Heart of a Punk - Soul of a Rasta

Punky Reggae '77 to '79 - Part One
Whilst in exile in London and in the midst of the release of his seminal "Exodus" album Bob Marley wrote, recorded and released the classic track Punky Reggae Party with the Wailers & Lee Perry producing. Lyrically Marley did what came naturally to him he told a simple story that rejoiced in the unification of people. Some of us spend their entire lives seeing only division Marley was completely the opposite he spent his life seeing only the innate commonality of people. In Punky Reggae Party which he recorded in July '77 he drew a parallel between the way Punks were being scorned and ostracised by the media and public, in much the same way Rastas were treated in Jamaica. When it was released in November '77 (strangely as a B side) it came as a sanctifying blessing of what The Clash had already begun by including a reggae track on their debut album in April of the same year. Henceforth the path that Punks and Rastas, Reggae and Punk took would be interwoven. At Bob's Punky Reggae Party the non reggae artists mentioned are The Damned, The Jam and The Clash - Dr Feelgood too. With the exception of The Clash the party goers were not destined to be the main exponents of the new musical mix, the musical message had spewed out onto the street.

In early '77 reggae was in the air, in the ears and on the mind of The Clash when they came to work out the track list for their self titled debut due for release in April. They decided at the last minute to include a cover version of the reggae track "Police and Thieves" by Junior Murvin in the line up. It is unquestionable that The Clash came to reggae solely from their love of the music, however Police & Thieves only made it on to the album when the band realised how short in time their track list was, and with Police & Thieves they had a track over 6 minutes long, so it was on. The die was cast Police & Thieves by The Clash instantly became the blue print that many would follow. And follow they did, some with a passion for reggae, some with a shrewd eye for commercial success, some using it purely as a way breakout of the 2 minute punk template. Between April '77 and the 2 Tone of '79 come they did, these are our favourites:

Watching the Detectives by Elvis Costello was released in November '77 the same month as "Jamming/Punky Reggae Party" by Bob Marley and of course at the end of the "Exodus" year. Elvis makes no secret of the fact that The Clash's debut was the inspiration for trying his hand at punky reggae. After buying the Clash album he listened to it alone in his flat for a solid 36 hours before penning the track and recording it in May '77. It was inspirational and shrewd it became EC's fourth single and both Stiff Records and his first hit single reaching number 15 in the UK charts.



On the "50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong"# live bootleg LP there is a version of "Detectives" from Cleveland Agora Ballroom on the 12th May 1977 (the month of the studio recording). On this version EC & the Attractions seem to embrace the new track with the love & enthusiasm of a new born. It is pounced upon via a segue out of "Lipstick Vogue" both Bruce Thomas (Bass) and Steve Nieve (keyboards) revel in the freedom it lends to improvise, but it is slow here, slower than on the record and slower than I can remember ever hearing it live. "Live at the El Macambo" (CD or bootleg its your choice) recorded on the 6th March 1978 almost a year later, and four months after its vinyl release the three minutes forty three seconds single has swelled to over five and half minutes long (and that doesn't take into account the adrenalin and/or amphetamines boost which results in it being played mightily faster). It is also much tighter than the '77 version, the stop start middle is clipped to perfection and it is now quite clearly the pivotal track of the fast and furious set. A dark mystery surrounds my copy of "50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong". I have one record that contains the Cleveland gig and one record that contains "Live at the El Macambo" instead of the Costello outtakes. Is there someone out there that went to a record fair somewhere in the UK sometime in the late seventies and bought "Live at the El Macambo" bootleg but actually went home with the Elvis Outakes record? If there is, come on its time to swap.

It was obvious from the start that Costello's career was never going to be penned in by a particular musical genre, on "My Aim is True" Costello's debut album he mainly used elements of Country, Rock and Rock n Roll - which is not surprising since the musicians on the LP mainly consisted of the Huey Lewis backing band Clover and was produced by Nick Lowe - what Clover and Nick Lowe didn't know about Country, Rock and Rock n Roll was frankly not worth knowing. When he came to record "Watching the Detectives" Costello did make a personnel change but he didn't turn to reggae musicians or a reggae producer, he employed the talents of Andrew Bonar (bass) and Steve Goulding (drums) from Graham Parker's band The Rumour with Steve Nieve adding keyboards and the immovable Lowe remained at the decks. The Stiff singles that preceded "Detectives": "Less Than Zero" "Alison" and "Red Shoes" were musically diverse but didn't make a dent in the charts. It seems remarkable that certain tracks that are today revered as classics, like "Alison" and "Sex and Drugs and Rock n Roll" by Stiff stable (not exactly) mate Ian Dury did little or nothing to kick start the careers of either. At a time when EC's career was more likely to be washed down the drains of Paddington, he used a blend of punky reggae and of course a fair dose of talent to produce "Watching the Detectives" and in so doing Costello threw a double six. Over thirty years later Costello has stuck his fingers into just about every musical pie and worked with just about every musician on the planet, but perhaps "one of these days he should pay it back pay it back". Think not what roots reggae has done for you EC think what you can do for roots reggae. But please not Elvis Costello meets Burning Spear (ahhhh I know the devil is abroad when I have thoughts like this).

Record collections always contain the odd (in both meanings of the word) embarrassment and I can assure you I have embarrassments a plenty in my record collection (including Embarrassment by Madness) some of them literally make me visibly wince when I rapidly flip past them whilst looking for something I lost, sold or gave away years ago. But I think the epitome of my "45 terry bleu collection" is Chicken Funk by Clover, those stalwart backers of Huey Lewis and Elvis Costello on "My Aim is True". How could I? Why would I? How old was I? Well I was actually given the record - you didn't really think I bought it did you? And if I had bought it do you really think I'd admit it! So who was the wonderful person who gave me this classic piece of vinyl that has been begging to be recycled into an ash tray for thirty odd years? Santa of course! That's who. I think this was when I stopped believing. Beacon Radio (a new fangled independent advert strewn station) had just started broadcasting from Wolverhampton in April 1976. As part of an advertising campaign for Christmas '76 Beacon Radio dressed up some poor geezer in a Santa uniform sat him in a local store, made him "spin some tunes" and give all and sundry a record shaped present. It could have been New Rose by The Damned, it could have been but it wasn't, it was Chicken Funk by Clover, deprived and depraved another childhood irrevocably scarred. Thanks Beacon.

Difference, what difference?