I have to say I didn't see this one coming, but I suppose it's no surprise that being an Englishman in your generation that you'd have heard of blue beat and ska, the music that came all the way from Jamaica.
But about the song in question, it is quite delightful. I was about to say it's contemplative... but no, actually it's the sort of thing that makes you want to step back and enjoy the moment as is, without contemplation. I suppose that's the sort of thing reggae/rocksteady/ska whatever-you-want-to-call-it does best.
@EP - at the end of the 60s; I listened to pop music on the radio - and had an older friend who had at least two LP compilations of what we called reggae.
It was all just 'reggae' and I never heard the specialist terms ska, rocksteady or blue beat (I was too young, and did not participate in the youth cultures - nor would I have wanted to)...
Until the UK revival bands such as Madness and The Specials emerged in the late 1970s-early 80s - when they became among my absolute favourites of that era - and 'ska' was then used to describe it, instead of 'reggae' - presumably because 'reggae' had changed a great deal by then, in ways I don't much like (not a Bob Marley fan).
English-produced 'Rocksteady' Reggae with jazz flute from 1971... what's not to like? I don't actually remember this from the era in which it was released - despite having had a strong liking for the Jamaican Ska/ Rocksteady/ Reggae of the late 1960s. But I recently came across it in a YouTube compilation of such music that was issued in the UK by the famous Trojan Records. It is such a great little track that I immediately recognized it as one of those which will, sooner or later, be rediscovered and used as movie background, or a the theme for a TV show; so that sometime in the future 'everybody' will know it. Well, thanks to BC's Notions; you can be one of the early adopters...
"Pharaoh's Walk by Exodus (1971) a revivalist craze waiting to happen..."
3 Comments -
I have to say I didn't see this one coming, but I suppose it's no surprise that being an Englishman in your generation that you'd have heard of blue beat and ska, the music that came all the way from Jamaica.
But about the song in question, it is quite delightful. I was about to say it's contemplative... but no, actually it's the sort of thing that makes you want to step back and enjoy the moment as is, without contemplation. I suppose that's the sort of thing reggae/rocksteady/ska whatever-you-want-to-call-it does best.
30 July 2022 at 03:22
@EP - at the end of the 60s; I listened to pop music on the radio - and had an older friend who had at least two LP compilations of what we called reggae.
https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2015/02/three-1969-reggae-classics.html
It was all just 'reggae' and I never heard the specialist terms ska, rocksteady or blue beat (I was too young, and did not participate in the youth cultures - nor would I have wanted to)...
Until the UK revival bands such as Madness and The Specials emerged in the late 1970s-early 80s - when they became among my absolute favourites of that era - and 'ska' was then used to describe it, instead of 'reggae' - presumably because 'reggae' had changed a great deal by then, in ways I don't much like (not a Bob Marley fan).
30 July 2022 at 06:56
"Rocksteady" is right!
30 July 2022 at 21:51