| Bob Marley and the Wailers – Mr. Brown Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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at the time, The Wailers were recording a lot at Randy's Studio, located on North Parade and right at the epicenter of the mass search for the elusive coffin and the three well-dressed John Crows atop it..... and right around the corner from Randy's was Idler's Rest, a hang out for many musicians and singers. additionally, Marley had a small record store nearby on either Orange or King St., and lived just west of the old downtown at the southern end of Trench Town, right across from Spanish Town Rd. - he lived and worked in the very area where all of the "Mr. Brown" mania happened to occur. so it would have been a fantastical story to witness, and even better to write a song about since topical events were a favorite subject of Jamaican music. |
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| Bob Marley and the Wailers – Mr. Brown Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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yikes... OK, settle down, drug conspiricists... the song is about an event that happened in JA in the fall of 1970. there was a story about a 3-wheeled coffin with three "crows" (a vulture in JA is commonly called a John Crow, the 3 "crows" atop a 3 wheeled coffin is an old bit of Jamaican folklore) running about the countryside, scaring the crap out of people. some back story: at the time, the belief in the supernatural was very common among ordinary Jamaicans, especially those who came from the country. to this day, you can still find perfectly intelligent and reasonable people who insist that duppies, obeah, and spirits in general are all too real (allegedly, including a former PM) the story started somewhere by word of mouth in the country somewhere, and soon the story spread...hence, the "from Mandeville to Sligoville" lyric. by the time the story eventually reached Spanish Town and West Kingston, someone had "seen it", and the story became more embellished as time went on. at one point there were hundreds of people out looking for the coffin downtown around the Parade Square area, and even barging into the notorious Tivoli Gardens to have a look. the three crows were apparently dressed in suits and asking people for a "Mr. Brown", people were fainting, a Spanish Town cop "shot at it", a boy's foot allegedly got run over by the coffin, etc. etc.... and yet no one could give a credible first hand account. as one might imagine, this made for 1) great comedy, or 2) "rahhh-tid! serious bumbu-clot duppy business!", depending on your beliefs. it all made the Oct. 29, 1970 Gleaner, with a front page article describing the goings-on. there were other "Mr. Brown" songs put out at the time, since it was such a newsworthy "event". every great once in a while, it's still possible to read of "duppy sightings" that make the paper. there was one back in 2010 of a boy in St. Catherine who was being bothered constantly by a spirit. newspaper and TV reports it just like regular news.... |
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| Desmond Dekker – Israelites Lyrics | 17 years ago |
| and also,one more thing: the line "i don't want to end up like Bonnie & Clyde" means that the subject doesn't want to have to turn to a life of crime to survive, probably a reference to the phenomenon of gun violence and political gangs that began to plague Jamaica in the late 60's and still continues to this day. | |
| Desmond Dekker – Israelites Lyrics | 17 years ago |
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Rastafarians borrow the idea of the 12 Tribes from Judaism, hence the liberal application of the "Israelites" to refer to fellow devout Rastafarians, and sometimes also to poor suffering Jamaicans in general. the popularity of Rastafarianism among poor Jamaicans picked up in the mid-late 60's - contrary to the romanticized images, it was BY NO MEANS an acceptable appearance in anywhere but the very poorest, neglected neighborhoods in Kingston, or in Rastafarian settlements up in the hills our out in the country. to wear your locks out in the open walking through the city was to invite yourself to judgemental looks from church-going folk (many Jamaicans are quite conservative and religious) and occaisional police harrassment (especially when walking through not-so-poor parts of Kingston). when i was a kid, Rastas were looked upon almost like crazy people - a somewhat popular insult at the time was "comb your head, nasty dread!"..... unfortunately, that type of persecution was relatively common, and the attitude extended somewhat to very poor Jamaicans as well. the government(s) typically did very little to help poor people, so starving to death was not out of the question for someone who couldn't hustle up some kind of working situation. and there was little work to be had. many, many people at the time were (and probably still are) desperately poor in the most literal sense. that's pretty much the crux of "Israelites". Desmond Dekker said he wrote the song while walking home as he overheard a couple arguing about money, the man couldn't make enough money to provide for his wife and kids. DD probably saw some really destitute people walking around with little more than rags for clothes (a not uncommon sight in parts of Kingston), and there's your song - everyday life in Jamaica: corrupt government/police/establishment.. aka "Babylon" ... keeping poor people poor, while they struggle just to survive doing whatever menial work they can find. "Israelites" might seem to imply that it's about Rastafarians, but in reality it's a song about the precarious situation of poor Jamaicans in general. |
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