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Rocksteady
Rocksteady is a music genre that originated in Jamaica around 1966. A successor of ska and a precursor to reggae, rocksteady was the dominant style of music in Jamaica for nearly two years, performed by many of the artists who helped establish reggae, including harmony groups such as the Techniques, the Paragons, the Heptones and the Gaylads; soulful singers such as Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson, Bob Andy, Ken Boothe and Phyllis Dillon; musicians such as Jackie Mittoo, Lynn Taitt and Tommy McCook. The term rocksteady comes from a popular (slower) dance style mentioned in the Alton Ellis song "Rocksteady", that matched the new sound. Some rocksteady songs became hits outside Jamaica, as with ska, helping to secure the international base reggae music has today.
The Jamaican musicians and producers who developed rocksteady had grown up learning and playing jazz and had played through ska. In a similar way to what happened at Motown, the musicians responsible for playing this new sound would go jam in a jazz club after work.
Other influences were: most notably, American rhythm and blues - Fats Domino, Louis Jordan and many others - mento, Calypso music and African Drumming feature, too. By the time rocksteady came around American Soul music was strong and that had an influence as well.
The tempo became slower with the development of rocksteady than it had been in ska. The guitar and piano players began to experiment with occasional accents around the basic offbeat pattern.
The slowing that occurred with rocksteady allowed bass players to explore more fat, dark, loose, slow tones than ska bass. The slower tempo and smaller band-sizes in turn led to a much larger focus on the bass line in general, which eventually became one of the recognizable characteristics of Jamaican music. In rocksteady, the lead guitar often doubles the bass line, in the muted picking style created by Lynn Taitt (as on "Run for Cover" by Lee "Scratch" Perry).
Due in part to the heavy borrowing from US soul songs, many rocksteady songs are love songs; e.g. "Sharing You" by Prince Buster, which is a cover of a soul singer Mitty Collier's original, and "Queen Majesty" by the Techniques, which is a cover of "Minstrel and Queen" by the Impressions.
There are rocksteady songs about religion and the Rastafari movement, though not to the same extent as in reggae. Rocksteady coincided with the rise of rude boys and some rocksteady songs reflect this (usually negatively) such as "Rude Boy Gone A Jail" by the Clarendonians and, most famously, "Judge Dread" by Prince Buster.
Alton Ellis was anti-rudie,[clarification needed] and Alton Ellis and the Flames' "Cry Tough", released before the term rocksteady was in vogue, urged Jamaicans in the ghettos to stay tough through the hard times.
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Rocksteady
Rocksteady is a music genre that originated in Jamaica around 1966. A successor of ska and a precursor to reggae, rocksteady was the dominant style of music in Jamaica for nearly two years, performed by many of the artists who helped establish reggae, including harmony groups such as the Techniques, the Paragons, the Heptones and the Gaylads; soulful singers such as Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson, Bob Andy, Ken Boothe and Phyllis Dillon; musicians such as Jackie Mittoo, Lynn Taitt and Tommy McCook. The term rocksteady comes from a popular (slower) dance style mentioned in the Alton Ellis song "Rocksteady", that matched the new sound. Some rocksteady songs became hits outside Jamaica, as with ska, helping to secure the international base reggae music has today.
The Jamaican musicians and producers who developed rocksteady had grown up learning and playing jazz and had played through ska. In a similar way to what happened at Motown, the musicians responsible for playing this new sound would go jam in a jazz club after work.
Other influences were: most notably, American rhythm and blues - Fats Domino, Louis Jordan and many others - mento, Calypso music and African Drumming feature, too. By the time rocksteady came around American Soul music was strong and that had an influence as well.
The tempo became slower with the development of rocksteady than it had been in ska. The guitar and piano players began to experiment with occasional accents around the basic offbeat pattern.
The slowing that occurred with rocksteady allowed bass players to explore more fat, dark, loose, slow tones than ska bass. The slower tempo and smaller band-sizes in turn led to a much larger focus on the bass line in general, which eventually became one of the recognizable characteristics of Jamaican music. In rocksteady, the lead guitar often doubles the bass line, in the muted picking style created by Lynn Taitt (as on "Run for Cover" by Lee "Scratch" Perry).
Due in part to the heavy borrowing from US soul songs, many rocksteady songs are love songs; e.g. "Sharing You" by Prince Buster, which is a cover of a soul singer Mitty Collier's original, and "Queen Majesty" by the Techniques, which is a cover of "Minstrel and Queen" by the Impressions.
There are rocksteady songs about religion and the Rastafari movement, though not to the same extent as in reggae. Rocksteady coincided with the rise of rude boys and some rocksteady songs reflect this (usually negatively) such as "Rude Boy Gone A Jail" by the Clarendonians and, most famously, "Judge Dread" by Prince Buster.
Alton Ellis was anti-rudie,[clarification needed] and Alton Ellis and the Flames' "Cry Tough", released before the term rocksteady was in vogue, urged Jamaicans in the ghettos to stay tough through the hard times.