Riddim rulers

With their inexhaustible catalogues of hit rhythms, stop-on-a-dime dynamics and superior-standard playing, backing bands are the true stars of reggae

by ERIN MACLEOD

There was quite a bit of talk about Damian Marley’s performance at the Osheaga festival this past Labour Day weekend. The crowd loved it, as did a few journalists. Rave reviews focused on the incredibly tight band and the ridiculous level of energy expended on nothing more than making sure the crowd was hyped.

Thing is, as good as Marley’s set was, it was more representative than exceptional—right down to the guy whose sole job is to wave an Ethiopian flag. A wicked band is essential if you want to get into the reggae game, whether here—at venues as diverse as E.B. Resto Bar, Castleton Gardens, Studio Juste Pour Rire, le Medley, Collège André-Laurendeau and Marymount Hall—or back a Yard. If, as Anthony Cruz says, “reggae music is like food to eat,” rock-solid drumming and fat bass is the basis of proper nutrition. And to be worth your salt, you’ve also got to know the recipes.

Reggae’s always placed the band—specifically drums and bass—front and centre. As Steve Barrow—co-founder of U.K.-based Blood and Fire Records, collector, historian and co-author of the authoritative Rough Guide to Reggae—says, “You need that unrelenting tempo. Its prominence comes from the fact that first the music was recorded for soundsystem play. It had to be recorded loud because the public arena was outside, in the open air. The bass and drums would have to be recorded very well, and high, so the bass would be full and the drums crisp. Everything is built on that.”

Learning the lexicon

Montreal’s Jah Cutta, who has been playing reggae for over 15 years, agrees. “Make sure your drum and bass is right on,” he insists. “It is the foundation of the music. It’s up in your face.”

Firie, bassist for local bands High Mood Riddim Section and Deya, echoes the sentiment. “Most of the work you have to do is the bass and the drum. These guys have to work together for a long time, to get that connection, that chimie.”

But it’s not just having wicked instrumentalists. Since reggae music is based on instrumental rhythm tracks (normally referred to as “riddims”) used multiple times by various vocalists, reggae musicians have to master what Barrow refers to as a “lexicon.”

Firie explains, “There are a lot of riddims, classics that you have to know. Most singers try to upgrade all the time to new riddims—you have to always keep up. You always have to be on top of things and learn the new riddims. We always try and play as close to the original, but you add a little something, a punch, or an intro or outro. The main essence of the riddim you keep, but you insert some originality.”

It’s also imperative that the riddim sounds just right. “[The riddim] has to be tight,” Barrow insists, “because the whole appeal of the music is the way that a singer will play across the riddim. So it has to have that regularity and forward motion from the interplay between the drum and bass. If a riddim is good and works on a big boom tune, then it means that it will work for a lot. But the riddim has to be played with drive and dynamism.”

Jah Cutta is quite clear on that topic. “When the band is not tight with you, it can be so shitty.”

Acts like wax

Once you’ve got a hot rhythm section that’s mastered a library of riddims, you also have to learn how to get the crowd going—just like Damian Marley did on an overcast Sunday last month. Unlike other genres of music, where recordings are trumped by live shows, reggae’s historical reliance on soundsystems, in lieu of live bands, flips this concept.

“When you get the band, you transpose from being on a soundsystem with a selectah,” explains Jah Cutta. “When you say, ‘Pull up, selectah,’ the selectah come again, and you have to have something new to say because the crowd give you that feeling.”

This concept of bands imitating the soundsystem set-up is derived straight from the dancehall. “After roots reggae, in the 1980s, the music reverted to the dancehall, rather than the international,” recounts Barrow. “There were all these riddims and recuts with new bands—the Youth Promotion band, Scientist’s bands etc. These bands were going out on tour with Yellowman. Because Yellowman was a deejay over riddims with a soundsystem, this is what he is going to be used to, so the pull-up of the record, the wheeling back, this was carried over to the musicians.”

In other words, the bands simply imitate what you can do with a tune on wax.

Jah Cutta remembers when he opened for King Yellowman. “The band was exactly like a sound system, except a bunch of guys—the keyboards, drums and the bass was the selectah. So if I say, ‘Gimme Sleng Teng,’ him give me [the riddim] Sleng Teng. A raw, raggamufiin, rough, deejay band. It’s like you’re on a soundsystem.”

Firie sees this too. “For many years now, starting from Yellowman, bands have been doing it over and over like a normal thing. Everyone knows the singer is the maestro. He says, ‘I want it low,’ ‘I want it steppers’—he controls the band.”

Head in the crowds

And all Jamaican bands that tour with artists like Damian Marley, Capleton, Sizzla, Luciano—the list goes on—are committed to putting on an awesome performance, every night. As Barrow notes, “There is a whole level of competence that isn’t even dreamed of in metropolitan or Western places. Music has to be cheap, but you have to keep going with it, you have to keep rolling. What’s developed over the years is a school of musicians who can do this.”

Bands here are trying to keep up, even though, as Firie comments, “The bar is pretty high. I think of Aston ‘Family Man’ Barrett, probably the best reggae bass player of all time, like Robbie Shakespeare, who built up riddims that we still use today. Those two guys are pretty much reggae music. They set the standard.”

Keep in mind, however, that the standard is always that high, and the band always wants to please the crowd. Marley’s performance is nothing without the crowd interaction. So if you want a similarly exhilarating experience, Rasta flag and all, come check out some reggae artists—both local and straight from JA. All are working to get the forwards from the audience.

Jah Cutta explains, “At the reggae festival, we see how the crowd is reacting to the atmosphere. I say, ‘Pull up, pull up,’ I say, ‘Bass man, play me the Punnany riddim, or the Shank I Sheck.’ You have to give them what they requesting fast. You have to make a change to please the people.”

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