It’s sadly still quite shocking to a lot of people that the Hub was basically the first place in the US to warm up to reggae. That’s right; in the early ’70s, it was students around Boston who truly embraced Jimmy Cliff’s The Harder They Come, turning midnight shows at the Orson Welles Theatre in Cambridge into a regular jam, while more importantly, it was right here in New England where Jamaican artists, along with a kaleidoscopic range of collaborators, began building a stateside roots scene.
A new compilation and accompanying book tell the Mass reggae story in detail and allows fans of the genre to experience critical tracks all together for the first time. The latest throwback goodie bag from the record collectors at Cultures of Soul, Take Us Home: Boston Roots Reggae from 1979 to 1988, features absolute gems from the iconic likes of the I-Tones, Danny Tucker, and Zion Initation. And thanks to a companion chronicle by historian-journalists Noah Schaffer and Uchenna Ikonne, the cuts are put in vivid context. As Abdul Baki, who played in Zion Initation and the I-Tones, told the biographers: “We weren’t just at clubs—we’d play churches, the Joy of Movement Center, and we’d hold events at the MLK School in Cambridge … The women would come with their hair up. It was a real cultural exchange.”
To learn some more about this remarkable cultural dig, and about Boston in an era when Rolling Stone called the city the “North American hotbed of reggae,” I sat down with Shaffer, a longtime friend and sometimes Dig contributor whose knowledge of our region’s diverse music scene is second only to some of the local legends he works with and writes about.
On Musical Discovery
A lot of times, because I like older music, people will say, Don’t you wish you were alive in the ’60s? And You could have gone to see John Coltrane and Otis Redding? Yeah, that would have been great, but I doubt that I would have been able to find out about as many things as I find out about now. …
If you kind of figure out who the main movers are in any scene, and follow them on social media or listen to their low-power radio station, which I listen to a lot, then it’s pretty easy to find out about shows. I doubt that if I was around in the ’60s that I could have gone to a killer jazz show, a bluegrass show, and an Ethiopian show all in the same weekend. …
One thing that’s been really great has been the proliferation of low-power radio stations being able to web cast. I used to wake up on Sunday mornings at 7 am, put a cassette tape deck on to tape the traditional gospel radio show, wake up again at 7:30, turn the tape over … Now, that same DJ, Bishop Branch, he’s on Pastor Bruce Wall’s [Boston Praise Radio], and you can just get the whole last week on YouTube. …
It kind of infuriates me when people are like, Gee, how did you end up [at a certain show]? Or think it’s strange that someone would go to this or that. It might cost 30 bucks, but it’s a big name in that world. …
Honestly, living next door to a Haitian restaurant helps a lot [in discovering shows]. I just look at [the signs in] the window. Also, in JP there’s a place called Franklin CD, and if you want to know what good music is going on, just walk down that block. It’s not that hidden. You’re going to see it.
On Boston Gems
I remember some of these bands from when I was in high school. Some of them lasted into the ’90s. Danny Tucker recently moved back to Jamaica, but for years he remained here with his own band. …
The I-Tones were the biggest band in their day. They were a massive regional band, they were being played on WBCN. They had, like, roadies, and the number one agent in town represented them. … A band like Zion Initation had a heavy following as a classic dub band from the era of roots reggae, and people who are connoisseurs of that had found them, but these were definitely not on Spotify. A few tracks made it to YouTube. …
It blows me away how much these bands were able to play. … The drinking age was lower, there were fewer home entertainment options, and let’s be honest, there were laxer drunk driving laws. There was a demand for live music we’ll never see again. A band could play a community event on Wednesday night, a college on Thursday night, the Western Front Friday and Saturday night, and a residency on Sunday or Monday. …
On Best Archival Practices
When these projects are really done right, it’s remembered that these aren’t just great records, but also that there are people behind them who made them. I think there can be a danger in just fetishizing the vinyl because it’s rare, without finding out who made it and what the circumstances were. There have been tons of great reissues that have done just that—found the people, told their story, and best of all given them a few bucks for their efforts. Usually not gobs of money, because they’re often niche efforts and will only sell so many copies, but I think now, without question the best practice is finding the artist and making sure you’re licensing it from them or their heirs if they’re not around anymore.
Any artist from this era has their share of bad stories about the music business, and you don’t want to perpetrate that. …
Jeff Swallom, the owner of the label [Cultures of Soul], produced the project. He loves finding obscure little gems and is big into Caribbean music, reggae included. Over the years he’s found these records, and there’s an address—such and such street in Dorchester, or such and such street in Cambridge. He had amassed his own collection of Boston reggae, and basically decided it was time to put it out in a format like this.
He said, “I have these records, and we have to find these people.” He handled the licensing, and I got to write about it. The first guy we found was Ram from the [I-Tones], and he had kept in touch with some people, so he put us in touch with someone else, and so on. Some took a little longer, but there wasn’t anyone we weren’t able to find eventually.
The Boston Sound
The first Boston reggae album comes out in 1979. It’s Danny Tucker’s Take Us Home, the title track of the album. …
At least half the tracks [on the compilation] were recorded in Jamaica. Bands lived here, but they had links in Jamaica. …
People who did record here sometimes found that studios really got it—there was one called Downtown Recording Studio that was around Newbury Street that a lot of these bands used. That became the reggae-friendly studio. …
What I think makes the bands uniquely Boston is that you have a mixing of the diaspora scene. It’s not purely Jamaican. I think in New York, the scene is very Jamaican. Like Ras Jackson from Zion Initation is from Montserrat. Other guys are from Grenada. So you had on one hand this pan-Caribbean scene, but a lot of them are also studying jazz at Berklee. And there are kids who also dabble on the rock scene.
That’s what makes it most uniquely Boston, that great mix of immigrants and students, which is what our city is.
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A Queens, NY native who came to New England in 2004 to earn his MA in journalism at Boston University, Chris Faraone is the editor and co-publisher of DigBoston and a co-founder of the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism. He has published several books including 99 Nights with the 99 Percent, and has written liner notes for hip-hop gods including Cypress Hill, Pete Rock, Nas, and various members of the Wu-Tang Clan.