Q: What was the teamwork with Perry like there, in producing these tracks? How do you recall the recordings down at the Ark? A: Yeah, I was maybe at the time - he had more respect for me I would say than maybe ninety percent of other artists. Because even in his transition, when he was using the famous 'x' as the missing letter, and crossing out using the 'x' to 'x' out everything. He had all portraits of pictures of every artist in the Black Ark studio. I mean, I found it significant that he 'x-ed' everyone out, and the only photograph which wasn't 'x-ed' out was mine, so (chuckles)... Q: You had a connection there. A: Yeah, y'know he came and even told me that hey, everything wha' 'appen I must come down, I'm still... Yeah, different to everyone... Yeah, we had a vibes, had a vibes. And even when I went to New York, when I left New York Scratch wanted to come and stay and I'm going home for about a month, and I spent about three and a half month I think before coming back home. So he lived by my place in New York for that period of time. And we still hang out. Last year I was down by him when he come home to Jamaica, and we still go and have a talk an' t'ing. Q: Who played on those sessions, for 'Security, 'Too Fat', 'Crying Wolf'? A: Most of the time I took in my musicians, Chinna (Smith), a guy called X Sweeney who used to play lead guitar for Zap Pow, Robbie Lyn... Q: On keyboards, yes. A: Yeah. Mikey Chung playing guitar. Bass, I used Robbie Shakespeare, ca' Robbie was a member of... Q: Sons of Negus. A: The Sons of Negus when we were together. Winston Wright, keyboards. Horns was like I use Deadly Hedley with Zap Pow horn section most of the time, percussion might've been a Sticky or one of our guys from Ras Michael and the Sons of Negus, or I would play. That's about it, basically, for the Scratch Perry recordings. I think I used Tyrone Downie a lot also, y'know.

Winston Wright

Q: You felt the need to take Perry's raw four-track recording to transfer and remix at Harry J's, that's where some overdubbing took place on those songs? A: I took it to Aquarius, to Aquarius and did other overdubbings, because Perry was limited. I mean, you could only do so much if you wanted to do anything over them. So at the time I wanted to fill my music in another area around certain things, and at Perry you find that the drum and the bass would've been tied in to one track, so if you wanted to make any separations otherwise around it's a bit difficult. Or two other tracks tied in with maybe horns and something else tied together, voice separate. So if you wanted to put... yeah? I mean, the sound - Perry's a genius, the masses at the time used to call him the Upsetter, very creative and, yeah, a scientist in a sense. But a four-track recording was - while it worked very well for certain type a t'ing, but some things that I felt I needed more than Perry's tracks. For overdubbing, I overdub a Binghi drum bass, funde, repeater, when you would've already laid a track without it. If you wanna do it is going to make you combin' on certain things, so just separate it by putting it on another track, and they mix it in. So this is why I overdub drums, guitar, Binghi drums on a couple of the tracks. I might've done some little background harmonies on some of them. But that's mainly it. On one or two of them, Tyrone Downie might've played a little more to fill in here and there. Q: Who did the final mix on them? A: At Aquarius? Steven Stanley worked with me on that. Q: Another single that saw release from the Perry sessions on Shepherd was 'Crying Wolf'. A: Yeah, we did that at Lee Perry too. That was overdubbed at Aquarius too, drums - the Binghi drums, the background harmonies - which was Congos and myself, was overdubbed at Aquarius. Q: Is this a track you've lost as well along the road? A: That's quite likely I think that might've disappeared too, with 'Security' and a number of other... yeah. I can't find maybe about nine or eleven of me two-inch tapes, some of them was destroyed beca' we throw them out. But five of them might've been stolen. About four in L.A. ... yeah. I left a couple of tracks at Inner Circle's in Florida, about two two-inch tapes. Those also got mixed up, I can't find them. So that is about eleven tapes, maybe another two to three in England and... yeah. So I lost a lot of music, I lost a lot, trust me, I lost at least two LP's worth of music, two or three LP worth of music. Q: Tapes scattered all over. A: All over. I don't know if maybe down in the future somebody... Because some of those things on LP, I really didn't dump them, I never leaving them. I thought they were no longer in a good... But I didn't throw them away, I left them at somebody's place. I can't find that person. I don't know if they might got rid of them or if maybe a year or some from now I could possibly find them and they might still have it, it should be great. I hope that it is so. And those in Miami, I left them somewhere, the person died. Well, two I know for sure, possibly two more which Inner Circle might have that, and they say they couldn't find it when they transferred some of them. So, who knows? I mean, maybe they might still have it somewhere down the road, somebody might come up with hidden treasures. Q: True (chuckles). You have to employ a detective to track them down. A: Yes (chuckles).

Kiddus I (Photo: David Corio | www.davidcorio.com)

Q: I would like to know how you developed that vocal style, which is in parts similar to Willi Williams, the man behind 'Armagideon Time'. You both sound more like an American west coast rock singer, more so than a native Jamaican, or having an obvious soul/R&B influence, but I find rock music being closer to you both. How did that evolve over the years? A: Yeah, I suppose I build up my own style from whenever, I never copied anybody or anything like that. Q: No, no. But you certainly had your influences. A: But I never tried to sound like any local artist per se. Foreign artists, never tried to copy anyone of them either. But I mean, there's songs from all different genres of the music which you liked, and which songs you liked you sing. I mean, like I said in 'People's Army', when I was a young boy growing up, I used to like Edith Piaf. Q: French, classic artist. A: Yeah, which is a French singer. Maurice Chevalier (was very popular on Jamaican radio) which was an asshole in certain areas of life, but a wonderful artist and performer. Even his sound (coughs) had a couple of songs which as a young man we liked. But my parents used to listen to blues, jazz, opera, classics. You know, Mario Lanza was one and what have you... Perry Como and the Bing Crosbys in American style, the Nat 'King' Coles, the Louis Armstrongs, the emerging sixties coming up with the rock'n'roll type of... the Fats Dominos, the Lloyd Prices, the Sam Cookes, the Jackie Wilsons. You know, a whole host of different artists, Ella (Fitzgerald), Sarah Vaughn, Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Carmen McRae. Ah! I mean, trust me, we heard it. What has always been played through the airwaves over in the fifties and sixties coming up, which had a good melody, good rhythm. I enjoyed any music, any form of music. I couldn't say I was one-dimensional in that I wouldn't have liked this music, but any music. The Cuban, merengue, the cha-cha, the South American feel, the Afro, the high-life, y'know. Q: I think in some way it shows in your music, the diversity, a wide range of influences, even if the foundation is roots. A: All right. Yeah, this is what... I really can't put a finger and say 'this is it'. Because, have a little bit of this and a little bit of that, I mean... I'm grown into the Rastafarian - the roots music. But then I go into a trunk, and this trunk from the root assimilate all the different music three-sixty degrees that you take into you, and then you go into a musical trunk and when you grow up in that t'ing you start spreading branches. And your branches a gonna spread three-sixty degrees right around, like the roots at the bottom. So what is gonna come out from that fusion of, yeah, everything that you have - has fed you, fed you musically over the years, that you drink. You know, it's gonna come out and blossom from the branches of your tree, if you have ears. Now some people might only assimilate and put it into like a railroad - one track, and they a run with that whether they do a blues feel, a jazz feel, a reggae roots feel - whatever. Or whatever, rock'n'roll, funk - whatever, some people just go into that, on that two-track and continue. I'm not like that, I tend to go on a two-track for a particular feel, then what I'm motivated by or influenced by. And then another day it might be a different - a morning which have a sunlight morning and a different feel, so you express it differently. It might be a grey or a wet, cloudy morning so you express it differently. It might be a happy, happy mood or it might be a reflective mood, or a somber mood in a different sense or a harsh reality which just came out and stopped you in your head and shocked your system, so you come out in a different vibes or feel. But music is just music and a part of the history my brother, and I'm not gonna say that I'm one, a this or I'm that, because music a flying through the heaven and you pick up a different feel and it comes in with a totally different, y'know, melody. Sometimes it come in a different sense, a different feel. But I can only depend on what I feel, anywhere that I see it and understand is that its never one dimension, right. I open up myself to all form of music. But I make sure that whatever I do, I put it as positive I can in being honest so that I don't undermine, mislead any entity, any child, any person, that my music is for positive upliftment in whatever area it is, whether I'm speaking of love or destruction of mankind. So we use music as basically to enlighten, to untangle, y'know, uplift, enhance, and be reflective. Food - thought-food for a person or a people who listens to music.

Kiddus I

Q: Some people refer to you as some sort of 'intellectual singer'. Whatever you feel about such designations, if you could put your lyrical inspiration into some kind of perspective, where that stems from so to speak, which basically shaped your generation of songwriters into what you are, what you became? A: Yeah, music is a way or vehicle, one has access to put on it lyrics or words. Words are very, very, very important - because you can mislead by words, you can present false by words, and you can at the same time stimulate ideas by the very word. So if you're using a vehicle for a mass of people throughout the world who might possibly get the opportunity to see what you're saying, well, I feel an obligation to make it as straight and as upful and true as I can, so that I don't mislead, misdirect, caused by use of word to entice or set somebody on a wrong track, wrong track and mislead them in any way, right. I think music owes - or the individual who use that vehicle to express yourself - should use the words positively, whether it's a simple thing of saying 'I love you' - the truth, or saying 'hey, careful a that walk over there'. If you do that, that might come back, y'know. If you spit in the sky it's gonna fall back, if you put out negative things then negative things will come back. If you put out positive things which served and enlightened to help a set of people who, trust me, this world - as it is, if it would be correct then there wouldn't be any need for words of truth and right and certain things. But when you have artists who, y'know, this is a part of Prophecy now; when it was said that a third of the Angelic Choir, right, led by the most - the Archangel, fled and took with him a third. So if a third of the Archangel Choir is in the earth using music to misuse and abuse the psyche of mankind, I'm not one of those. Because I think I'm the Master Computer on the Databank of Life, the Father has an instant replay button which the Master Computer upholds each entity's life from then until now. So if I'm gonna put on vinyl - or CD - something derogative, undermining, not upful, not in oneness, not in harmony with the creative sources, then I think I misuse, abuse, and would be one of the false in the Angelic Choir, I don't see myself in that. To misuse words and music is so powerful, that if one use it properly, trust me, it will elevate and take care of a lot of the problems that mankind is going through, y'know what I mean. Yeah, if I had to answer for what I have said on vinyl, I think I can face whoever, the Creator, whatever force in life, and say 'Yeah, I said those things', right. I don't wanna mislead as I say my brother, if you use music wrongly to just mislead one entity in creation, I think that's a great, great, great, great crime. So for me music is inspirational and should be used as such. Q: As a guide for the masses more than use it for a selfish purpose or to just express vanity, wants? A: For selfish reasons or for just money or whatever. I mean, what is that, if you understan'? I mean, it don't have to be abrasive to society, or to people. Music can be simple without putting anything that is gonna mislead, y'know what I mean? So, that is my... Yeah, that is me for music, that's what I think music is. It's a tool to express to the world upfulness, right.

Kiddus I (Photo: Sankofa)

Kiddus I

Q: If you look back on the era you came from, the seventies, you felt it was a collective feel or spirit in conjunction with what you said now? A: Yeah, it was an inspiration that taught I and I and I within the scene at that time, and even the artists around - I mean most of the artists around, were using it as a positive feel of expression that could enlighten and strengthen certain people in stress or whatever situation they were in in life - morally, spiritually, physically. But when you use it regressive and then in decadense now, it don't do anything - it don't direct, it don't lead. It just leave people out there in a coal-sack, y'know what I mean, a circuit that is going around, going after their peers, like a dog trying to catch his leash - no direction. Q: I know you and several others had deeper aspirations or hopes with being involved in the 'Rockers' movie back in '77 - than what became of it in the end, tell me how you got involved in that project? A: I was in the studio two years before recording the same song. Q: 'Graduation In Zion' (aka 'It Won't Be Too Long')? A: Yeah. I was doing that, and Ted Bafaloukos had come out and met Jack Ruby, and Jack took him to the studio and when he came in that's what he saw, he saw me singin' that song. I was actually laying the voice then. So, two years afterwards that was just a repetition of what he came in and saw, and he said wow, he would love to use that song in the movie, but it was to be released. So I didn't, I kept it back and didn't release it. I didn't know it was gonna be two years. And then I re-record it again live for them in the same studio that he came and saw me working.

Jack Ruby

Q: Which was Harry J's. You had some co-production thing going with Jack in '76, what was it? A: Myself and Jack was working together, Jack Ruby was one of the first... He was the first producer who heard me and said 'Hey man, wow, wow, wow! Let us gwaan, ready we ready, wow! And let's go!', right. And I liked Jack because me and Jack had a good rapport at the time, and so I started doing some recordings. I did about four recordings at Harry J. So again, I think Jack should... did I have those...? No, I think maybe it was my tape, my music still, beca' we were doing a co-production, it wasn't a total production where he was producing. So I don't know, I should go down in two or three weeks and check and see if his sons have any of them tapes, because that would be two tapes on thinkin' back now that Jack should have. Q: So 'Graduation In Zion' was the only one he made available with a proper mix of these songs, the rest was unfinished, unreleased in any format? A: No, actually none was released from it, I think he played them on his sound system. Q: Dub-plates. A: Yeah, dub-plates for sound system. But the only track which was released is the one from the movie. Q: How come that was the only one that saw release? A: I dunno, well, that was just put out because the movie wanted it. So we did that, I produced that. Actually in the time when they recorded me in the studio was on my studio time at Harry J. So, just never the get-around, because after that I was busy. I lived in New York for a little bit, I lived in L.A. for a little bit. And when Jack died I was actually in England.

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Article: Peter I (Please do not reproduce without permission)