The influence of reggae on modern pop music is enormous, particularly in the United Kingdom, where a large immigrant workforce first began importing the sounds of the Caribbean in the 1950's.
Reggae itself is derived from 'rocksteady' - a slowed down version of ska better suited to Jamaica's heat. Ska in turn came from the mixing of New Orleans r&b in the early 1960's with 'mento', a traditional Jamaican musical style often confused with calypso, as Jamaican musicians picked up the music of artists like Fats Domino and Allen Toussaint in radio broadcasts from the southern United States. This early period of ska's development was greatly influenced by The Skatalites, particularly Jackie Mitoo, and also Prince Buster.

The reggae sound is easily recognizable by staccato chords played by a guitar or piano on the offbeat of the measure, but until 1968 it didn't really have a name, other than maybe blue-beat or perhaps Jamaican r&b. In that year The Maytals recorded Do The Reggay, penned by their frontman Toots Hibbert, and in the process defined it as a separate genre.

One of the first reggae artists to make it big outside Jamaica was Desmond Dekker, who had hits with The Israelites, Problems and It Mek in 1968 and 1969, at about the same time as Jimmy Cliff was finding a wider audience for his more mainstream sound. US born Johnny Nash did a lot to promote the style's wider acceptance with the self-penned hit Hold Me Tight in 1968. But it wasn't until the mid 1970's that reggae finally produced it's first star of international standing, when Bob Marley unleashed a brand of folk-influenced reggae-pop, (with political undertones) which spoke to people of all race, colour and creed the world over. Some of Marley's seminal recordings in the early 1970's were produced by Lee 'Scratch' Perry, who is widely held to be the architect of the transition from ska to the new reggae-pop sound, a sound taken up and used by the likes of Eddy Grant and The Police in the 1970's.

As previously mentioned, the UK was a primary destination for emigration from the Caribbean as early as the late 1950's, where it evolved into several subgenres and fusions, most notably the so-called 'lovers rock', which was seminal in the formation of other musical forms like drum and bass and dubstep. Late 1970's Britain saw the emergence of Maxi Priest, The Specials, UB40, The Selecter and Madness at the forefront of a ska/mod revival, largely under the auspices of Jerry Dammers' Coventry-based 2-Tone label.

By the mid-80's reggae had faded in the UK and 2-Tone closed down in 1985, but worldwide the style has gone from strength to strength, fusing with many genres in the Americas through Africa and into Asia. Some elements initially based in reggae, particularly 'toasting' - i.e. talking over - music by DJs and MCs, and the mixing techniques found in dub (an instrumental form of reggae) have had a big influence on the development of later styles, most notably rap and the reggae/rap hybrid known as 'ragga'.

{back}      {next}