or with aspects from the devoted energy of the Bobo.

Still, I did not get an unpleasant “strict” or “zealot” vibe from most songs of Sizzla, or Fantan Mojah for that matter, I liked. After all, they had many fun-loving and party songs lyrically, also about marijuana, and positive lyrics about peacefully living together.

It is said that even stricter than the other mansions, Bobo Ashanti maintain that smoking weed is strictly meditational and “never” for fun or recreation. A strange contradiction – good fun is in my opinion also in a sense “meditational” . This “pure for meditation” use is formally upheld, yet conflicting with some “ganja (marijuana) as fun” lyrics by Sizzla, Anthony B, Capleton, and other Bobo artists.

As individual artists they don’t take it all so strict or literal, apparently, which I appreciate. Else lyrics become “pushy” and “preaching” in a wrong way. I seldom have that with the “new Roots” with Bobo Ashanti dominance.

They, including Fantan Mojah, tend to express their Rastafari faith in a pleasant, accessible manner lyrically, with good musicianship and songs. So, not as conservative “tight-asses” bothering us with their authoritarian, rigid world view. Only here and there (regarding homosexuality, sexuality) some strict or intolerant views came to the fore, as became known of Sizzla.

Funny, how Capleton – in response to critics – said that “fire” or “bu(r)n” references in lyrics, even “burn battyman/gays” – are meant metaphorically, not literally.

Some of the stricter views of Bobo Ashanti, however, derive from taking the Bible, with ancient Hebrew prescriptions taken more literal than in other branches of Rastafari.

SELF-SUFFICIENCY

Bobo Ashanti also live more separate from society than the Twelve Tribes, known to just participate in (Western) society, when inevitable (“normal”, Babylonian jobs), while the Bobo Ashanti strive to self-sufficiency, in own communities. The best known is that at Bull Bay (about 16 km east of Jamaica’s capital Kingston), known as “Bobo Hill”.

This aspect of self-sufficiency appeals to me more, as both “big business” and “big state” in the Western (Babylon) world, have proven to be oppressive, and continu to be today, with new “scams”, like covid, war/military industry, digital ID, control, etcetera, added to their continuing neoliberalism and neocolonialism.

My mother told me that “if people know that you are dependent on them, they will abuse you..”. So for Black, African people in a White-led Western society and economy, self-sufficiency is certainly a good idea. It also is in line with Marcus Garvey’s views, even if outside of ancestral Africa, to which repatriation remained an aim.

The mental strength of trusting in one’s own capabilities might explain the energetic ambitiousness, and work ethic, of some Bobo Ashanti artists, making them dominate the “New Roots” of conscious Reggae music: less diluted by “society” or commercial demands.

RESPONSE TO GANG CRIME?

My personal hypothesis is that I relate it to the risen gang-related and gun-crime in Jamaica since the 1980s. The risen popularity of the “strict”, disciplined mansion of Bobo Ashanti within Rastafari, might well be a response to the inner-city “chaos” of crime, violence, and slackness – especially since the 1980s in Jamaica -, demanding a fierce response, separating from a society enabling this, by way of own communities, such as the one at Bull Bay by the Bobo Ashanti: less temptations of crime there. Thus, Bobo artists like Sizzla came to the fore by the 1990s.

In the end it is – on the other hand – an individual process, guided by individual wisdom. Malcolm X had a chaotic, opportunistic life of crime before he went to jail and joined the (also strict and separatist) Nation of Islam (NOI), but became influential not because he belonged to the NOI, but due to his strength of character, “charisma”, and shown and uttered wisdom. NOI members eventually turned against him, as is known, so “collectivistic group thinking” is not the way. Many criminals in recent times converted to Islam in prison – known in current times in England, for instance - possibly influenced by Malcolm X’s story, often even from non-Muslim backgrounds (e.g. Caribbean), but many of them lacked the personality to be anything more than “wannabe’s”, or even worse, continued with crime thereafter.

VERSATILE

Also an artist like Fantan Mojah clearly seemed to have an own free mind and strong personality, showing in his versatile songs and lyrics, including militant, socially critical, spiritual, emotional, and joyful – in other words broadly “human” - vibes, that resounded well with his and Reggae fans. For that reason, he had many “hit songs” in the Reggae scene, internationally..

LYRICS

Having mostly "conscious" lyrics, attacking injustice, poverty, "Babylon" or spiritual tunes (praising Jah), for good measure Fantan Mojah also made some nice, catchy love songs, often also making it "to the clubs and dances" as well (e.g. She Makes Me Feel So Nice).

Capleton was the one who more or less guided Fantan Mojah in the Reggae music industry, also giving him the name Fantan Mojah, after he embraced Rastafari. Before that Fantan (born Owen Moncrieffe) named himself Mad Killa, after artist Bounty Killer.

His "slave name" Moncrieffe sounds a bit "French", but is originally Scottish (region Perth) and Gaelic, pointing at the specific origins of the European family who once owned his family during slavery days, of course. In the British Caribbean about 70% of the slave owners originally came from England, and about 30% from either Scotland or Wales.

Fantan Mojah has a bit more love songs than his "mentor" (in part) Capleton, who has few. I thought once none, but in time I found out that also Capleton made some love songs. Of course their own choice, but perhaps no extreme is good: only lovey dovey songs? are there no social problems in this world?, or: no personal feelings or love songs? are you not a person of flesh and blood? The balance seemed in this regard okay with Fantan Mojah..

VOCAL STYLE

I personally like several songs of him, noting good musicianship (good Jamaican instrumentalists, including the drumming for a nice, danceable groove) – albeit often on known riddims - and catchy melodies, as well as intriguing, “wailing”, round and thunderous vocals with a unique energy, both for conscious tunes or occasional love songs. Songs with varying themes, from “Babylon a Murderer” to “When Will I See You Again”, therefore equally convinced.

Difficult to compare Fantan Mojah’s singing voice, though it has some similarities with Pressure Busspipe, or with new artists like Stranjah Miller. A slight “tunnel” feel, one might say.

His vocals can be seen as part of the “sing-jay” realm, increasing its popularity within Reggae since the 1990s: chorus melodic/sung, while the verses are dee-jayed/chatted/toasted more rhythmically. Fantan tended to vary melodically, though, even within such verses, also in “tempo” or pace. This added variation and intensity..

LEGACY

Songs that – due to good musicianship – never seemed to grow old, such as his most famous song Reggae Got Soul, which I heard many times in Reggae clubs (Café the Zen in Amsterdam, when it still existed, up to 2020), perhaps hundreds of times, but still I repeatedly enjoyed it. That is a sign of enduring quality.

I met Fantan Mojah in Café the Zen, Amsterdam (Netherlands) in 2017, when he gave there a small-scale “club concert, a kind of intimate one among fans, which was nice as change from the big venues (e.g. Melkweg or Paradiso in Amsterdam) where thousands of people fit, or on festivals. The intimacy gave a “community sense” to the songs we knew – I would even say: more meaning - , differing from the anonymity or (in part) commercial artifice of big venue-concerts. Money talks too loud, there.

After this Café the Zen “club” show in Amsterdam, he stuck around in Café the Zen and partied along with us to Reggae from a selecta/deejay played, and took photos with audience members. Nice vibes. (photo underneath: I-man with Fantan Mojah in 2017)

I saw shows by him in bigger venues too, such as the Melkweg, Amsterdam. The last time being in January 2025, with a good show, with some of his classic songs and club hits coming across well, with not too much interruptions or “flow breaks”. Little did we know this would be his last concert there, though it was known he had health issues.

Fantan Mojah leaves behind several good and catchy Reggae songs with good, positive messages. The dee-jay/selecta “tributes” and mixes made of his songs recently appearing online (e.g. on YouTube) testify to that. Also an older one, at https://youtu.be/fj77YLxJ5rM?si=aGyFTY1wopGqd4cf , by DjEasy mixmaster, I can recommend.

I have no specific favourite songs of Fantan Mojah as such, though among them would probably be Tell Lie Pon Rasta and Murderer, both engaging in their Rasta militancy and tune-wise, or the vocally varied Jah Time. More songs I like, though.
Rest In Eternal Power.

Recognizing Sly's Style

As recently the well-known and influential Jamaican Reggae drummer Sly Dunbar deceased (26th of January, 2026), a tribute seems fitting. Especially on this blog of mine, where I earlier discussed musicians and artists at that time just passed away.

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..

Troubled identification with Jamaica in reggae lyrics

Reggae music is of course for some time now a main “export product” of Jamaica, and especially since Bob Marley’s fame put it on the global map, since around the 1970s.

There is however one historical elephant in the room, or maybe an inherent contradiction: Reggae is Afro-Jamaican music, that arose among those who descend from Africans who were brought once forcibly to the island Jamaica, had to work as slaves, and remained in poverty on that island. There is thus a problematic identification with the nation of residence.

The same applies of course to all other Black music genres in the African Diaspora, from the US, to Cuba, Trinidad, Colombia, Brazil, and other former colonies, later becoming known for internationalized music. About 70% of what we call “Salsa” is in fact based on Afro-Cuban musical structures – with clear Congo retentions -, to which in New York were added influences, often also from the African Diaspora (Dominican Merengue or Afro Puerto Rican Bomba). Calypso (Trinidad), Blues (US), Samba (Brazil): also all created by descendants of Africans, in a place where they were brought by force.

This is an existential problem, shared throughout the African Diaspora, yet in different ways. Even if, say, countries like Trinidad, Brazil, or Cuba, seem celebrated proudly in lyrics as one’s home, the tragic undertone remains somehow there. Unease remains.

TRAUMA

That tragic undertone is the trauma. In essence, “trauma” can be defined as “losing control” of the situation, and in a sense “inaptitude”. One’s people did not choose to make Jamaica their home, but were pressured to do so, with a lot of abuse. Music helps to remind of the African roots, so that the tree growing can bear good fruits, even in alien soil, to quote Marcus Garvey (more or less).

The human rights abuses, violence, and deaths that came with trans-Atlantic slave trade and plantation slavery, added to the existential problem. After deracination, came dehumanization, and marginalization. Music genres developed among poor Black people answered that, contrasted that with roots, humanity, and self-expression.

REPATRIATION

This existential problem is shared throughout the African Diaspora, but in the case of Jamaica, that trauma of deracination or displacement, has been answered more manifestly with the Garvey movement – Back to Africa -, and the related Rastafari movement, since the 1930s.

Jamaica was and is for most Garveyites and Rastafarians not the ideal place for African-Jamaicans, who should according to them repatriate to Africa. They belong there. The sensed urgency of this repatriation might however differ per person.

While Marcus Garvey attempted in earnest to set up a steamship line to bring people back to Africa – the Black Star Liner – in the US after 1917, it was sabotaged and eventually ill-fated. More sabotage than mere “bad management”, as some claimed it to be.

Within the Rastafari movement, repatriation remained a goal, that seemed somewhat “stalled”. Poorer early (Rastafari-adhering) Reggae artists could simply not travel, whereas later Reggae artists making some money, maintained a lot of loyalties within their island of birth, Jamaica, or migration destinations (US, Canada, Britain). Only a few Reggae artists actually made repatriation efforts to Africa as such, some moving (partly) to African countries: Rita Marley being a known example in Ghana, while other Reggae artists bought land and property in parts of Africa (e.g. Sizzla).

This “back to Africa” focus of the Garvey movement and Rastafari is the most outspoken contrast to the initial trauma of forced displacement: (re)taking control of one’s lot again, as solution to the trauma. In theory to start with, as hopeful vision and, perhaps, consolation..

Elsewhere in the African Diaspora - outside of Jamaica - the same existential trauma is more implicitly referred to.

In Jamaica itself – after all a racially “majority Black” country - , some recent voices call for “Africanizing Jamaica”, instead of the unrealistic – or at least seemingly impractical – repatriation of Africans back to Africa. This cultural Africanization was however already happening all along, and at most will entail some policy changes in the higher circles of society, often more symbolic than anything else. The majority view among Rastafari adherents in Jamaica seem to still be repatriation, returning to the African homeland.

REGGAE LYRICS

Of course, Reggae music has been strongly influenced by the Rastafari movement, especially Roots Reggae (old and new), evident in lyrics, with a maintained Back To Africa focus, real or symbolic.

It seemed to me interesting, therefore, to study how (especially) Rastafari-adhering Reggae artists discuss their island of birth, Jamaica. Is there some sensed connection or sense of belonging with Jamaica?, or is the message that one is essentially just “stuck” there, still trying to make the best of it, while thinking of ancestral Africa?

With the recent hurricane called Melissa in 2025, causing destruction in parts of Jamaica, the sense of community and connection with the island as location was again put to the fore (and test), as rebuilding was required.

Rebuilding a Jamaica where you never chose to be in the first place, but had been made into home, also by your own direct ancestors.

The history of slavery is recalled a lot in Reggae lyrics, wherein Jamaica figures as “plantation island” where Africans taken from Africa lived in slavery, and later “ghetto island” where Africans lived in poverty. Jamaica forms part of larger "Babylon" (the corrupt Western world) in many Reggae lyrics. Of course this is all from the poor people’s perspective, excluded from high society.. or even middle-class society: the sufferers and ghetto dwellers, creating Reggae.

Other lyrics - dealing with current events, or later epochs – showed a broader connection with Jamaica, but mostly also one that is also “tainted”, as inequality between haves and have-nots persists. In many Reggae lyrics, from the 1970s to now, gun violence and crime, are added problems for identification with the island, for ghetto residents, also with a “class” aspect.

This became clear already when Jamaica became independent: especially some well-connected politicians, or Afro-Jamaicans with higher positions, exhibited an opportunistic sense of Jamaican identity and connection, aligned then to one’s position of relative power within the political system. The “Uncle Tom”-effect, you can say, or “Boasy Slave” in Jamaican parlance.

This is also critiqued in Reggae lyrics, such as the patriotic, national slogan, Jamaica had a while: Out Of Many One, in e.g. Mutabaruka’s lyrics. This slogan was copied from the US, but ill-fitted the Jamaican situation, where over 80% of Jamaica is mainly of African descent, so the other of the “many” get a privileged status, it seems. Indeed, minorities like the Chinese, Lebanese, Europeans, and to a lesser degree East Indians, are up to the present economically disproportionately powerful and wealthy within Jamaica.

Reggae lyrics by Rastas, therefore, when dealing with Jamaica include this critique and – one can say – alienation, and dreaming of Africa and Zion. This tragedy at the very least renders great musical art: as James Brown once said “soul” is the word “can’t”.. and Reggae Got Soul, as songs by Toots & the Maytals and later Fantan Mojah are titled.

CULTURE

“Celebrating Jamaicanness” – the other extreme - is found less in Roots Reggae lyrics, but is not absent, even vowing “never to leave it” songs by Eric Donaldson, Admiral Bailey, a.o.). Yet, even among Rastas, as a “cultural” rather than a “political” nation, Jamaica is appreciated: music, food, daily customs, family and friends, specific drinks, parties, specific towns/areas, natural landscapes, but also Jamaica as birthplace of cultural movements with global impact (Garvey, Rastafari, Reggae, a.o.) putting small Jamaica on the map, offering some sense of pride.

Even Sizzla is quite positive about developments – or at least freedoms – within Jamaica on his song In Jamaica.

The quite recent “club hit” The Voices Of Sweet Jamaica at the celebration of 50 years independence of Jamaica from British rule, in 2012, also celebrated food, natural beauty, and culture.

Chronixx has a nice, nuanced vision on Jamaica in Smile Jamaica, as some other Reggae artistes too (like Tarrus Riley, Etana, Jah Cure, a.o.), including mostly the historical existential unease.

Most of the more “conscious” Reggae lyrics (old and new) tend to emphasize the social problems within Jamaica, at most praising cultural resilience. Jamaica equates an involuntary lot or burden to overcome. It appears as such in lyrics of songs by Morgan Heritage, and earlier Culture, Peter Tosh, Hugh Mundell, Junior Delgado, Twinkle Brothers, Bob Andy, or even Bob Marley, the most internationally well-known Jamaican. This accentuates the problematic, conflictive relation, calling for wanting to go “home” (Africa)..

LATIN AMERICA

It also shows, on the positive side, the relative lack of censorship and free speech in Jamaica, and lacking social pressures, compared to other places in the Americas, where Africans ended up, and have less channels to express grievances, than in Jamaica. These grievances and inequalities are certainly there in places like Cuba, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, and Brazil, where – as also documentaries by Henry Louis Gosset jr. (Blacks in Latin America) showed - , Blacks/African descendants remained on the lower rungs of society, among the poorest.

In dictatorships like Cuba, this even caused some censorship problems and persecution problems of Afro-Cuban artists with direct criticism in the lyrics on the regime or inequality. Some artists in Latin America, like Cuban rappers, resorted therefore to more covert lyrics and “code words”, to express grievances, when questioning that myth of “racial, mixed democracy”. This also applies in Brazil, being the country outside of Africa with most people of African descent, but presenting the world a “mixed, equal” image, to hide actual race-based poverty and discrimination (also in e.g. police killings disproportionately of Afro-Brazilians in Rio de Janeiro).

GOOD AND BAD

Natural beauty in parts of Jamaica – certainly present – is also mentioned in both Reggae lyrics and earlier by Marcus Garvey in his writings on his growing up in rural St Ann. When I visited, I personally also liked the lush, tropical landscapes of parishes of Jamaica, like St Ann (where Marcus Garvey and Bob Marley were born) – more hilly -, and St Thomas – more mountainous – in Eastern Jamaica. I saw beautiful landscapes there.

Crucially, local living or “culture” is celebrated in such Reggae lyrics positive about Jamaica, more than nationalism. Nationalism, like patriotism – as the –“ism” ending suggests – serves often “politics and (economic) power” goals from élites, and thus top-down. It might influence those lower in the hierarchy, but remains partly artificial.

Culture is by contrast from the bottom-up, as folk culture is what you get when common people are left alone, to their own devices.

You don’t celebrate adversity, but how you “overcame” it, simply said.

Tellingly, the artist Ijahman Levi called Jamaica his “culture country”, where Marcus Garvey was from.

Burning Spear has a song “Land Of My Birth” (“I love you..”), and on his latest album a song called Jamaica (praising its culture), whereas Island In The Sun (rhyming with “fun”), appears in lyrics by group Israel Vibration, and others, quasi-positively, while also some places in Jamaica are described with some mild affection, such as Kingston, Montego Bay (a song by Queen Ifrica), Spanish Town (by Chronixx), or Negril, an affection mostly shaped because of friends or family there.

The mostly Rootical/Rasta group the Itals also have a nice, jolly song about Jamaican style of living and dances.

ALIENATION

The many good Reggae songs, also about this theme of alienation or connection with regard to the nation Jamaica, furthermore go interestingly against the Nazi-doctrine of “Entartete kunst” ..

When the Nazi’s took power in Germany in the 1930s, and turned it into a fascist and racist (Germanic supremacy) dictatorship, it entailed censorship of certain art forms, not fitting the national-socialist party line of Germanic superiority, and being too foreign, non-German, racially impure (made by Jews), or “entartet”, which is the German word for “degenerated”. This art thus deemed was condemned openly then banned, by that regime.

What Reggae – and other music and art in the African Diaspora - proves is in fact the contrary: art being valuable as precisely an expression of alienation and being deracinated, therefore all the more soulful and powerful.

More so than just confirming conservative cultural norms in closed communities, with lack of creativity and innovation, remaining safely on the well-trodden paths, to please the authorities. This occurs when people have not been displaced by outside forces, and remained in the same land as their ancestors, practically since years BC, only with some admixtures. Stagnation sets in those cases inevitably in. More travelling and persecuted groups like Jews or Gypsies had to be more creative with their art, yet those were precisely seen as “undesirables” in Nazi Germany.

To a degree, also more historically “mixed” Mediterranean nations (also culturally) like Spain (with a Moorish past), France, or Italy have this less than dominantly, more mono-ethnic Germanic or Slavic countries elsewhere in Europe, giving some more space for creative artistic periods in Southern Europe. Yet, also Vienna in Austria at the time of Mozart, was more multicultural than the rest of Austria, while also Amsterdam and Antwerp (and London) had long an international, “tolerant” image, enabling innovations, though at first mostly economically motivated, it increased variety and openness.

Jamaica was a British colony, and inherited more the Germanic/Northern European sense of “racial purity” and racial connection to a specific land, that the Spanish colonizers had less.

From the start, as even racist, ruthless colonizing conquerors following Columbus to the Americas, like Pizarro and Cortés, soon accepted racial mixture between Spaniards and present Amerindians, even allowing on occasion the mixed offspring some of the inherited power and material inheritance.

In British colonies, and the US, racial purity, segregation, and strict inequality was however more the norm, whereas societies like Cuba, Brazil, and others boasted earlier a “mixed” identity.

This more “mixed identity” in Latin America, proved on the other hand often however hypocritical in light of actual racial inequalities, - as already mentioned -, that persisted in places like Cuba and Brazil, where people of African descent, especially when darker-skinned, remain among the poorest of all groups, and descendants of Europeans among the most powerful and wealthiest. Up to this day: even the in name progressive and anti-racist Communist Party of Cuba, is mostly disproportionately “lilly-white”, or at least Spanish-looking, in its higher echelons.

Similarly, in Brazil, only very light Mulatto might obtain some political power, further the domain of also “lilly white” (European-descended) people, with only in sports and music (Pele, for instance) some status for Afro-Brazilians, similar to the situation in the US, for that matter.

NATIONALISM

US comedian Roy Wood jr. had an entertaining bit about the “conflicted relations” of African Americans with the US, inhibiting them from writing truly “patriotic” songs about the joy of being from the US, - as some White US artists did -, but instead created the lamenting Blues.

This more or less applies to Jamaica as well, and to elsewhere in the African Diaspora, especially in light of persisting racial inequalities, also in e.g. Colombia. The national projects simply went from colonial to postcolonial projects, any popular input in achieving or fighting for independence soon sidelined. Nationalism became an élite thing in the Americas, much more than in Europe.

Many borders in Europe developed historically in a rather haphazard manner (or through royal interests), hardly ever conscious political projects, though a shared ethnic base and history procured a sensed affiliation, even with political leaders. Italian unification – led by Garibaldi – seemed a project, but covered uncomfortably many regional identities within current Italy, and to a lesser degree also German unification.

Still, a sense of being where one historically belongs is present among most European nationals (and in Asia and Africa), resulting in stability and self-assurance, as well as arrogance.

My personal prediction in Late 2020: that the whole Covid virus ordeal or “scam” (according to opposers of it) impacting societies and limiting usual freedoms globally, but especially in Western countries, starting around March 2020.. this would (I predicted) increase nationalistic tendencies, rather than global rebellion. It is not my genius, but rather my knowledge of history that made me predict this well.

While political leaders in Italy, France, Germany, or elsewhere - both on the Left as on the Right – pay lip service to “patriotism”, their alignment with global élites is also evident, mostly for power and economic reasons.

Some right-wing popular movements or political leaders contest this with sometimes even xenophobic nationalism, and simplistic and generalizing “anti-migration” stances. Not positive, but showing that the “national belonging” is sensed and ancestral, with “outsiders” becoming intruders. Outweighing – harshly – global inequality or shared injustices.

This never developed as such in the Americas, only a bit more in more racially mixed societies like Brazil, Cuba, Colombia, or the Dominican Republic, where nation or a vague “Latino” identity becomes a substitute for uncertainty of identity, almost by necessity. This is not without creativity, and even understandable, but the “depth” of the connection with the nation should not be exaggerated.

I have met Cubans and Colombians of mixed race, knowing more or less of a Spanish ancestor, a Chinese one, and African one, and even where from in China, Spain, or Africa. I met a quite dark-skinned Cuban woman once in Cuba – adhering to Yoruba Santería btw –, who asked me if I have ever been to Asturias, as I was half-Spanish. I answered that my mother was more from the Southwest of Spain (close to Córdoba), and Asturias was rather in the North of Spain, having only visited it once. Apparently one of her ancestors came from there. She was mostly of African descent, though, so mixtures differ.

Anyway, the focus remained in the cases of people with mixed ancestry worldly and international, which in itself helps to keep an open mind, and makes identity less “strict”. Yet also more insecure.

FRICTIONS

While the result of a largely tragic history of inequality and exploitation, this “looser” national identity in the Americas is not without its merits. It avoids “redneck”-like small-mindedness and xenophobia, that even hides behind the “subtle” racism now common in Western Europe, or more open variants of xenophobia in parts of Eastern and Southern Europe.

The cultural friction with the also proud Islamic adherents - present among migrants - caused increased tensions and misunderstandings, as both in England as in the Netherlands – for instance – anti-migration parties – called “racist” by some, e.g. the National Front in Britain, or the Dutch Centrum Democraten, soon shifted their focus from people from the colonies of another race (but at least speaking the language and adapted in some ways), to the increased group of Muslim migrants, increasing in number.

This cultural friction is maybe lamentable, but to a degree universal, as such frictions are also found in mixed American and Caribbean societies, e.g. Guyana. There is then only no connection to "sacred" patriotism for the country, where one’s ancestors are after all not even from, but is more a matter of cultural frictions or irritations.

Reggae lyrics therefore also address the dominant influence of Chinese finance in Jamaica (Kabaka Pyramid in the song Well Done, or Vybz Kartel’s Poor People Land), partly in line with tourism promotion, sideling the local population, benefitting thus less from tourism. Kabaka Pyramid states that politicians “sell out the country” Jamaica, for their own gain.

This happens also in parts of Africa, along with neocolonialism trough the banking system (IMF), seemingly rendering repatriation to Africa as an idealistic, yet unrealistic daydream.

In a very recent song (late 2025), Kabaka Pyramid has a quite positive song about Jamaica as “sweet”, even stating as nowhere better, and its culture.

ONE’S GEOGRAPHICAL ROOTS

One - maybe - can “feel at home” in places where one’s (geographical) roots are not, especially when among one’s own people and family. The lack of a deeper connection need not to inhibit happiness.. or does it?

One may be satisfied somewhere else in the world, even a place nothing to do with their family, yet sense on occasion a lack of purpose, or “tranquility” and “security”. For that reason, most people when arriving in places where their roots lie – especially the first time – tend to sense stronger emotions than they thought, which some even describe as a combination of goose-bumps and tears. Migrants know how this feels, when returning to their native countries.

I recall from my youth that when once driving to our Spanish family for holidays - from the Netherlands where we lived -, my Spanish mother was reading or sleepy when driving through France, in the back of the car my Italian father drove, but that my mother started singing merrily when she knew we crossed the Spanish border. I found that funny – knowing how she was - , but my father mumbled something like “too proud and patriotic, always, those Spaniards”.

I had, however, similar feelings when arriving in Spain after some time, in different epochs of my life: recognizing accents, looks, names, knowing my ancestors lived there, gave me a special feeling of “calm”. I missed that growing up in the Netherlands. Afro-Americans – even mixed-raced ones - visiting for the first time Africa, have that even stronger, often with overwhelming yet satisfying emotions. There was after all a real trauma to resolve, based on slavery and forced displacement, lacking even the semi-voluntary aspect of migration.

One can be happy without that actual connection with one’s geographical roots, I imagine, yet to degrees, perhaps missing a dimension to make it perfect. On the other hand, humans have always travelled and migrated, so that is also humanity and fulfillment of another kind. Traveling, but then “back home” – or at least the promise of it , and totally by free will! - seems even more satisfying and consoling, as the Jamaican and Rastafari cases show. It helps heal the historical trauma.

Africa as home remains also in modern Roots Reggae lyrics, therefore. In some parts of Africa, the Islam is also quite dominantly present, or strict Christianity, not necessarily welcoming of a Rastafari people “influx” from the Caribbean. Luckily, some African countries, often heralded as “Zion”, and the main place of return for Rasta’s, like Ethiopia or even Ghana, have showed some tolerance for this migration, and do not know so much religious (Islamic or Christian) extremism, allowing tolerance. Ethiopia's Muslims tend to be relatively "mild" or moderate nowadays, some Ethiopian friends of mine told me.

Still: there are vested interests there, as shown in conflicts in Shashemane land in Ethiopia: a territory emperor Haile Selassie set aside for Africans in the diaspora for settlement, and a group of (Rastafari-adhering) Caribbean migrants indeed settled there. A land conflict with local Oromo people arose there, however, causing some tensions, as there were earlier with Ethiopian Communist and later governments, long (about 40 years!) even withholding Caribbean Rastafari-adherers in Shashamane recognition as national citizens, up to only about 8 years ago.

Still, repatriation as proposed within the Rastafari movement – and still in Reggae lyrics – is in theory not impossible, as the history of mankind shows, sometimes even led by leading “prodigal sons”, wishing to improve their country of origin, as a way to honor ancestors, in some way. It is by itself redemptive of the historical trauma, as I pointed out.

It is therein that I think that the “enduring wisdom” of Marcus Garvey’s “back to Africa” approach, inherited by Rastafari, lies.

IDENTITY

Elsewhere in the African Diaspora, - notably the US - fake, somewhat forced “identity politics” (rigid yet simplistic black-white distinction) has taken this place, with a less clear, often inherently contradictory direction. In Latin America however, African cultural and racial presence is as indicated more often “drowned” in a carnivalesque mix, which may seem pleasant or realistic, but is inherently infantilizing and patronizing as well, especially in less-democratic contexts. The goals seems all too clear to “depoliticize”, and defuse any rebellion.

On the plus side: the latter openness to local mixture makes all rigid, ancestral “national identity” relative and malleable, thereby allowing an open mind and flexibility, and avoiding parochial mindsets, rigid xenophobia or racial thinking, all too common elsewhere. This openness contributed to rich, and fascinating cultures in places like Brazil, Cuba, and elsewhere, including recognizable African retentions.

On the down side: one is more dependent on higher-placed others in a set location and on shaped conditions of inequality and poverty, for lacking another place of one’s own where one actually belongs, and the protection and consolation this provides. This is undeniably an existential need, that is then ignored and denied.

Interestingly, much Reggae expresses Rastafari views (repatriation, Afrocentricity, spirituality), along with serving as the “true, popular newspaper” of local conditions and problems, rather than the mainstream news in most countries, driven eventually by élite, upper-class interests, hidden or not.

Reggae lyrics seem to encompass both these spectrums (African roots and local conditions), in my opinion, even allowing a healthy “open doubting”, which makes one not only more “intellectual”, but I think also more fully human, “realer” as person. It also makes “art” – which includes music - more profound.

The latter might even have attributed to the international appeal of Reggae, since Bob Marley, who had deep lyrics about this, in simple language. Identifiable language and lyrics of a searching, spiritual individual, later found among many more Reggae artists, from Alton Ellis, to Culture, Burning Spear, Dennis Brown, Ijahman Levi, the Mighty Diamonds, Morgan Heritage, Luciano, Sizzla, Bushman, Buju Banton, and countless others. That spiritual searching can also be called “soul”.

NOI, Garvey, and beyond

Funny how things go..

As I got into Reggae music around my 11th year, and since then learned more about the associated Jamaican culture, “Black Power” as such I first encountered in Marcus Garvey and Reggae lyrics.

Yet, around the same time (Late 1980s), more US influence came through television and mass media, in the Netherlands. Hearing about Malcolm X, the Nation of Islam, Minister Farrakhan, and movements where Rappers belonged to (5% nation), I initially thought they were “trying to imitate” Jamaicans, or – nicer said – “were inspired”, by e.g. Marcus Garvey, or even Rastafari.

I was even right, to a degree. The influence of Marcus Garvey – active in the US since 1917 into the 1920s -, and his movement, were present in all these US Black Power movements, including the Nation Of Islam (NOI).

Yet, they worked out in different ways. As I later focused on Malcolm X as person, the Nation Of Islam became a backdrop, though I still learned something about the NOI, and its ideas.

There were also differences with Garvey, I noticed. For one, Garvey was not a Muslim, but neither (as a Christian) religiously aimed: his goals were social and political, keeping religion more in the private sphere, though still criticizing “pro-White” religious teachings in general.

Beyond this: what are the differences between the Nation Of Islam, and e.g. Rastafari, why ‘Islam” , Black nationalism, etcetera?

A good excuse, moreover, for me to study the Nation Of Islam more in detail, for comparing, with what I have studied already in detail: connecting knowledge I acquired, personal reflections.. the synthesizing essence of the “essay”, in short.. While learning myself along the way..

NATION OF ISLAM

My knowledge about the US organization the Nation Of Islam (henceforth: NOI) was – to be honest – “medium”, and here and there sketchy. Reading more and more about it, I saw more dimensions: “zooming out” or “bird’s view”, to put it in either digital or pre-digital terms. I could compare better with what I have read about and by Marcus Garvey, and general history.

Tellingly, the aspects in which the NOI differed from “mainstream Islam” were aspects that shared similarities with Garvey and Rastafari, but also with ancient African folk beliefs. While the Islam is seriously adhered to, and even seen as the “original religion of Black people” (which – IMHO – is at least a debatable claim, though some want to believe it), at the same time the NOI’s Islam serves similarly as Catholicism once did among Yoruba African slaves in Cuba and Brazil in colonial times, simply as a mask and “front” to hide own beliefs.

STORIES

Own interpretations, deviations are all parts of “story telling”, and history of mankind has taught us that a “good story” can connect masses of people to external, then internalized, goals. For better or worse, certainly. The Bible being a prime example. Also Fascism, Communism, and other totalitarian regimes, – after all - had stories that convinced many, to bind the populace.

There’s a lot of quite imaginative “storytelling” within the NOI I noticed, with several story lines, creatively describing the history of mankind and races. Originally, in the NOI’s teachings, Whites were a race created by an evil scientist on a Greek island named Patmos (strange detail..), lacking all virtues of the original (Black) man, and having only vices and wickedness in them, therefore at one time banned by the supreme being to Western Asia (actual Europe) to live in caves. This view was later sidelined, but was also what Malcolm X was taught, as he entered the NOI: whites were a race of devils.

Absurd?, maybe; racist?, probably; vindictive?, certainly.. but still a creative and powerful story, in some sense. Of course, more nonsensical stories can be found within the NOI, as well as some more positive and plausible ones. In essence, that is the same with the Bible. The strength of Christianity lied in the engaging story: it convinced, and was well-written. The Bible had good, thrilling “plots”.. But.. is what the Bible relates all true, did it really happen? Some scientists doubt that, even beyond the obvious absurdities like Moses splitting a sea, or Jesus walking on water. It is still a good story/plot, and culturally interesting. Moreover: it is of course about the “symbolic” value, the metaphorical meanings, not to be taken literally. Some fools do, though (in all religions).

The latter also applies to the NOI, in my opinion, interesting cultural response through stories/storytelling, but in this case a clearer symbolic, and “social” role and response, namely to the racist conditions and inequalities disfavoring Blacks in the US. That gives it a dynamic, “activist” vibe. One of self-protection, making it more understandable, and – in a sense – more benign.

MAINSTREAM ISLAM

The interesting “off-shoot” of the NOI, “the Five-Percent Nation”, founded in 1964, in the 1970s growing among Black youths, was also nominally Muslim, but strayed even further from mainstream Islam as such. Its (the Five-Percent Nation's, as well as the NOI's) views of Black self-sufficiency and pride are echoes of Garvey, whereas their idea that each Black man is a god, goes toward the Rastafari concept of “I and I”, e.g. God/Jah “within man” (inna man).

Likewise, the NOI has a different view on the “afterlife” than in mainstream Islam, emphasizing more to live good today, with Rastafari adherents having similar ideas, though probably earlier in time. This allows a more activist stance during one’s actual lifetime, more seeking one’s rights while living.

This sets Islam as older (and Arab) religion apart from such later emancipation movements. Islam began as an ideological religious movement among some Arabs on the Arabian peninsula, and became a spreading, conquering religion.

The Garvey movement and NOI were mostly occupied with finding and defending oneself, one’s own group. Seemingly, the Islam served to give “structure” to such goals, for the NOI, while Marcus Garvey kept religion out of his movement, though considering himself a Christian (first Methodist, later Catholic).

Religion is essentially “power”, else it would be a loose spiritual movement, so adding Islam to Black Power probably provided that power base.

For the same reason, though more gradual, the Early Rastafari adherents, largely fitted their views in a Biblical context, and Christian world view, as common in Protestant-dominated Jamaica. A sense of stable power.

Garvey, however, focused on economic organization and international organization of all Black people as source of “stable power” for the UNIA movement. Though not just that: Garvey left religion out of it, but origins certainly not: Africa as Black motherland became equally a (desired) power base, once freed from colonialism.

Therein lies the crux of the difference between the NOI in the US, and the Garvey movement, of which Rastafari can be seen as a branch: the role of Africa, the motherland/continent of origin.

BIGGER WHOLE

Marcus Garvey famously and eloquently said: “ I won’t give up a continent for an island” (meaning Africa for Jamaica). This was later quoted in some Reggae song lyrics by Rastas.

This answers to common human, psychological needs to belong to “bigger wholes”, which is healthy when it is natural. Unhealthy when it is fiction, and only effective for so long, crippling over time, as it alienates someone from oneself.

That psychological need for “a bigger whole” was among the NOI answered by the Islamic faith, after abandoning the “repatriation goal” to Africa, while recognizing the African roots as (merely?) “something of the past”. That is less natural, and not even historically totally correct. Islam originated on the Arabian peninsula by Arabs, then spreading with armies conquering toward North Africa, further into Asia, and even reaching parts of Europe (Iberia, Sardinia, and Sicily).

The connection with Africa – of Islam - is therefore more indirect, as the North African countries “converted” to Islam, were before that Christian, without even European imposition.

This is a fictional element that need not be destructive for a movement, but is nonetheless distracting from truth. Only focusing on the truth secures a strong, lasting foundation.

Eventually, the NOI “gave up on the continent Africa”, as in its pleading for separatism, and a separate homeland for African Americans, it meant (even explicitly stated) a separate state for Black people “on American soil”.

Another key difference, thus, with Garvey’s UNIA movement, which kept aiming at repatriation to an independent Africa. The Rastafari movement in Jamaica, one of the heirs to the Garvey movement maintained that.

AFRICA

Is one Black Power movement therefore better than the other? Mutabaruka describes Rastafari as a “Black power movement with a theological nucleus”. In itself true, but when comparing – as I do now – with the NOI, a word should be added: “with an OWN theological nucleus ”, namely on Haile Selassie – many Rastas consider divine - and Ethiopia, while reinterpreting the Bible. NOI copied an Arabic religion, adapting it also a bit to its own needs, but maintaining its tenets and banner.

The abandonment of a focus on Africa in the NOI started quite early in the movement. The NOI claims that the early precursors of the NOI were the enslaved Africans who were Muslims in parts of the US. A reference to Africa, where parts in the wider Sahel region – from Senegambia to Northern Nigeria -, were Islamicized earlier by Islamic invaders, mixed in within the local culture. This occurred before English, French, Portuguese, Dutch, and so on, got their slaves from there.

While it is true that Africans from those Islamic areas ended up in the US – even relatively more than in Latin America -, they were still not the majority among enslaved Africans in the US, who mostly had other “religions”, “beliefs”, spirit/nature religions before Christianized. The Mississippi Delta was a region in the US South where relatively many “Senegambia/Guinea/Sahel” Africans ended up, having an interesting echo in the Blues, and guitar playing (and the swing/shuffle feel).

Another caveat is that – as many who travelled through different parts of the Islamic world can tell you – that Islam in African countries like Guinea, Senegal, Mali, parts of Ivory Coast, northern Nigeria, Cameroun, parts of Burkina Faso, etcetera, is evidently an own, local, “free” interpretation of the Islam, especially when analyzed beyond the superficial “main pillars”, upheld there too (5 times prayer a day, no alcohol, women dressed with veils and modestly, no public nudity/sexuality, fasting, diet, etcetera). Islam is in Guinee/Sahel Africa mixed with own African traditions. Also among, e.g. the Hausa (a quite numerous ethnic group, also in neighbouring Niger) in northern Nigeria, although a violent Islamist group like the Boko Haram seeks to enforce a stricter Islam.

While – musically - the Mississippi delta Blues, and “swing” in other US Black music styles echo and reflect the heritage that Africanization of Islamic influences (like e.g. “string” instruments) of the rich Guinea region “griot” (travelling musicians) tradition, the Nation Of Islam (NOI) apparently did not attempt such a cultural Africanization, even over time leaning more to the “Orthodox Islam”, the original “Arab model”, so to speak. This also came to the fore in the Malcolm X movie by Spike Lee.

AFRICAN CULTURE

What about more historically accurate alternatives, one might ask? Just like among some Rastas, directly African-derived spirit religions, surviving now in Haitian Vodou, Santería (Cuba), Candomblé (Brazil), or Obeah (Jamaica), known “spirit possession” religions seem to be viewed as backward and “devilish” within the NOI.

Among Rastas, Haile Selassie, and “old” and indigenous Ethiopian Christianity seemed a better foundation, or just some Biblical/Christian aspects “from an African perspective”.

This disdain of Vodou-like actually African religions within some Black Power movements is interesting for its connotations. Of course it relates to a cultural inferiority complex, because of the colonial and slavery past. It also has to do, however, with an already mentioned “stable power base”, and the idea of/believe in "one supreme God". The old-fashioned, rather conservative views on male-female relations within the NOI and (to a lesser degree) among some Rastas – with the man as “head” of the household, women serving him and dressing modestly and behaving sexually conservative, of course are also found in the Bible and the Quran (and Hadith: extra, oral accounts of Mohammed). Stable, strong families, must be the idea, but with a patriarchal structure of male dominance, even bordering misogyny at times.

There’s the idea that matriarchy – or mother/female dominance within families – within Black US (and Jamaican) culture arose from the disruption of family ties due to slavery conditions. This is partly true. Many of the enslaved Africans, though, came from areas in Africa with quite matriarchal, often polygamous cultures, even with polyandry (one woman having several men), and loose relations between even those sharing children. The “extended family” was in such cultures much more important than that Western “nuclear family” idea. Partners (even sharing children) often even did not live together (separate places for women and men, with occasional, let’s say “visits”, haha).

This was the case in many societies from Southern Ghana to Central Africa, which the Islam reached less. North of it (the Sahel zone), remnants of this were somehow fitted in Islamic male patriarchy standards.

In short, male dominance was originally not the family culture in much of Africa, also parts where many slaves came from (percentages dependent on colony: Ghana, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroun, Congo, or Angola).

Some historians even claim that colonizing Spaniards of the time of Columbus were more patriarchal culturally than Yoruba or Congo men in that time, ending up as slaves in Spanish colonies (often brought and sold by other Europeans), or many Amerindians, due to Spain’s religious (Catholic and Moorish/Islamic) conquest history, both upholding male patriarchy and “machismo”.

Further relevant facts: the enslaved Africans in Jamaica came for over an estimated 40% from the (non-Islamic) Ghana region, while Afro-Cubans in nearby Cuba for about 40% from the Congo region, and in also nearby Haiti Africans from the Benin/Togo area were dominant..

To the US went/were brought quite some Senegambian and Guinee-region slaves – Islamic-influenced before -, but also many from non-Muslim areas (many from Igboland, Nigeria, for instance).

The legitimacy of choosing the “Islam”, by the “Black Power movement” NOI, seems thus weak, at best. The NOI thus chose mostly fiction over reality. This is dubious, in my opinion. It betrays political, hidden goals, without knowing what’s hidden.

Reality is the African origins, from which African Americans (and Afro-Caribbeans, of course) were forcibly taken. Reality is however also “cultural heritage”. Culture is very much neglected in political discourse, probably because it is “feared” as too free and liberating for the masses, especially folk culture.

Rastafari is reasonably connected to culture, also to African retentions in Jamaica. While an African retention like Obeah is by some criticized as “devilish” magic, African remnants are in many small and big things in Jamaica, with a “Western” or British superficiality, or even influence, but always mixed.

The connection of Rastafari with Jamaica’s rich musical tradition (and notably Reggae), and Bob Marley’s global fame, brought Rastafari influence in Reggae music, and more African-derived percussion, for example. Subtly woven through Reggae music (and its precursors), the African polyrhythmic and harmonic musical heritage has, by the way, always been present and essential to it.

In addition, the “back to nature” focus of many Rastafari-adherents, with communal self-sufficiency and natural living, also draws on African traditions, long-lost in most of Europe and the Western world since its modernization and industrialization.

The NOI also has acquired economic power and ownership of businesses – along Garvey’s lines –within Black US, but simply fitting in the US capitalist society, without even much of a “cultural” change.

These contradictory aspects in the NOI were forgotten with extremely communicative and intelligent leaders like Malcolm X, keeping it together.

IDENTITY

In time, however, the “slippery slope” of “identity” politics slipped in the NOI, with as effect a superficial and political “identity”, totally detached from (lived ) culture stemming from an actual history. This can have – temporarily – a beneficial, emancipatory effect, but can go terribly wrong, especially with totalitarian regimes. After all, the German Nazi’s had as political identity “the Aryan”: a superior Germanic race, that should rule the world (according to them).

I now also live in a country (the Netherlands) said to have (like Germany) mostly a Germanic/Teutonic (ethno-historic) origin, and in time I got to wonder: what is this own Dutch, originally Germanic (in English also Teutonic) culture? Maybe some countries, like England, the Netherlands, and Germany modernized and industrialized too soon too much to maintain much “original culture”, and the Nazi’s replaced that, indoctrinating the people with a mythical, absurd “racial supremacy” notion, at the cost of others.

Nowadays, despite hidden ancient, Germanic cultural “remnants” (beyond the language), the Netherlands people are international, even imitating aspects of other cultures: from the US (even Black culture), more Southern parts of Europe with presumably more “temperamental” and “life-enjoying” people, or other parts of the world. I noticed this identity crisis – in hindsight – among White Dutch people I encountered, trying to “out-Black” me, because I (of South European descent) showed some appreciation for Black culture: a Reggae t-shirt or patch, for instance. For some odd, mistaken (slightly psychopathic) notion they considered themselves “gatekeeper” (for having more Black friends, maybe?), a phenomenon - White gatekeepers of Black culture) still found here and there. Seems almost like politics.

I guess that “culture” keeps the mind softer and opener than politics..

A Black Power movement based on Vodou-like beliefs would be strange – or to be honest: I would find it funny and intriguing -, but without going so far, still a fruitful, open-minded balance can be found, as is achieved in the Rastafari movement, lacking authoritarian, strict rules.

A balance seems most reasonable in the case of the African Diaspora in the West: colonial past, adapted to other societies, but knowing one’s roots. Realistic about one’s history, roots and routes.

The NOI – for all its interesting aspects – seems to deny some “realistic” aspects, but that is just my opinion, and it’s their prerogative..

IMPLICATIONS

Still, this choice to “abandon” Africa, the continent, as focus among the largest “Black Power” group in the US, the NOI, can have in my opinion negative connotations. For one, it replaces solidarity with the brothers and sisters on the African continent, with a semi-fictional one with the Arab world. You notice this even in the Palestina protests. Fine, and even noble, that Black people feel solidarity with the Palestinians’ cause, and critique Israel’s harsh, brutal, and discriminatory policies in Gaza and elsewhere. Too often, though, these same “selective” activists do not mention what happens elsewhere in the world, such as Africa, with genocides also having occurred or attempted in Sudan (e.g. Darfur) – some say still going on - , and some brutal regimes and violent conflicts here and there (I mentioned already Boko Haram).

Could it be that the fictive/symbolic alignment with the Islam as a “Black man’s religion” – popularized by the NOI – made many turn a blind eye to whatever is done in the name of Islam in Africa, especially when combined with a nice, melanin skin? Could it be that superficial?

People in Islamic (Northern) Sudan call themselves “Arabs”, while clearly mixed with Black Africans, pointing at cultural annihilation and depreciation of Africa and its people. Not unsimilar to what occurred among some African-descended people in the Americas. In the Dominican Republic, most people are mixed (mostly Spanish-African) and Mulatto-like, but long upheld a vague “Hispanic” identity, derived from European Spain. This differed among Dominicans (some saw themselves as mixed also culturally), but was the political norm. The same in Jamaica, where the political elite long fought the Afro-centric Rastafari movement, including even brutal repression and raids up to the 1960, and customary discrimination even into the 1970s. A “Black British” culture aimed at the Anglo-Saxon world, was the proscribed norm for the populace, it seemed.

BLACK-WHITE

Another negative implication is the Black-White discourse. In my opinion, this has gotten out of hand. In the early stages of emancipation it had a function, and even a positive, path-making one, as also Marcus Garvey used that dichotomy (albeit in his days (1910-1930s), also with now old-fashioned terms like Negro and Coloured).

Garvey however never forgot or abandoned the connection of “Black” with Africa.. Despite the politically (and historically) correct now common moniker of “African Americans” for US Blacks (along the lines of Irish American, Italian American, etc.), in common parlance “Black” and “White” is still the norm, not even just among stand-up comedians, for comedic effect (of variable quality in my opinion, though sometimes funny, I must admit).

This seems innocent, and just words, but psychologically can legitimize superficiality of skin color, over a rich African heritage, from even way before slavery. Even the interesting history from “way before Islam came to Africa (7th c. AD)” for that matter.

In my opinion, one’s sense of its (true) origins and culture makes one truly stable and stronger, and even more balanced. Ironically, also more open-minded, as less involved in “politicized oppositions”.

If you know “who you are”, as some put it, you are honest and spiritual enough to show sincere interest in the true beings of other humans – and other cultures! – as well, without games or hiding.

You also are more able to step out spiritually of the “rat race” of Western politics and economics, and apply other worldviews, with distinct, more natural and communally based lifestyles, also found in the African tradition, and applied (in their own way) by e.g. Rastafari adherents in Jamaica or elsewhere.

Also, in different ways, Vodou practitioners in Haïti, or those Afro-Cubans involved in Santería (Yoruba-based) or Palo Mayombe (Congo-based) spiritual faiths, kept open their mind for “alternatives ways of looking at Western culture ”, the (in this case) Catholic colonizers forced on them.

CULTURAL IDENTITY

Sometimes forming one's own personal cultural identity is a matter of “taking the best of both worlds”: I have known in Cuba some (pitch-) black Cubans – who would physically hardly stand out in Lagos or Kinshasa -, who only spoke Spanish proficiently -, and who could quote some poems by Spanish poets (like Federico García Lorca), and even from the famous Spanish novel Don Quichot – while at the same time attending Santería gatherings, and dressed in African/Yoruba attire on occasion, or playing Batá drums.

Rastafari artist and radio personality Mutabaruka also said in an interview that he tries to get the best of both worlds (Western modernity/technology and Africa), and learn about different parts of the world, while at the same time seeking to expand (also in his radio show) the knowledge about Africa and its history in Jamaica and beyond. It broadens one mind, in short, also to compare better internationally.

Though there were interesting and open-minded intellectuals within the Nation Of Islam (NOI) in the past and present – knowledgeable about global affairs, and sometimes say something sensible about it, even Louis Farrakhan – most of its rhetoric deals with the US situation.

Even if this is often just and right criticism of a certainly racist system and society in the US (and also other Western countries, for that matter) – keeping African Americans back structurally -, I think the knowledge of an own origin, and knowledge of one’s culture, offers more ways to deal with this, in an enduring, fruitful way, than playing along with that superficial (colonially inherited) game of “skin colour”. Even if your color is used against you, you can stand above that with pride in your own culture, your actual history, as a “true identity”. True self-assurance and true self-confidence.

That is also the power of a “story”, but more importantly: an indestructible power base in “truth” and love.

Reggae(-fied) cover songs

The Rolling Stone magazine listed their favourite Reggae cover songs in 2023, which I find interesting enough. Only a small mistake slipped in, because they failed to acknowledge the subjectivity, and kept “the best” in the headline.. but okay, I let that slide, haha. In the introduction it is however explained that the list consists of the ”favourites” of musician/producer Michael Goldwasser, someone with some experience in Reggae. Fair enough.

Here is the link to this article, to open it (in new window):

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-reggae-cover-songs-1234724075/

I am after all curious what songs he would mention, in comparison to what I have known over the years as cover songs in Reggae.

Good to clarify on forehand what is meant: songs from other genres and foreign artists, by (Jamaican) Reggae artists, not covers of other Reggae songs.

WHAT I KNOW

I know some good examples of such Reggae(-fied) cover songs, let’s start with that, but also some that were not so much “bad” – musicianship mostly tight – but more: “unnecessary”, or “ill-advised covers”, as some album/song reviewers put it. The artists – who make good original songs themselves – moreover don’t really need it. Only when an own twist makes a song nicer for Reggae-accustomed ears, then respect is regained.

In ancient times, before recording and technology, in the folk tradition, songs, lyrics, and melodies, were shared among people, specifically artists and performers, often traveling around. “Folk standards” arose thus, with often even an unknown/unspecified – or just vague – origin.

According to many sources about it, cover versions are in essence “tributes”, which seems commonsensical. If I dislike a song, find it unpleasant to listen to.. then why would I bother to make a (better?) version of it, yet based on it? Indifference is often the biggest disdain.

Some cover songs indeed have some parody or even ridicule in them of the original song (and its cultural context), therefore comment on it, yet not surpass it. At times, the artists just do cover songs for commercial reasons (often pushed by their record company), to open new markets, or similar not-so-kosher reasons.

Mostly, however, it’s obviously a sign of respect, especially when the original artist is mentioned and recognized. This also led to some problems in the past, in contexts with little legal copyright protection, including in Jamaica up to the 1990s. This goes to show that there is difference between “recognizing” someone and “respecting” someone, “recognition” being rather similar to mere “acceptance”. Like you accept also negative facts.

British band’s UB40’s brand of Reggae – including some cover albums of Reggae songs – may not be everyone’s (like “Reggae purists”) cup of tea, but they handled copyright issues with Jamaican artists/composers of the originals they covered justly/respectfully and fairly, and were praised for that among these artists. Not everyone is that considerate, though.

From my perspective – see the name of my blog -, I can decide whether I agree with choices by Michael Goldwasser, or reflect on what he missed.

THE LIST BY MICHAEL GOLDWASSER

Not all mentioned cover songs I knew, to be honest, but a majority I indeed knew. As Goldwasser has an actual “ranking”, I found more to disagree with. Number one is the biggest commercially successful hit, which reminds me of the prevalent, commercial logic of the Grammy awards, seldom recognizing (let alone “respecting”) “real” culture, or only limitedly. It’s about the money made, in the end.

That biggest hit is Now That We Found Love by Third World. An okay song, in my opinion.. not much more than that, but a bit too “poppy” for Reggae ears. He makes it number one.

Ranking - to put one thing above others, and hierarchy -as such tends to give me a headache (maybe an allergy: or my “hierarchophoby”) , but I still can mention what choices of Goldwasser I also like as adequate – or even improving – cover songs (often of US R&B and Soul, but with exceptions).

Some choices of him seemed very peculiar to him, as I found those songs not very special or moving. Finely executed by skilled musicians, usually, but not special. I guess it depends on the fact whether I like – or would have liked! – the original.. the bar is laid high – or as they say in Dutch: “je legt de lat hoog” – and to improve on what’s good you have to be better, just as often, though, a cover is different, but slightly less thrilling. Originals often feel more real, after all.

The song One In A Million by Sanchez does not move me so much; Sanchez has in my opinion better songs.. even better covers. Sanchez has many covers, being his specialty, interchanged with occasional own compositions. More in the “Roots” realm, in earlier Reggae decades, Johnny Clarke operated more or less the same, but mostly covered within Reggae itself, like in the folk – shared culture – tradition.

Though I did not know Devon Russell covered a song I liked, Curtis Mayfield’s Move On Up, I found Russell’s cover not much more than okay. I guess Mayfield’s original is “too” original, haha. The percussion on the song (by Master Henry Gibson) is as flavouring as it is inimitable and idiosyncratic/unique. I miss it in Russell’s cover.

Some covers in the list by Johnny Osbourne (Ready Or Not), Dennis Brown (Silhouettes), Freddie McGregor (Sitting In The Park), Sugar Minott’s catchy cover of the Jacksons song, and Norma Fraser’s fine The First Cut Is The Deepest I did like myself too, and immediately, but Alton Ellis has, for instance, better cover songs than the one Goldwasser mentioned. Not so outstanding, though adequate. The Tamlins' Baltimore cover is groovy – played by Sly & Robbie -, while the almost classic Queen Majesty is flawless and more importantly: “soulful”, at least equaling in a Jamaican way the Impressions’ original. Those are indeed good covers.

In these cases the covers certainly gain a unique Jamaican feel, Reggae-fied, so much so that it feels natural and “fitting” somehow.. Like it should have been a Reggae song, almost. Sugar Minott’s version adds nice percussion, instrument-wise too, I noticed, “Caribbeanizing” it, so to speak.

Marcia Griffith’s cover of the Beatles song, Don’t Let Me Down.. a song I myself played/jammed on (on covers that is) often with my percussion, and resulting in jazzy escapades on those jam sessions.

The Beatles original I liked, and are one of my favourite songs of theirs, maybe. Marcia does not stay far behind, with an own twist. On the other hand, Chris Martin’s cover of Michael Jackson’s Lady In My Life could have been better, though Martin can sing for sure, but the production is kind of bland, in my opinion.

Foxy Brown covered an already great song by Tracy Chapman (Sorry), but hardly improves on it, but that is more to blame on mediocre production, than on her.

Horace Andy’s Ain’t No Sunshine (covering Bill Withers) is fine, but neither very outstanding within Horace Andy’s oeuvre: he has several better songs.

Finally, the Max Romeo cover mentioned is fine, but I liked Romeo's recent one (on what would be one of his last albums) of Eve of Destruction better.

ANALYSIS

This Rolling Stone magazine list is thus a highly personal one by Michael Goldwasser, who seemed qua tastes more influenced by the current, more commercial mainstream and “Pop” than, e.g., me. About 5 of his choices I could understand, and these (and some other song) have some interesting aspects, and are fine enough, though somewhat underwhelming.

What did Goldwasser forget, or in other words: what would my list more or less be (my “alternative” list, say)?

Goldwasser’s list is from 2023, so not so long ago to have missed nice recent covers in Reggae.

MY LIST

I don’t want the headache hierarchically “ranking” songs brings with it, so I won’t do that. I can give my “alternative” list, without order or ranking, of course not any more authoritative or “correct” than Goldwasser’s, but just showing different tastes among two Reggae fans, both named Michael (well, I also Michel/Miguel).

I focus on cover songs that I myself personally liked, just like Goldwasser did (even without admitting the subjectivity fully), although guided by some knowledge about Reggae, and being a fan of it for decades.

- Terry Linen – The World’s Greatest (I liked the original, even quite a lot, for which I now should be ashamed, as R. Kelly was caught with some - as deemed - questionable sexual escapades. Still, the original was strong, and Linen does it justice, and more, with a good danceable groove, Reggae-fied finely. Terry Linen’s voice “fits”, furthermore. Terry linen likes to cover songs, having made some other nice ones too.

- Alton Ellis – You’ve Made Me So Very Happy (original by a woman, a Motown Soul, Brenda Holloway, showing how gender in this case does not matter, as Alton at least exhibits the same soulful spirit to the song, with great singing). There are more examples of good covers by Alton Ellis. He had the talent for it. He even improves on Neil Sedaka’s Working On A Groovy Thing.
- Burning Spear – Estimated Prophet (cover of a Grateful Dead song, a California band around the celebrated Jerry Garcia. I did not know the Grateful Dead’s original, when I first heard Burning Spear’s version, but knew I liked Burning Spear’s/Winston Rodney’s rendition, with interesting, magical elements in the production. I later heard the Grateful Dead’s original, which is okay and well-composed, but less my thing. In my opinion, Burning Spear improves on it.

- Tarrus Riley – Human Nature, a cover I immediately liked. It was also of a song I liked of Michael Jackson, that somewhat helped. Tarrus does sing well and soulfully, almost as much as Michael, and that is necessary to do the original at least justice. In addition it is nicely Reggae-fied, with authentic Jamaican Reggae musicians: it fits a Reggae groove (or the other way around), giving an extra touch above the “slick” more mainstream original on Jackson’s Thriller album, that seemed (IMHO) a bit “too polished to be funky” (a general critique I can give to the Thriller album), though nice enough. The song itself is strong, is the case, almost irrespective of accompaniment).
- The Mighty Diamonds should be mentioned, and in fact I can mention several cover songs by them I like, sometimes improving on them, or lifting them to other, soulful heights, aided by Tabby Shaw’s beautiful lead vocals. Gipsy Woman (cover of Impressions song) can be mentioned as excellent, Stoned Out Of My Mind is nice , but even Putting On The Ritz (seemingly one of those “ill-advised” covers, dating back to a 1930 “jazzy” Irving Berlin song) they cover well, clearly improving on the original).

- Ken Boothe, the Impossible Dream, is a cover from a musical Man of la Mancha, based on the life of Don Quichot, the self-sacrificing, idealistic Spanish knight. Something else than the more common Soul, R&B, or folk/pop songs, Reggae artists tend to cover, and therefore an original choice. The song and its lyrics lend itself well to Ken Boothe’s exquisite, soulful vocals, lifting it higher on a nice Reggae groove. The original in the musical drama I saw and was kind of moving (also within the story line), but later covers of this musical song by others in other genres (Luther Vandross, Tom Jones, Temptations, Josh Groban, a.o.) differed in quality, and often lacked an edge: too polished and smooth. I found Ken Boothe’s to be one of the better ones. It is soulfully convinces, and you feel the message, probably even without having seen the musical.

- The Heptones covered Bob Dylan’s I Shall Be Released to good effect, but also Elvis Presley’s Suspicious Minds they pulled off well. They added a warm, own Jamaican harmony vocal touch to these originals. Also these lyrics fit the soulful singing on these Reggae versions.
- John Holt made some nice covers too, of which Killing Me Softly probably convinced most in its soulful feel.
- ‘African Herbsman’ is the title of is Bob Marley and the Wailers's effective and appealing cover of Richie Havens (1969) “hippy soul-like” Indian Rope Man, so lyrically “Rastafaried” to African Herbsman. Havens original is nice and atmospheric, but the Wailers version more groovy and danceable, with Lee Perry-produced Reggae adding extra flavour.

- Everton Blender covered the already great Black American (Soul) classic, by Syl Johnson: Is It Because I’m Black?, orig. from 1969. Everton’s cover version is great, but in fact it has been covered by several Jamaican artists, also very admirably by Ken Boothe, Delroy Wilson, Nicky Thomas, and recently by Samory I. These are also good and soulful, Everton Blender’s version perhaps adding an extra, nice “edge”. As with other “classic” songs with “soul”, the strength is the song (melody, message, feel) itself, not so much the musical accompaniment, which is replaceable, and is on Syl Johnson’s original not bad, but with a quite basic Soul groove. Reggae versions, like the one of Everton Blender, certainly added a more danceable, and impressive accompanying groove, and a fuller instrumental part (horns, percussion, a.o.), while of course roughly following the original’s chord structure. Samory I’s version (with partly changed lyrics) is in comparison more sober, but the song’s strength still gets through, with an own original twist..

- Glen Washington covered a Soul classic by Luther Ingram with some merit: If Loving You Is Wrong (orig. 1972), especially adding a Reggae feel with similar “soul” as the original. Sometimes, like with Terry Linen, a singing voice “fits” with the original covered.
- The latter applies – perhaps more surprisingly – to Anthony B who recently covered I Want To Know What Love Is by US pop/rock band Foreigner. One could argue that it is a strange choice for a “conscious” Reggae artist, but I must admit I even liked the original (rock ballads not usually “my thing”, but a good song is a good song). Anthony B does it justice, with a nice Reggae twist, and his voice seems to “fit”.. somehow..

I can list more examples, but will just conclude with some “honorary mentions” added to this: Luciano’s Bob Dylan cover of Knocking On Heaven’s Door is fine, and – as they say – “made his own”, Toots & The Maytals covering one of his inspirers Otis Redding with I’ve Got Dreams To Remember is a good cover.

Some effective covers of Dennis Brown and Freddie McGregor (e.g. I’ll Never Fall In Love Again, What Difference Does It Make) on their early Studio One albums. Also – more recently -, Sly & Robbie’s cool, characteristic cover of Marvin Gaye’s Inner City Blues (sung by Delroy Washington), Bushman’s cover of the 1960s “hippy/flower power” classic One Tin Soldier (on his great 2004 album Signs), - strange choice but it works, Bushman’s deep voice interestingly contrasting the original’s female sung original.

In addition Sizzla’s funny (and groovy!) Dancehall take on Bob Dylan’s Subterranean Homesick Blues.. with even the video being a cover of Dylan’s.

I probably forgot some I also liked: mostly good singers, in old and new Reggae (like Romain Virgo) usually make good covers of Soul, R&B, or Pop songs, sometimes even improving on the originals..

Some of these I mentioned in my list did – in my opinion – just that: improving on the originals, or at least equaling them.

TRIBUTE?

In English you can use the linguistic term “cover song” or alternatively “interpretation”, in Spanish the main word is (just) “interpretación”. This is not quite the same as strictly “copying”, since you “interpret” it in your own way – to differing degrees. While I prefer original songs by talented artists (the other songs have been done already, by others), that could be also a function of cover songs for even established artists: showing their talents to “interpret” good or famous songs, thus displaying their own talent and skills (or not), while also some musicians/instrumentalists probably enjoy “Reggae-fying” the original song’s accompaniment and chord structure, considering this a nice challenge as well.

Paying tribute is another already mentioned function, but is partly relative when departing from an “interpretation” perspective. Some – I suspect even within Reggae – choose songs to deliberately improve on them, showing their Jamaican and Reggae identities.. The Mighty Diamonds’ Putting On The Ritz could be an example. Yami Bolo’s cover of Madonna’s La Isla Bonita – it exists! – could be such a perceived challenge, although it is also possible that Yami Bolo actually liked the song. Not all Madonna songs are so bad, as some of her haters claim, by the way. Madonna at least works with talented musicians, I hear on some of her songs, or maybe she is more talented than we assume.

In most cases, though, these Reggae covers of genres outside of Reggae are indeed meant as “tribute” or “respectful”, in many cases honoring the covering artists’ idols or inspirers within Black US music (Soul, R&B), mostly, although Bob Dylan, and Elvis Presley are also repeatedly covered.

OVERALL

Remarkably, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye are not covered so much in Reggae (a few cases.. Delroy Wilson covered What’s Going On nicely), even if several Reggae artists said they count them among their idols. Otis Redding and also Sam Cooke are covered in Reggae, though. The same can be said of James Brown, though that may relate to James’ rhythmic, “funk” focus. The Impressions/Curtis Mayfield are on the other hand covered a lot within Reggae (also by Bob Marley), and were indeed an inspiration for many Reggae artists.

In addition, I think the lyrics play a role. Some of the artists covered relatively often within Reggae tend to express social critique as in much Reggae (Bob Dylan, Curtis Mayfield), anti-war or –establishment messages like some “flower power”/ hippie songs, or share in the “Black struggle” (but in the US). Other covered songs discuss a more universal human condition, while others just have somehow appealing, identifiable approaches to love and romance.

However, Reggae artists – overall – more often cover other Reggae or Jamaican artists, that came before (Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Dennis Brown, Gregory Isaacs, Ken Boothe, or from the Studio One era: Bob Andy, Eric Donaldson, Tyrone Taylor, the Techniques/Uniques, John Holt/Paragons, etcetera). These differ also in quality, but are not the subject of this post. It shows, however, well how rich the Jamaican musical culture was and is, over the years and decades. Nuff elders to cover within Reggae itself.

Anyway, the fact that Jamaican Reggae artists with several good and great original songs of themselves , still choose to cover songs by these other (foreign) artists – mostly to good effect, with an own touch - makes the inherent compliment/tribute of cover songs even bigger. More sincere appraisal, and less “wannabe-behaviour” or “commercial calculus” , so to speak.

All good and well, these lists of Reggae(-fied) cover songs – and culturally interesting, international /Black US influences, etc. – but let’s not forget that many of the covering/interpreting Jamaican artists mentioned have many good original songs themselves, that at least match many of these originals. While some of these Reggae(-fied) songs became “club hits” of sorts, seldom are they “standouts” on albums with further an artist’s original songs, often more solid.

These great originals only reached less people for being confined to the globally less-commercial marginalized Reggae world of Jamaica, and remained unknown to many outside of it, too limited mostly to “niche” markets in the Western world and elsewhere (read: Reggae fans).