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articles tagged “music”

“Place Call[ed] Africa” by Junior Byles

If I had to pick one reggae artist who most deserves more attention then (s)he has received, it would probably be Junior Byles. He was gifted with a beautiful voice and an ability to convey a lot of emotion with it. Which he did, on some deadly serious songs like “Beat Down Babylon,” “Demonstration,” and “Fade Away.” Even a love song like “Curly Locks” has as a subtext a plea against discrimination.

Most of Byles's early work — indeed, much of his finest output — was produced by Perry, and it deserves a wider audience.

The two met in the late 1960s when they were employed by music executive Joe Gibbs, Byles as lead singer of the Versatiles, Perry as Gibbs' house producer. When Byles decided to start a solo career, in 1970, he turned to a now independent Perry to help him.

“Return of Django” by The Upsetters

Early in Lee Perry's career as an independent producer, he recorded a slew of instrumentals credited to his house band, The Upsetters. For song titles, Perry took inspiration from Spaghetti Westerns. Like many reggae artists, he loved that film genre. A quick glance at his output includes

  • “High Plains Drifter”
  • “Dig Your Grave”
  • “Big John Wayne”
  • “The Man With No Name”
  • “Amigo”

Let's add to that list “Return of Django,” my favorite of the late 60s/early 70s Perry instrumentals.

“A Wah Dat” by Junior Dread

I don't know much about Junior Dread outside of the two toasting records he made for producer Lee Perry. One is a solid outing over a dub mix of the Heptones' “Sufferer's Time.” The other is “A Wah Dat,” cut on an otherwise unused rhythm (or, if it was used elsewhere, I'm unaware). Both are sufferer's tunes, so-called because they express the plight of suffering people. But “A Wah Dat” is, for me, the better of the two.

The lyrics are a first-hand account of desperation and mounting financial trouble during the Christmas season:

Christmas a come And me soon get a next son And that's no fun yuh! No no no no no no

“People Funny Boy”

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In 1968, reggae pioneer Lee “Scratch” Perry launched his first record label, Upset Records, with the single “People Funny Boy.” The title might seem odd, but try this: mentally insert a comma so that it reads “People Funny, Boy.” It's a complaint, as in “boy, people are funny.” And who was Perry complaining about? His former employer, Joel Gibson, AKA Joe Gibbs.

Working for Joe Gibbs

Two years earlier, Perry had begun working for Gibbs, ostensibly a music producer. In reality, Gibbs was not a music producer, but an executive producer — he financed the operation. Perry was the music producer. He scouted talent, supervised sessions, arranged and wrote songs, and promoted records that appeared on Gibbs' Amalgamated and Pressure Beat labels.

“Rightful Ruler” by U-Roy and Peter Tosh

In 1969, Lee Perry produced one of the first ever deejay records, “Rightful Ruler” by U-Roy and Peter Tosh. And as I wrote in my list of recommended U-Roy records, it is a remarkable record.

First, recording a deejay artist on a reused rhythm track was a novel idea at the time. Second, the rhythm track, originally used for a song called “Selassie,” was substantially changed for U-Roy's cut. Most early deejay records use an instrumental mix of a record as the backing track, replacing vocals with deejay rhymes. For “Rightful Ruler,” Perry did much more:

We Beg Your Pardon America

Ever heard Gil Scott-Heron's spoken word piece about Gerald Ford's pardon of Richard Nixon? It's called "We Beg Your Pardon America (Pardon Our Analysis)" (from the album The First Minute of a New Day). Here's an excerpt:

We beg your pardon, America. We beg your pardon because the pardon you gave this time was not yours to give.