At one point, to feel socially energized in the Caribbean, it mattered if
you were young and alive in Kingston, Jamaica in the 1970s, and you
were hearing for the first time the street hailing sound of U Roy.
Since his death, words of tribute have rippled across media pages. For
many there was a special resonance in his voice. It was like nothing you’d
heard before.
Islanders in the 60s were more at ease with the Byron Lee Dragonaire
sound. His sun-enjoying beats accommodated a need for pleasant nights
out dancing, on hotel floors or at island nightclubs.
Came the 70s, and a range of performance to choose from: a catch fired
Bob Marley jamming, his appeals for crossAtlantic justice. Songs of love
and wanting from sweet melodians (Gregory Isaacs, Phyllis Dillon).
Straight dance party favourites, or those home galloping Rastafari drums.
In the mix U Roy appeared and immediately it struck you: this guy was
bold and streaking. His improvising style was not the very first of its kind,
but original he was all the same.
The voice overlays, the out of line affirmations – here was someone
rising above reggae’s bass ruling manners, interrupting the call for
pure entertainment – “Wake the Town and tell the people, ‘bout the
musical disc coming your way” – challenging air play predictableness
like never before.
Back then he was simply U Roy, his birth name obscure to outsiders. His
‘toasting’ style would find inheritors (Big Youth, Yellow Man) but nothing
compares with discovering those U Roy 45s; with being there, eager to
be invigorated.
At times his ‘words of wisdom’ in and alongside popular songs came
across as almost ‘rude’ attachments. He had something to say; he wanted
the whole world to hear what he (not Ken Boothe, not Jimmy Cliff)
understood about the Kingston tough life / hard love experience.
He seemed to suggest there was nothing fate binding about anyone’s
birth or circumstance. You could bike ride through Kingston’s top | bottom
grading streets; or stand aside and look. Or with a little hop and scat you
could remodel the wheel, refashion the world with ‘versions galore’.
If you were lucky to be in Jamaica in the 1970s, the U Roy sound, tossing
live words into streams of complacency, was like nothing that came
before.
With rap imitators doing celebrity laps now everywhere, generations
late may wonder: does the man deserve a Caribbean halo? remembered
as an island music ‘originator’? Yeah yeah yeeeah! As he would say.
– Wyck Williams
FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN 