soul
Reggae Covers: Jimmy Lindsay – Ain’t No Sunshine (Bill Withers)
Starts kind of respectful, even mechanical, but quickly assumes its own character and style. Jimmy Lindsay’s recording of the Bill Withers original brings hints of African drums, rock & roll (that sax solo!), and his nascent rasta consciousness.
Reggae Covers: Slim Smith – Everybody Needs Love (Gladys Knight & the Pips)
What an outstanding vocal track on this single! Kingston, Jamaica’s Slim Smith here offers a truly noteworthy, upbeat cover of the swinging original recording by Gladys Knight & the Pips.
A lot of reggae covers (including some on this site) come off as bound to or hindered by the original recording in an almost postcolonial sense. This artist however takes the slow-danceable, heavily-orchestrated original released to US audiences in 1967 and turns it into a whole new piece of art: one that preserves the essentials of the song (melody & lyrics) but turns them up for the hip-shaking audiences of 1969 Trenchtown.
Say you wanna be loved
But you won’t let me love you
Say you want someone to trust in you, baby
Can’t you see that’s what I’m tryin’ to do?
Reggae Covers: Derrick Harriott – Groovy Situation (Mel & Tim)
A nicely-produced, 70s-heavy cover of the 1969 original by Mel & Tim.
That girl
Gonna’ make a man if it takes all night
Reggae Covers: Big Youth – Wake Up Everybody (Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes)
A plaintive, slow-rolling version of the 1975 original by Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, this cover lacks a lot of the typical punch & urgency of Big Youth’s music but the message is spot-on with the original.
The world won’t get no better
if we just let it be
Reggae Covers: Zap Pow – If You Don’t Know Me By Now (Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes)
A not entirely unexpected reggae arrangement of the 1972 classic soul tune by Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes. Groovy in the sense of the original song, but lacking all of Teddy Pendergrass‘ bombast and the fantastic string orchestration of the original.
If you don’t know me by now
you will never never never know me…
Reggae Covers: Lloyd Charmers – Let’s Get It On (Marvin Gaye)
Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On” was released in 1973 to instant critical acclaim, followed by an era of serious American investigation into the making of sweet, sweet love to its ever-smooth melodies, the title track becoming the metronomic groove-finder for couples coming together anywhere there was a hi-fi. Lloyd Charmers –a veteran ska & reggae singer from Trench Town– recorded this trippy, ethereal, groove-heavy cover in 1974.
If you believe in love, let’s get it on…
Reggae Covers: Watty ‘King’ Burnett – Rainy Night in Portland (Tony Joe White/Brook Benton)
Written in 1962 by Tony Joe White and later popularized for American audiences by Brook Benton in 1970, this reggae-fication of a classic soul number by Port Antonio Jamaica’s Watty ‘King’ Burnett is trippy; heavily dub-themed.
Rainy night in Portland
Rainy night in Portland
Lord it’s raining all over the yard.
Lord it’s raining all over the yard.
Reggae Covers: Inner Circle & Jacob Miller – Rock the Boat (The Hues Corporation)
After a slow start this 1973 recording for California’s The Hues Corporation from the album ‘Freedom for the Stallion‘ eventually skyrocketed to the top of the Hot 100 in July of 1974. Later the same year renowned Jamaican journeymen Inner Circle, backing the inestimable Jacob Miller, released this cover on their eponymously-named ‘Rock The Boat’ LP on Trojan Records.
Our love is like a ship on the ocean
We’ve been sailing with a cargo full of love and devotionSo I’d like to know where you got the notion
Said I’d like to know where you got the notionTo rock the boat (don’t rock the boat, baby)
Rock the boat (don’t tip the boat over)
Rock the boat (don’t rock the boat baby)
Rock the boat…
Reggae Covers: The Chosen Few – Chain Gang (Sam Cooke)
A melodic, musically tight 1975 cover of Sam Cooke’s 1960 original by Kingston, Jamaica’s The Chosen Few. It’s a fairly straightforward cover, right down to the backing vocals.
All day long they work so hard til’ the sun is going down
Working on the highways and byways and wearing, wearing a frown
You hear they moaning their lives away
Then you hear somebody sayThat’s the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, ga-ang
That’s the sound of the men,
Working on the chain, gang.
A Biscuit In The Sun 