when we first went to america, back in the early eighties, R&B was very different. It was about dressing up and straightening hair. everything was smooth and slick.
over time, R&B developed a rougher edge. Buster rhymes had a big influence at that time, and ragga and roughneck styles came with the gangsta lifestyle.
back in the days of alexander o' neil and the club crooners that rough-neck style would be avoided. Black america didn't really know what reggae was, our first US audience came mainly from the colleges. Now, when we play the states, the audience is much more mixed. Mainly because of immigration. We get africans and polynesians and south americans.
reggae has been assimilated into the culture of the kind of music we are talking about. timberland sound like sly and robbie to me, before them R&B productions were smooth and filled up with strings and all kinds of gloss and polish. Timberland changed that, and i'm convinced that it was reggae culture and sound that they were inspired by.
the sad part is that there isn't that same authentic sound being made in jamaica.
back in the day jamaica saw england as the 'mother country' because of empire. There are more protestant churches per head of population in jamaica than anywhere else in the world. with independence, and the growth of world-wide broadcasting and communication technology, that connection to britain faded. Black american culture became dominant, and that's where all the role models come from.
with all the good and the bad that comes with it.
and cricket is part of the erosion of influence of empire.
why should kids now be interested in an arcane sport played by posh white people ???
Good points, Jimmy...I definitely think hip hop started to provide the American r&b sound with a tougher edge and more of a street image from the 90s on, so it wasn't so far removed from reggae. There was a period when Timbaland, Missy Elliot and others were using drum patterns that are straight out of reggae. Shaggy once mentioned that Timbaland has loads of Sly and Robbie in his record collection. On the other hand, when I've heard some of the reggae djs on pure r&b type tracks, it doesn't work as well to me.
I see your point regarding cricket. At the same time, the likes of Viv Richards, Clive Lloyd and co were doing the same as what people like Jack Johnson and Joe Louis accomplished in the USA: i.e. going into an area which had been the sole territory of white sportsmen and audiences, and then re-shaping and dominating it. In doing that, it was no longer just for the upper class audience. Yes, it's perfectly understandable why young black kids would be more drawn to basketball - it's a more black oriented/youth oriented sport, it's faster and more prestigious. Yet at one time, I'm sure basketball was where boxing was before Jack Johnson arrived on the scene. I think in overlooking cricket, the baby got thrown out with the bathwater.
Last edited by Soul Adventurer; 26th January 2012 at 07:20 PM.
Admirable thoughts from Mr Ram Jam Rodigan who has forgotten more about reggae than i'll ever know but can't see it. No doubt victims of the digital age but no record pressing plants left in JA.
UKW made an interesting point about it becoming more of a niche area year by year. In my opinion it is there already. I still buy loads of reggae vinyl and half of them are reissues of old tracks - take a look at the Dub Vendor website for examples. The other half pick up on a point made by JB about 70's reggae where they certainly draw their inspiration - usual odes to rasta/sensi. They satisfy my need for bass. I even have a DJ mixer simply for the fact that I can boost the bass.........
I love them but they ain't gonna gain much attention outside of the existing reggae trainspotter fraternity. Dub step,like D&B before it, may well set some curious kids off in pursuit of the roots of their musical choice, a bit like how a certain UB40 helped open up the world of reggae to me some 30 years ago.
It is not all doom and gloom and this forum often shows that there are lots of good tunes about, you just got to look that little bit harder. Tuff Scout, Belleville, Scoops, Heartical, Ariwa are all labels where quality control is good. You have producers like Russ D, Dougie Wardrop, who like the G Corp boys clearly love what they do - I guess it must be as they ain't never going to get rich on the record sales.
__________________ PLEASE SIR WOULD YOU MIND SAYING THAT AGAIN
I think what's sad is that the type of U.S hip hop lifestyle that influences the young in Jamaica and around the world is the manufactured stuff. The kind that lacks any social/political messages.
while the band was on one of it's overnight journeys, we watched a very interesting documentary called 'why we laugh'. It's about the history of black humour, and traces it back from the days of minstrels and eye-rolling servants, through the period of game-changing artists like Richard Pryor and bill cosby to todays more 'hip-hop' style comedians. the most significant thing about the pre-and post civil rights artists were their determination to break stereotypes. They refused to live up to the expectations of the wider [white] audience, and they created a new identity for themselves that was truthful and inclusive. Everyone I knew loved those old richard pryor stand-up movies from the 70's. His mainstream movies were often trite, but his stand-up routines were legendary. his themes were universal, he didn't bang on about how terrible it was to be black, he made observations about life that we could all relate too. And he did it with a likeability that anyone could warm to. Bill cosby even more so, he didn't even SWEAR ! yet his stories of family life, and children in particular are full of wonderful little observations of human behavoir that transcend race and culture. Unfortunately, as we went through the 80's, the new generation of gang-style hip-hop comedians rejected the cosiness of the huxtables. And when NWA took the angry politics of public enemy and turned it into 'gangsta's' they had a world-wide smash hit with their album. And that has been the blue-print for most hip-hop ever since, and the biggest market for the gangsta style is white suburban teenagers. To the average white teenagers blacks were dangerous, carried guns, always had beautiful ho's around them, didn't obey the law, shot first and asked questions later, and had no allegience to anyone, but themselves. In other words, the complete opposite to THEM. It's a fantasy, to escape boredom. Ali G was a wonderful satire of this, with his staines massive 'gangsta lifestyle. I suppose the point I'm making here is this. In the early days of entertainment, at the beginning of the last century, most of the black characters were eye-rolling servants and maids. This is because the white people producing and controlling the media wanted it that way. fast forward to todays hip-hop generation and blacks are still being forced to roll there eyes, except this time it's with aggression, with a 'ho' draped on his arm, and drug money cascading out of his pockets. They sell that image because this is what the white people want. And when statistics tell us that a young black male is most likely to be killed by another young black male, it makes you think that maybe this culture isn't very healthy for black people.
while the band was on one of it's overnight journeys, we watched a very interesting documentary called 'why we laugh'. It's about the history of black humour, and traces it back from the days of minstrels and eye-rolling servants, through the period of game-changing artists like Richard Pryor and bill cosby to todays more 'hip-hop' style comedians. the most significant thing about the pre-and post civil rights artists were their determination to break stereotypes. They refused to live up to the expectations of the wider [white] audience, and they created a new identity for themselves that was truthful and inclusive. Everyone I knew loved those old richard pryor stand-up movies from the 70's. His mainstream movies were often trite, but his stand-up routines were legendary. his themes were universal, he didn't bang on about how terrible it was to be black, he made observations about life that we could all relate too. And he did it with a likeability that anyone could warm to. Bill cosby even more so, he didn't even SWEAR ! yet his stories of family life, and children in particular are full of wonderful little observations of human behavoir that transcend race and culture. Unfortunately, as we went through the 80's, the new generation of gang-style hip-hop comedians rejected the cosiness of the huxtables. And when NWA took the angry politics of public enemy and turned it into 'gangsta's' they had a world-wide smash hit with their album. And that has been the blue-print for most hip-hop ever since, and the biggest market for the gangsta style is white suburban teenagers. To the average white teenagers blacks were dangerous, carried guns, always had beautiful ho's around them, didn't obey the law, shot first and asked questions later, and had no allegience to anyone, but themselves. In other words, the complete opposite to THEM. It's a fantasy, to escape boredom. Ali G was a wonderful satire of this, with his staines massive 'gangsta lifestyle. I suppose the point I'm making here is this. In the early days of entertainment, at the beginning of the last century, most of the black characters were eye-rolling servants and maids. This is because the white people producing and controlling the media wanted it that way. fast forward to todays hip-hop generation and blacks are still being forced to roll there eyes, except this time it's with aggression, with a 'ho' draped on his arm, and drug money cascading out of his pockets. They sell that image because this is what the white people want. And when statistics tell us that a young black male is most likely to be killed by another young black male, it makes you think that maybe this culture isn't very healthy for black people.
It goes to show that music isn't simply a form of entertainment. On one level it is, of course but it's also a way of influencing people's behaviour, for good or for bad. I'm not sure what happened to reggae from the mid 80s onwards but by the time Public Enemy were on the scene, the music had gone in the opposite direction in its image, i.e with the dancehall stuff.
As for what happened to hip hop, here's a recent video from one of the members of Poor Righteous Teachers, who were one of the popular socially conscious artists of the time.
interestingly I was reading "Jamacian warriors" last night and the author interviews U Roy. U Roy speaks about the "demise of reggae in Jamacian" he says that the youths dont want to emulate the sounds of the past and are now advocating American RnB but with a "Gangsta attitude beacuse it sells".
He is upset that you dont get kids wanting to make their own islands music anymore as its not seen as cool. What was also interesting was he said that the youths cant see that they are recycling theri own culture as it was jamacians in the USA toasting over records that gave american blacks the idea too rap over music in the first place.
He also said that the message of "self improvement of the soul" in music has turned to one of "self improvement in riches" and the youths are trying to turn their backs on their own culture and people, they would rather be steeped in gangster chic than be photographed outside of their own tin house in the townships.
He also said that their are some great singers in Jamacia, but the music always suffers as its always a secondary thought in the creative process. He just wished they would sing more concious lyrics instead of advocating violence. He calls them scared people, who dont like violence but to be able to get noticed they have turn their lyrics that way.
Sad really. Still, on the plus side he said that music is always changing and one day he says they will change their message and drop the guns and hate, but he says its goign to take someone brave to change tack now.
Good points, Jimmy...I definitely think hip hop started to provide the American r&b sound with a tougher edge and more of a street image from the 90s on, so it wasn't so far removed from reggae. There was a period when Timbaland, Missy Elliot and others were using drum patterns that are straight out of reggae. Shaggy once mentioned that Timbaland has loads of Sly and Robbie in his record collection. On the other hand, when I've heard some of the reggae djs on pure r&b type tracks, it doesn't work as well to me.
I see your point regarding cricket. At the same time, the likes of Viv Richards, Clive Lloyd and co were doing the same as what people like Jack Johnson and Joe Louis accomplished in the USA: i.e. going into an area which had been the sole territory of white sportsmen and audiences, and then re-shaping and dominating it. In doing that, it was no longer just for the upper class audience. Yes, it's perfectly understandable why young black kids would be more drawn to basketball - it's a more black oriented/youth oriented sport, it's faster and more prestigious. Yet at one time, I'm sure basketball was where boxing was before Jack Johnson arrived on the scene. I think in overlooking cricket, the baby got thrown out with the bathwater.
Remember reading a great story about Jack Johnson Imani.He got stopped for speeding by some redneck cop somewhere in the deep sound.Jack knew he hadn't been speeding but remained calm.When the cop demanded payment of a $20 fine Jack calmly opened his wallet and said "Here's $40,I'm coming back this way".
interestingly I was reading "Jamacian warriors" last night and the author interviews U Roy. U Roy speaks about the "demise of reggae in Jamacian" he says that the youths dont want to emulate the sounds of the past and are now advocating American RnB but with a "Gangsta attitude beacuse it sells".
He is upset that you dont get kids wanting to make their own islands music anymore as its not seen as cool. What was also interesting was he said that the youths cant see that they are recycling theri own culture as it was jamacians in the USA toasting over records that gave american blacks the idea too rap over music in the first place.
He also said that the message of "self improvement of the soul" in music has turned to one of "self improvement in riches" and the youths are trying to turn their backs on their own culture and people, they would rather be steeped in gangster chic than be photographed outside of their own tin house in the townships.
He also said that their are some great singers in Jamacia, but the music always suffers as its always a secondary thought in the creative process. He just wished they would sing more concious lyrics instead of advocating violence. He calls them scared people, who dont like violence but to be able to get noticed they have turn their lyrics that way.
Sad really. Still, on the plus side he said that music is always changing and one day he says they will change their message and drop the guns and hate, but he says its goign to take someone brave to change tack now.
It's a real shame, it seems like nothing less than a revolution of the mind will change the way the music's going.
Remember reading a great story about Jack Johnson Imani.He got stopped for speeding by some redneck cop somewhere in the deep sound.Jack knew he hadn't been speeding but remained calm.When the cop demanded payment of a $20 fine Jack calmly opened his wallet and said "Here's $40,I'm coming back this way".
I think I need to read up more on J.J, Tom. He was way ahead of his time.
It occurred to me that Reggae over the past 20-25 years has become a music of solo artists - djs and singers - as opposed to BANDS. Both in the uk and Jamaica. Singers can come up with amazing lyrics and sing them beautifully but if they don't play an instrument or don't have a good sense of how to arrange instruments, the overall end product will be less than amazing. For songwriting, they have to rely on "producers" who are really just guys with a computer. That's what I see. True quality often gets mistaken for quantity.
Much the same has happened to soul/rnb in this respect, so if RnB is the model for the younger reggae artists, it's not surprising the standard has dropped, IMO.
26th January 2012, 07:08 PM
REGGAE MUSIC CAN'T REFUSE IT
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