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Kingston 75

Reggqes Jomqicq's Rebel fUlusic

By Rita Forest*

"On the day that Bob died from which this burst forth, has I was buying vegetables in the mar- been described as a "very small con- ket town of Kasr El Kebir in nor- nection that's glowing red-hot" bet- thern Morocco. Kasr El Kebir was a ween "two extremely heavy cultu- E great city with running water and res"-Africa and North America. ot streetlights when London and Paris But (and its predecessors, were muddy villages. Moroccans and rock-steady) came sparking off U tend not to for any form of that red-hot wire at a particular o western music, vastly preferring the moment-a time in the mid- odes of the late great Om Kalthoum when was in the throes of a or the latest pop singer from Cairo mass migration from the country- z= or Beirut. But young Moroccans side to the city. These people, driven 5 love , the from green a only form of the hills into the hellish Ut non-Arabic music I ever saw country tangle of Kingston shantytowns, d= Moroccans willingly dance to. That created reggae music. afternoon in Kasr El Kebir, Bob This same jolting disruption of a Marley banners in Arabic were centuries-old way of life has also strung across the main street. . . ." shaped the existence of many mil- (Stephen Davis, Reggoe Internatio- lions of people in cities around the nal, 1982). world today. And the best of reggae, Reggae, a music barely 20 years which righteously confronted the old, has penetrated remote deserts in horror that is "modern" life for the Mali, is played by aborigines in Aus- masses in these citadels, quickly tralia, has hit the top ten in countries found an international audience of all over Europe, and has influenced youth overripe to climb to some hig- musicians on every continent. When her heights: these sounds get carried around the planet to places where there are only *Rita Forest is a member of the batteries to power the rare tape Revolutionary Communist Party, player, it is certain that a very deep U.S.A., and an activist in the chord has been struck among the cultural sphere. This article has MASSCS. been slightly edited for publication Jamaica, the Caribbean island in AWTW. 76

"Burning and a-lootin' tonight the former home of Maas' Nattie, culture. Burning all pollution tonight the man who'd raised him like a fa- As it happened, a musical storm Burning all illusions tonight." ther, and discovered that two Ame- of such gigantic proportions and "Burning' and Lootin"' The rican tourists had taken over the deep roots among the oppressed was Wailers- backyard and were lazily growing up from below that it would ganja and sunbathing, stark naked. spin out of their grasp. . . . By any calculation reggae has Ivan watched while one of them There is more than symbolic signi- been a huge musical explosion com- tried to milk a male goat, then jum- ficance to the story of the son of a parable in some ways to the birth of ped on his motorbike in disgust and white Jamaican ruling class family rock n' roll in the U.S. Kingston, for sped away over the mountains and who was born in the U.S., gradua- example, has grown to be the largest through the foothills choked with ted from Harvard (and not Britain's producer of singles per capita of any bauxite dust, back down to Kings- Oxford) in the late 1950s, and retur- city in the world-and almost all of ton. From that moment on, he refu- ned home to Jamaica to do anthro- it reggae. sed to look back, and with nothing pological work among the peasants, What was it about Jamaica, the ti- to lose, he shot cops and sang his investigating folk practices such as mes, the world, that gave us this way to fame and notoriety. He was obeah and musical traditions asso- music? an outlaw, and a fearless hero to ciated with Pukkumina religion. He In Michael Thelwell's novel The those being ground up in this new soon moved to Kingston, set up a Harder They Come,adapted from urban "promised land"-a concrete small recording company to docu- the film of the same name, Ivan, a jungle where you couldn't even find ment this culture, then turned his at- Kingston "" (ghetto youth a clean glass of water, let alone a tention to the music scene in the in and around the Jamaican music day's work. West Kingston ghettos and became scene) tries lo visit his family's home one of Jamaica's first record produ- in the mountains after several years 1962: Jamaican "Independence" cers. This young music entrepreneur of living in the city. "Nothing was In the late 1950s, the Jamaican was none other than the current Ja- familiar....Bush-bush full up countryside was getting ripped apart maican prime minister and man-on- everywhere. But...dis coulden the by U.S. capital more intensively the scene for U.S. imperialism, Ed- right place after all? Right down than almost any other Caribbean is- ward Seaga. dere should be the tin roof. You land. They took over from the Bri- When he entered politics in 1959, mean say bush-bush grow up, cover tish plantation-style rule after - Seaga secured a constituency in one it?. . . vering bauxite there during World of the toughest new ghettos in West rr)e 6 "There was no evidence of the War 2. Major U.S. and Canadian Kingston with his music credentials, : passage of his generations, the an- aluminium companies appropriated and introduced guns onto the street cestors whose intelligence, industry huge areas of land from the peasants along with systematic gangster-style z and skill had created a self-sufficient and left gaping strip-mined valleys violence to force "loyalty" among homestead here. None-at aII...." of the burning red dirt all through this very angry and volatile section grandmother who had raised Jamaican hills. More people of the population. He also put to full =ot\ His the a him up there had died several years were forced off the land with the sta- use his earlier study of peasant reli- q earlier; his mother was back down in gnation of the British sugar planta- gious practices and superstitions in Kingston working at starvation pay tions, as well as the growth of tou- his political rallies and slogans. This o as a washerwoman; his uncles were rism. They flocked to Kingston to is the man, head of the Jamaican La- = long gone off the land and had met survive, pitching tin shacks on a re- bour Party, who came to be known their ends all over the globe. One claimed garbage dump in the har- internationally as CIAga for his died in World War 2 fighting for the bour. There were a few jobs on the mafiosa-style services and overall British; another went to cut cane in docks and in some new U.S. plants, political assistance to the U.S. Cuba and was never heard from but for most the pickings were slim bourgeoisie-which has continually again; another was serving a life sen- and many kept going. In the 1950s manoeuvred for a tighter hold on its tence in the Kingston penitentiary and 1960s, one-eighth of the popu- backyard island-and who was pu- for killing his wife.... lation emigrated. (Today only 2 I /2 blicly denounced for running guns "Ah shoulda did stay an' tek care of the 4 million Jamaicans in the for the CIA into Jamaica in the late of de place, he thought. The worst world actually live on the island.) 1960s. Exactly how much his early insult that people has was sneering, As Jamaica lurched from British career was sculpted along these lines 'Cho, you no come from crown colony to U.S. neo-colony, with outside interests is not entirely nowhe'.'...He wanted to go get a the island's local bourgeoisie got a clear. machete, to cut a path to the graves lift as they hitched themselves to this For the next two decades and con- and clear the bush away. But...what new capital and the freshly-stirred tinuing today Seaga and all rival de raas is de use. ..What's the fucken waves of nationalism that surged up bourgeois politicians, particularly use? He felt empty, and frightened, off the "independence" celebration the up and coming "socialist" lea- futile, miserable, and very alone. He in 1962. They had a new style of der of the People's National Party, would never, he swore, come back rule, and a greater freedom and ne- , would be forced to ever." cessity to promote and especially to deal in the currency of the "suffe- He continued down the road to try to gain control of a "national" rah," the sufferers in the city-and 77

reggae would figure large in this. Baton sticks get shorter/ horrified at. these rebels wearing Rudie gets taller their hair in thick "natty" dread- The Rise of Reggae ...Can't fight against the youth/ locks (long, tight curls) who were The first strains of the new music Cause it's wrong also beginning to gain a little noto- arose as transistor radios cropped up Prediction: riety internationally as well. on the streets of Kingston and the Them people a-going wild The country was further polari- rude boys started popping their fin- Dem a rude rude people... sing in all ways. By 1969, Jamaica gers to the tunes of Fats Domino, What has been hidden was listed as having the most une- Brook Benton, the Drifters and From the 'wise' and the polluted qual distribution of income of any other singers who Will be revealed country in the world-truly a "black were being blasted out from U.S. ra- In the heat of the summer sun man's hell in a white man's para- dio stations in nearby New Orleans Oh Rudie, be wise..." dise, " as reggae artist Gregory and Miami. At the time, the locally- "Jailhouse," also called"Rudie"- Isaacs would sing it. produced music scene was relatively The Wailers Huge numbers of youth, with no barren, at least compared to Trini- jobs, no future and in most cases, no dad's calypso or the Latin beats of Rarely has a song so captured the way to ever get off the island, were the Spanish-speaking islands. For brooding and insolent confidence of being bombarded with American the youth, an evening's entertain- youth coming of age in an uninha- goods, culture and enticements via ment was provided by the roving bitable place which is itself "new," the English-speaking media and re- disc jockeys (DJs) holding court but already a virtual bomb-site. The latives returning from abroad. Reg- from trucks stacked with monster musical response at the end of each gae came like a blast of fresh fury speakers: the "" line came like a threat and a state- blown back in the face of U.S. im- dance. Competition among these Ie- ment of fact-sung in the sweetest of perialism. It was another stunning gendary figures was ferocious, each harmonies. example of the fact that for all its ef- DJ vying for the attention of the This type of thing was not at all lorts to forcibly recruit the world to crowd who demanded the hottest what the local bourgeoisie had in the American way, those people they and newest releases from the U.S. mind for their "post-lndependence" oppress are just as likely to take such When, in the early 1960s, this pop Jamaican culture, and all along the U.S. exports and transform them in music became slick and soft and way they tried to redirect it-with their own manner. In the case of reg- their audience required something Seaga often as pointman. At first the gae, they were beaming back a fierce new and tougher, DJs like Coxsone Skatalites were ridiculed for playing new music which turned the beat Dodd and Duke Reid opened recor- "bongo" music, but as early as from abroad onits head. ding studios, and by 1963 anew Ju- 1964, Seaga, as Minister of Develop- Browsing through bins of old reg- oE rnaicqn sound was in the air. Ska ment, tried to take over ska, intro- gae singles, you come across a com- - was a brassy, jumpy blend of ducing it at the New York World's mon graphic theme-a clenched fist rhythm and blues, jazzriffs, rock n' Fair with a hand-picked delegation in several variations-with label na- u roll, (a calypso-influenced Ja- of musicians, passing over the mes to match: "Voice of the Peo- o maican folk music), gospel, universally-acknowledged rude Latin boy ple," "Bullet," "Wail 'M Soul E and big band horns, and the African originators. These youth had lately 'M," "Tit for Tat," "Hungry beat of the Rastafarian burru drum- become even more outlawed because Town," "Clinch." The upheavals = mers. The originators of this sound of their association with Rastafarian of the world were starting to make \o included the Skatallites, made up of (and ganja-smoking) musicians who themselves felt in Jamaica in brutal (n6 the cream of Jamaica's men were neither respectable nor willing ways. The influence of the Black Li- b who had grown tired of answering to be hired thugs for either of the beration Movement in the United tourists' requests for "Yellow Bird" two major Jamaican political par- States also arrived in Kingston where and bastardised calypso on the ho- ties. The official policy on these un- many people found it decidedly un- tel circuit. Beginning in 1963, an his- ruly "seeds": "Kill it, before they foreign. The Wailers wore their hair toric collaboration took place in grow. . . ' ' as one famous song would in Afros back in the late 1960s be- Coxsone's Studio One between the put it. fore growing , and their Skatalites and the Wailers, who But in the next few years, as ska "" featured were one of the expert harmony slowed down into the "rock steady" them decked out in guerrilla gear re- groups then springing up in the go- style and finally around 1967-68 to sembling uniforms worn by the vernment yards (housing projects) reggae, the music became tho- Black Panther Party at the time. among the toughest youth in Kings- roughly dominated by the rude While reggae, like any musical ton. The astonishing music that is- boys. The music took over the sound form, has also produced its share of sued from these sessions would soon system dances and jukeboxes, selling insipid love songs and boring pop re- put the new generation of rude boys huge numbers of singles-but all the makes throughout its history, what like Ivan on the stage for the first while it was almost completely ban- is striking is that most of the best time. ned from the radio. The national reggae musicians have always consi- culture was definitely splitting in dered themselves "warriors against "Jail house keeps empty,/ two, with polite society (to say no- Babylon," as they refer to the op- Rudie gets healthy thing of the tourist board!) properly pressor's system. And the sound of 78

the music has from the beginning "In our days everything seems within the reggae scene). attracted the ears of thousands of pregnant with its contrary. Bob Avakian, Chairman of the youth like Ivan who know from Machinery, gifted with the wonder- Central Committee of the Revolu- torturous experience that there is ful power of shortening and fructi- tionary Communist Party, USA, no going back to "simpler times." fying human labour, we behold star- has compared the Rastafarian And most wouldn't want to ving and overworking it. The movement to that of the Jewish peo- anyhow.r newfangled sources of wealth, by ple at the time "Revelations" was So the stage was set for the rise of some strange wierd spell, are turned written (around 60 A.D.). This New reggae in Jamaica-including the into sources of want. The victories Testament book, often quoted by fact that Kingston had developed of art seem bought by loss of Rastas, predicted the destruction of economically to the point it could character. At the same pace that the Roman Empire and "reflected support an embryonic record in- mankind masters nature, man seems the position of the Jewish peo- dustry, an unlikely eventuality in to become enslaved to other men or ple...in that period...a people sore- neighboring Haiti, or the Dominican to his own infamy."-Karl Marx, ly oppressed by but in many ways Republic at that time. "Speech at the Anniversary of the marginal to the Empire." He adds But another ingredient was added People's Paper" that the Rastafarian movement to- rnto this new musical mix. day "to a significant degree finds its basis among sections of society that The Rastafarians " Rastaman first bring civilisation have been reduced to a largely on ya..." goes a reggae tune called marginal existence by the workings "...Cause I feel like the "History of Captivity" by of imperialism-particularly Bombing a church Carlton Jackson. So it seemed to peasants land in jungle driven off the Now that you know many in the of Kingston Jamaica into the cities, or even into whose centuries The preacher is lying. history consisted of other countries such as imperial Bri- So who's gonna stay at home of slavery, colonial rule and neo- tain or the United States, finding When the freedom fighters colonial "modernisation"-all of it themselves in a declassed or semi- Are fightin'?" bearing the stamp of approval of the declassed situation, That, however, preacher gruesomely "Talking Blues"-Bob Marley Christian so is not the whole picture, because for depicted in The Horder They Come. one thing in a period like the im- Most reggae musicians hold to the But, as has happened before in mediate one, where in most coun- people Rastafarian world view. This mili- history when an oppressed tries and on a world scale the forces e preparing !o tant turning of Christianity upside mount the stage, to over- of the proletarian revolution are still held o\s down has had its own odd results- throw much that has been weak and still recovering from re- clearly not all of them negative. sacred, the pull to at least make cent and devastating defeats (above peace your Right at the moment when Seaga with god sometimes all the loss of socialist China), more = and Manley & Co. had hoped to becomes irresistible. Rastafarianism than a few oppressed proletarians o= gather the masses around in a considers itself a religion of libera- will be drawn toward movements L respectable congregation of "freed" tion, doing battle against both real like the Rastafarians." (From "Pro- a colonial subjects content with the and "spiritual" chains, but relying vocations, " Revolutionary Worker, q new terms of their enslavement, on much of the mysticism and non- October 28, 1983) o boom! up pops who scientific explanations that bind The "semi-declassed," or semi- wants none of it. Most significant- one's origin and to some degree proletarian sector is quite vast in q= ly, the Rastas had no patience for one's destiny to a Creator and his Jamaica because, as in many op- planet Christian promises of the good life emissaries on the earth. In pressed countries, the development when you're dead and gone. If the this case. the Christian enforcer of of the proletariat has been severely god times were "dread," the possibility impenalism was replaced by a stunted by imperialism, confined of overthrowing the whole order was and tradition from Africa, largely to miners and workers in the also alive in the world, if presently complete with a neo-colonial tourist industry or government- out of reach-and this new creed lackey, .2 Rastas also many of whom are relatively well demanded black redemption here on held closely to the which was off. Both ofthe national bourgeois earth. Africa, the scene of recent often the only book Jamaicans political parties were strong in the struggles against imperialism, was owned and read, and many of its miners' unions, for instance, while where it was to be found-quite precepts have gone unquestioned, the more radical Rastafarian move- logical for a people stolen from that becoming mingled with African ment grew up among these landless continent as slaves and stranded on traditions "from anciency" in an peasants forced to hustle in the an island which was becoming in- attempt to explain and resist the city-very tough people with creasingly intermeshed with the assaults of this modern world. nothing to lose, not even a plot of world, but on the most savage terms. Coupled with this is the tendency to yams, but (partly because of their They were confronting the violent incorporate and extol the conditions of life) still fettered with intrusion of capitalist relations into widespread smoking of ganga into superstitions and practices of an peasant society which Marx describ- Rastafarianism (whose mysticism earlier time. This has meant that ed 100 years earlier: finds a variety of interpretations while most have some understan- 79 ding that it is the tentacles of im- perialism which are choking off their lives, many have come to the conclu- sion that bringing down this monster can only be done with the help of a force outside this world. This contradictory position has led on the one hand to the creation of songs like the following which mockingly puncture Christian illu- sions that affect the outlook and struggle of the oppressed:

"Well they tell me of a pie up in the sky Waiting for me when I die. But between the day you're born and when you die They never seem to hear you when you cry. So as sure as the sun will shine I'm gonna get my share now, what's mine And then the harder they come The harder they fall, one and all. Cos I'd rather be a free man In my grave Than living as a puppet or a slave." - Jimmv Cliff

Yet, the pull of feudalism weighs heavily, and nowhere more brutal- ly than in the "sacred" sphere of relations between men and women. The Rastafarians generally uphold peasant customs regarding the woman as childbearer and obedient mate. In Kingston, less than one quarter of the mothers are legally married, but pressures are so intense in the ghetto thal a whole vocabulary has sprung up to describe the most common familial relations: "baby-mother" or "baby- father" referring to the parent. And :::lji : 'iil conversation is littered with expres- :!r-:. sions like "He bred her," "He con- trol her," "He rule her" to describe "normal" love relations. Among Rastafarians these prac- tices are only modified with attempts to sequester the woman further, "honouring" her as a "queen" while maintaining hegemony in the household. The enraging twist here Bob Marley is that this reaction to the degrada- tion of urban capitalist society ends up being yet another excuse to tighten the chains on women, this 80

time in the name of "African tradi- cannot indiscriminately or blatant- reggae musicians, as Rastafarians, tion." And even some of the best ly snuff them out without suffering are also widely looked to as spiritual reggae groups put these byzantine great political damage. Yet the leaders, and their music as spreading sentiments embarrassingly to music: strength of the art makes the protest the message of "" to people cast of the artist all the more compelling out of their African homeland. "She's my queen/ to the masses. I'm her King man This situation is full of contradic- "Cause the wicked carried us away ...I a warrior tions for the oppressed as well, par- in captivity with my comforter ticularly in these times when Require from us a song, Behold how good throughout the world revolutionary But how can we sing and pleasant it is leadership is lagging behind what is King Alfa's song* She'll stand by me needed, and people have come to In a strange land?" Birds of a feather look towards the most radical public "Rivers of Babylon"-The Melo- We worship Jah together... figures around for some direction. dians Sitting on a throne of gold." These have often been artists, in "Throne of Gold"-Steel Pulse part, ironically, because the (*King Alfa led an army against bourgeoisie is forced at times to Nebechadnezzar, the ruler of The kicker comes when the watch its step with them. But the Babylon.) "ministers of the western shitstems" problem here lies in the fact that ar- as describes them, are tists are simply not equipped to lead As Peter Tosh often puts it: "The said to "design it that the woman see the revolutionary movement, at least singers and players of instruments herself as the dominant figure" not os ortists. The demand that they are the only true prophets in this when it's the Rastaman that is the do so only undermines the process time. " This confluence of contradic- rightful "king of the jungle." by which actual revolutionary tions raises the ante on these musi- Ironically, these Old Testament dic- leadership is developed, and cians, making their art and lives the tums circulating among the oppress- simultaneously tends to drag down subject of intense scrutiny among ed only serve to keep those rulers in their art to the level of tedious the Jamaican masses who demand power, and once again go to prove pedagogy: people need real pro- much from individuals they consider Marx's comment: "Everything that paganda and agitation on the political and spiritual guides. But the exists has this much worth, that it political problems of the world, and contradiction cuts both ways. Under e will perish." instead get an article set to music. pressure to "lead a movement," or €v') While all art is political because all at least be "more" than an artist, o\ Politics and Religion artists, like everyone else, have a many of these musicians have political worldview, and will by nonetheless created soaring works of "Fighting spiritual wickedness necessity bring this to their crea- art. = In this concrete wilderness... tions, art fulfills a different human How can this be? Marley was once o= It's not my intention to be a warrior requirement than political educa- asked if "Dem Belly Full" was a h But constant aggravation make I tion. Confusion on this question has tract on starvation and wealth. He a man rude. reigned for decades, partly due to answered, no, not exactly. "...Food q That's why I'm a warrior, revisionist dictates that the artist might be in your belly but there's o Reggae warrior...Rasta warrior" function as educator and leader. more to life than just filling it." The "Reggae Warrior"-Pablo Moses Marley understood this contradic- very strivings of many reggae musi- = tion a bit better: "These songs, peo- cians for something higher than By many estimates, over a million ple understand them, or they cyann more food in the belly, even if those people, almost half the population (can't) understand them, but ya aspirations take religious form, have of Jamaica, attended the funeral of have fe sing them just the same. Ya propelled the best of reggae into a Bob Marley in 1981. On his deathb- really have fe sing them. What the realm beyond the pedestrian "pro- ed, Marley was given the Order of people want is the beauties, mon." test music" which typically com- Merit (Jamaican version of Reggae won its place in the hearts plains and "educates"...and never knighthood), and Prime Minister and minds of people on the strength takes you higher. Seaga presided over the funeral of of the "beauties," but in the volatile This spiritual outlook also tends this man who five years earlier his Jamaican political scene of the to veer away from some of the nar- own Jamaican Labour Party had, it where the masses were courted by rowness of the Pan Africanist vision is widely believed, tried to murder.l demagogic "socialists" and the among many Rastafarians. It seems that great contradictions more open U.S. lackeys, both of Although this philosophy has chiefly are in store for a ruling class when whom ultimately maintained neo- been one of bluck redemption, tak- an artist rises to world renown status colonial rule through naked force, ing as its legacy the Garvey back-to- and remains at the same time a people increasingly Iooked to reggae Africa movement in the 1920s as sworn enemy (or even serious critic) artists as their political represen- well as the African liberation strug- of their rule. They have on their tatives. gles of the 1960s, this sentiment of hands what they would like to claim This situation was further com- reggae band is as a national treasure, and so they plicated by the fact that a great many widespread: "It's a peoples' music. 8t

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I just deal with no one people. I deal reggae artist extremely hazardous. least a dozen have died under with people throughout the earth." While it often appears that they can suspicious if not murderous cir- With this philosophy, Jamaican na- "chant down Babylon" with im- cumstances. And despite rhetoric to tionalism carries even less weight: punity (especially if they can be the contrary, Manley's "socialist" "We like Jamaica, but Jamaica is harnessed to someone's political regime from 1972 to 1980 provided spoiled as far the Rastaman is con- campaign as, for example in 1972 no safe haven. Bob Marley in 1978: cerned...when we check out the when Manley used the song "Better "These things are heavier than system here we see death. And Mus Come" by artist Delroy anyone can understand. People that Rastaman seh, life." (Bob Marley) Wilson), further down the road they are not involved don't know it..." But if the sights of many reggae could be found rotting in General and "A man look at me and say, musicians go beyond the "fussing Penitentiary or dead in a ditch. The 'Bob, you need protection.' Can you and fighting" of Jamaican international music press does not tell me what that means...I am walk- bourgeois politicking, they still usually find it "newsworthy," but ing on the streets and a big politician figure large in the class struggle there many, many reggae artists have been going to call me and tell me say I exactly because they command beaten nearly to death by the cops, need protection. Now they ruln the batallions among the masses on the spent time in jail or had their records country and they call me and tell me basis of their political and spiritual banned from the radio as subver- and say, 'Bob, you need protec- authority. This has made life as a sive. Within the last few years at tion. "' 82

"\ile're Bubbling Up on the Top Britain, went down to Jamaica in Virgin's New York offices besieged 100, Just Like a Mighty Dread" 1976 with fists full of money and by furious dreadlocked musicians There is something to be learned signed a number of acts to try to get demanding what was due them. The from the course which reggae took the edge over Island which always , for example, within the U.S. market. On the face had the lion's share of the reggae whose 1976 album sold of it, the promotion of someone like market internationally.a in the hundreds of thousands Marley or Peter Tosh might be the Virgin meanwhile hooked up huge throughout the world, were told by last thing one would expect from the direct sales of certain reggae records Virgin that their royalties had all corporate tycoons in 1976. This was, to Africa-sending, for example, gone to "expenses" and instead have after all, the "height" of the lull, hundreds of thousands of copies of recently been sent a bill by the politically speaking, in the U.S. No a U-Roy album to Nigeria. This company ! mass movement was propelling such strengthened their capital base tre- Meanwhile, the American press characters onto the stage as had been mendously (which, according to was hailing reggae as the next big true in the late 1960s. most accounts, had originated with sound, and after years of being con- Yet this was exactly when major South African money). But when fined to a kind of cult following promotion of reggae acts first occur- several West African countries clo- (mainly on college radio, in the West red in the U.S. , who sed their borders to record imports Indian communities, and wherever had first signed Bob Marley (and the in 1978 to stem the flow of currency, the film The Horder They Come Wailers) back in l972,beganin 1976 Virgin abruptly phased out reggae, played), reggae broke through to to throw the tens of thousands of using the profits amassed from this land on big radio playlists. dollars into the backing of Rastoman "fad" to move into mainstream Explanations for this surprising Vibrotion which was needed to get rock. (Ironically, the reggae- turn of events are complex. It is it played and to push reggae off the influenced group, , is often noted that the pop music scene ground. It was also around this time their latest gold mine.) Bootleg reg- internationally at that moment was that the U.S. media giant, Colum- gae continued to sell in mas- dead in the water, dominated by bia Broadcast Systems (CBS) did its sive numbers throughout Africa. tired stadium rock acts-and anyone first significant promotion of reggae Royalties due to artists from that with ears had them to the ground for with Peter Tosh's Equal Rights. And period of killer contracts have been something new, including the music , a recent split-off systematically denied, and in the Iate industry. Simultaneously, develop- from the Island label based in Great 1970s it was not uncommon to see ments in Jamaica had given rise to e slro 3

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Bob Marley's record factory 83 the unusual appearance of more were, undoubtedly, in the true cor- comparues were pumplng masslve than one first-rate musician. Reggae porate tradition, but rarely has that promotional money to the stations. had started attracting the attention overridden the compulsion to pull a The pressure from below also began of artists like the Black American profit-at least not for long. Profi- to mount, as some determined popu- Stevie Wonder who celebrated and tability was certainly the reason they larisers helped to make the power of borrowed from Marley, and others produced such incendiary music in this music felt through concert pro- like British rock singer Eric Clapton the first place, and why they actually motions, smaller radio airplay, and who had their own style of "borro- did make significant, though largely almost hand-to-hand record distri- wing," taking Marley's songs and unsuccessful, efforts to break into bution. The artists, too, tried to con- cashing in on hygienic versions. the U.S. Black youth audience which nect with Black audiences, playing, (Amazingly, Clapton's version of the buys vast numbers of records and for example, Harlem's Apollo Thea- song by Bob Marley, "I Shot the often sets trends that cross over to tre, one of the main venues for Black Sheriff ," received much heavier the even more profitable Top 40 music in New York City, when they radio play than Marley's original, mainstream. could have easily filled an arena even in Jamaica-one of the many People like Percy Sutton, who ran downtown instead. tactics used there to keep Marley's the Inner City Broadcasting Corpo- However, the Black bourgeoisie's influence in check.) Quite signifi- ration controlling major Black radio opposition to reggae cannot be said cantly, the punk movement which in New York and other cities formed to be the main reason for its failure blasted out of England beginning in one major obstacle. Sutton's upward to "cross oYer," or take root among 1976 made common cause with the social climb was part of the U.S. a Black audience in the U.S.. For spirit ofreggae, eventually even crea- ruling class effort to bolster the one thing, most everyone in the ting a music which was a wild kind Black bourgeoisie in choking off the U.S., Black or white, had grown up of hybrid of the two-the "ska" Black liberation movement of the listening to popular music not cha- sound of the mixed Jamaican and late 1960s. The strata he became part racterised by the underlying white "2-tone" bands like Selector of was marked by a profoundly con- rhythmic "beat " found in reggae and English Beat. servative and provincial all- and similar sounds. Then too, the Of course, the U.S. bourgeoisie as American outlook, who saw Pan- atmosphere of upward social mobi- a whole could hardly have been Africanism, for example, as a means lity that was promoted off the wides- happy with the dominant reggae to exploit African goods and mar- pread confusion and disillusionment artists of the mid-1970s, "chanting kets (a principal source of Sutton's over the results of the movements of down Babylon" to such an infec- personal fortune). Their greater poli- the 1960s affected how some Blacks tious beat. But it seems they may tical interests lay in directing the received the rebel spirit of the music. E have been temporarily prevented attention of the Black masses in the Added to this was the historic anta- o from clamping downs on the music U.S. to the most narrow of indivi- gonism and competition among E in the interests of maintaining illu- dual concerns, all in the name of West Indians and Blacks in the U.S., U sions of American pluralism in the "taking care of business for real, based on earlier years of migration - arts, with the U.S. playing host to forget the violent pipe-dreams of the by more upper class West Indians o world cultures and democratic aspi- '60s." They were naturally in a rela- who often filled "Black" positions E rations. They were, however, assis- tively better position to deliver this in universities, opened small shops, ted in holding reggae in check in a message than the bourgeoisie as a etc. = less obvious way by a junior set of whole, who were happy to see them s (n6 cops in the U.S. cultural scene- take on the job. Rat Race namely Black radio, which was lar- This brand of Black nationalism ar gely owned and operated by power- was not compatible with much of "Dem a go tired see me face ful members of the Black bourgeoi- Kingston reggae, to say the least, and Can't get me outa ro\fff{.*^n", sie in the U.S. the Black playlists, and media were not opened to this music, which Black Radio Blockade was labelled Reggae's chance at the U.S. ttundanceable,""white," "unintelligi- A peculiar situation arose as ble," "jungle mainstream was also relatively short- "white" multi-national corporations music." It got so bad that, of all the lived. The big promotional money like Island Records and CBS, which major national U.S. publications, which had been supporting Marley had a product and a potential mar- including Time and Newsweek, the (and was de rigeur for any major ket, came head to head with Black only magazine which never wrote a rock act) was cut off by Island bourgeois forces who had no inten- word about Bob Marley was around 1978. (After this, Marley put tion of seeing their market invaded Ebony-the quasi-official voice of his own money into U.S. promotion, by unruly foreigners singing about the Black bourgeoisie. (This, even especially trying to batter down the "blackman's redemption" and "It after interviewing Marley extensively doors to Black radio.) Other reggae takes a revolution to make a solu- in their offices.) groups with Island got an even worse tion...." At the time it was popularly The blockade was penetrated deal. All the reasons for this are believed that Island was simply racist slightly in the late 1970s when Mar- cloudy, and Island executives are not and ignorant about marketing any- ley and others were climbing up the talking, but strictly on the business thing but white rock. Racist they pop music charts, and the record level, they may have been wary of 84

overextending themselves in this January 1981, his first foreign visi- cheaply, turn a profit without doing music whose U.S. market was ting head of state was Edward anything for the music-and move seriously (if artificially) circumscri- Seaga. Jamaica was from then on to on to the next big sound. So reggae, bed. And the musicians themselves become the "showcase of demo- which had always been Island's were not easily "manageable" com- cracy" in the Caribbean, with U.S. financial bulwark used to support modities. Marley, for instance, had gunships to back it up. It was now the much more expensive rock acts, refused to continue the U.S. leg of "safe" to "come back to Jamaica," continues to be milked for that his in the summer of the TV ads crooned to the tourists. purpose. 1977 after his toe had been diagno- And it was time to show the unruly In Kingston, though reggae still sed as cancerous and he was having elements in this backyard of the U.S. has a shockingly difficult time (and trouble even walking on it. Island just who was running the show. increasingly so) getting on radio had urged him to have it cut off so In the spring of 1981, Bob Mar- playlists jammed with American and he could continue to do the promo- ley died of cancer. British pop, it is no longer on the tional tour. Marley is also one of the The truth behind his death has fringe of things. It has become big few people on the planet to have tur- never been satisfactorily revealed, business, a regular "national pro- ned down an interview with U.S. but it is beyond doubt that having duct" on the order of bauxite, tou- television "superstar" Barbara him out of the way was advanta- rism and ganja-and has attracted Walters. geous to all bourgeois interests con- numerous uninspired producers and By 1978, Virgin Records had vir- cerned, including both Jamaican con-men chasing fortunes. Not that tually finished producing reggae, parties. Eight years of Manley had rip-offs are anything new in Kings- and the other major companies did not made the route of pallid ton reggae business, nor that the out- not sign many new acts after that, reforms, backed by a "heavy man- law artists who originally put reggae even though great music was still ners" police state under Cuban or on the map are out of the race. But coming out of Kingston and Great Soviet auspices, any more attractive as competing paths develop in the Britain, and the audience overall was to many politically awakened music and as the audience broadens growing. New small companies like people-including Rastafarians and out, the powers-that-be have been Schanachie and Alligator stepped Marley. And no amount of sugar- compelled to increase their influence into the gap, as well as the more esta- coated bullets or outright intimida- within this scene as well. blished independent labels in Britain, tion had been able to soften him Other developments have also but their distribution couldn't begin up-his music at the end was as worked to temporarily dampen the to reach the potential audience. strong as ever. In fact, it is signifi- situation. In Kingston, live concerts a1.l 6 Simultaneously in Britain, reggae cant that most of the major musi- have always been a rarity because it o\ hits had mysteriously stopped cians remained "warriors against was too expensive and there were no e making it up the pop charts even Babylon" ; reggae had yet to pro- proper facilities. The music met its though they were selling like crazy duce a renegade on the order of Bob audience in the sound system dances, in the stores. This was particularly Dylan, the U.S. singer of the 1960s and in recent years the "DJ style" =o suspicious in a country where reggae who deserted the revolutionary (artists toasting--and sin- had been widely popular for over a camp. ging over recorded tracks) has come a youth e decade among proletarian of In some ways, the shock of Mar- to be a very popular form itself. The o all nationalities who listened to it on ley's death put reggae on people's events of the day, the motions in the neighborhood jukeboxes. This minds internationally more than dance, the comical strivings among rather blatant purging (which would went =<( ever. Sales up temporarily, but the masses to ape foreign ways...are eventually hurt reggae sales signifi- even after that very few record con' all talked about over a version of a cantly) came right on the heels of the tracts with new artists were signed. traditional reggae rhythm track. 1981 riots in Brixton and other cities Increasingly, Island has sat back and Those artists who can do this with in England that were marked by the gotten fat on posthumous Marley style have become the new stars with serious collaboration between the releases. And currently, their only the crowd, and Jamaican white punks and West Indians. other reggae projects are re-releases, producers, who are often dreads In 1980, any breaks that might compilations and live albums of operating on a shoe string, have hap- have existed from the vantage point established artists like Gregory pily turned to the inexpensive pro- of the U.S. bourgeoisie for the music Isaacs and Steel Pulse. One of their ductions involved in this kind of to be promoted were closed up. All top executives recently revealed, music. seductive overtures to Manley had "We're not putting any more money This dance hall style rises directly been called to a halt when they into promoting reggae-the music from the masses in Kingston, and couldn't wean him of the Soviet bloc sells itself." (A quote which Musi- DJs and singers make it or break it sufficiently to swallow a very bitter cian magazine edited out of its inter- by way of the live (and at times bru- IMF austerity deal. Classic CIA des- view with him, for "space reasons," tal) response from the audience. This tabilisation tactics were used to put the author was told.) They've fired music is also rather hard-going for him out of office, while 600 youths the people who were capable of fin- most non-Jamaicans since it gene- were murdered in the streets by the ding, developing and marketing new rally relies on rapid-fire patois for its rival Manley/Seaga parties. When acts, and apparently their current punch. It has gone almost unmarke- Reagan became U.S. president in strategy is to put out old reggae very ted in the U.S. with some exceptions 85

like Yellowman and Eek-a-Mouse known to have hooked more than talent. However, the depth of any who, a couple ofyears ago, took to one musician on cocaine and other given trend in literature and art is competing for lewd lyrics (called hard drugs. The results are all too determined by its importance for the "" by Jamaicans) and got evident in the music, as well as the class or stratum whose tastes it plenty of airplay from Kingston to violent incidents that accompany all expresses, and by the social role New York. big-money drug dealings. played by that class or stratum ; here Some observers look to the work too, in the last analysis, everything ofthe "dub poets" as the inheritors The Root Is There depends upon the course of social of the "Marley tradition," but these development and on the relation of radical poets who set their words to "You can cut down the tree, social forces." music have rarely risen to the artistry But you'll never, "The Role of the Individual of the reggae masters, largely You'll never succeed, in History" because they tend to take on the Cause-The root is there. "mission" of spiritual and political And you cannot get rid of Certainly the last has not been leaders in the most literal fashion, AII of I and I now..." heard from the "sufferahs" in giving lessons not art. And unfortu- "The Root is There"-Mighty Jamaica whose tastes this music con- nately, some of their fans and critics Diamonds tinues to express. Nor from the actually demand this of them. Said rebels from Japan to Poland who one of : "One danger While the reggae runnings have have taken this music as their own. I see is that he is...considered an been rough in the last few years, clo- It is a sure bet that Marley and the entertainer. He is not, he is a revo- sing the book on this music is mani- rest of the reggae greats, the "crea- lutionary." Since when are these festly absurd. In 1898 G. Plekhanov, tion ," will find their way mutually exclusive ? when he was still a Marxist, com- into the hearts and cassette players One insidious imperialist contri- mented : of the Ivans of the world, right on bution to the entire scene has been through to when the "right time" what can only be described as the "A given trend in art may remain really does come..."If a egg, natty systematic introduction of hard without any remarkable expression inna de red.*" u drugs into Jamaica. In recent years, if an unfavourable combination of heroine and cocaine have appeared circumstances carries away, one on the streets of Kingston, not unlike after another, several talented peo- the situation in the wake of the Black ple who might have given it expres- * "Natty Dread" by Bob Marley, people's rebellions in Harlem and sion. But the premature death of from a folk proverb meaning : If it E Watts in the U.S. in the 1960s. This such talented people can prevent the is an egg, natty is in the yolk, at the o had taken its toll on reggae ; certain artistic expression of this trend only centre of the storm. Eggs in Jamaica E "hangers-on" in the business are if it is too shallow to produce new are fertilised-and red. U o E l. The amazing sounds created by Jamaica's participation in what was considered a pro- observers, this rather anarchic flood of foreign intrepid "dub" engineers have also raised Manley concert. They may well have had the capital, doled out by people with little unders- = world standards for studio production...this, tacit approval of Manley forces who would tanding or genuine interest in the music, also \o in a city where the water or power might be also ultimately benefit from getting this irre- resulted in Jamaican producers witholding 6 cut off any time of the day or night. pressible rebel out of the way (the gunmen some of the best music from their studios just (^)e 2. Selassie, a spiritual figure for the Rastas were never apprehended by Manley's police to keep it out of the hands of these grubbing had a certain historical appeal be'cause in addi- for instance). And the U.S. bourgeoisie also soul brokers. ("They want shit, give them tion to being the first BIack head of state in appears to have had its fangs in this, one indi- shit.") the twentieth century, he resisted Mussolini's cation being the fact that Carl Colby, son of 5. This is not to imply that reggae artisls were invasion, making Ethiopia one of the last CIA director William Colby, showed up as a not subject to inordinate harassment, having African countries to succumb to imperialism. "cameraman" at the retreat Bob was secre- their concerts mysteriously sabotaged, or while He was also originally promoted by Marcus ted to by the Manley government after the just walking the streets of Brooklyn and the Carvey's early Pan Alricanisr movement, shooting. Bronx in New York City. Peter Tosh was once which formed part of the roots of Rastafa- 4. Virgin's reggae ventures present in micro- arrested in Miami customs for impersonating rianism. After the African colonies were yan- cosm the international financial and political Peter Tosh! Nor does it counter-indicate CIA ked away from Italy at the end of World War thicket which reggae artists were required to participation in such harassment in Jamaica 2, however, this "" ruled his penetrate in order to be heard beyond the itself. Bob Marley appears to have been under Black "subjects" for the greater U.S. impe- rather small market of Kingston. After signing constant CIA surveillance for years...just rialist empire with a brutal and bloody hand. many groups at bargain basement rates, Vir- minutes before he was to play a major con- Before his death, Carvey, too denounced him gin proceeded to promote only a handful, cert at Madison Square Garden in NYC, an as a Black slavemaster. hoping to find a hitmaker like Marley or Cliff, invading army of undercover agents cleared 3. Biographies of Marley make a variety of and shelved most of the others. This strategy his dressing room of his entire entourage and speculations as to who conducted the shoot- brought the company quick profits on the big interrogated him alone on some murder sup- out at the Marley compound in 1976, and acts and starved out some of the best groups posedly committed by dreadlocked masked why. But all evidence from inside sources indi- to keep the competition from making money men the night before. tr cates that JLP thugs actually carried out the on them, and to keep a stranglehold on the dirty work in retaliation for Bob's planned development of the scene. According to some