Derrick Morgan – Heather Augustyn

Giving Thanks

November 23, 2016February 22, 2023 haugustyn

In the United States we celebrate Thanksgiving on November 24th this year, a holiday that according to history.com was designated by Abraham Lincoln. “In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast that is acknowledged today as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. For more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated by individual colonies and states. It wasn’t until 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be held each November.”

So in honor of this holiday when people from Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon will break bread together with family and friends in a tradition of community, love, and unity, let us give thanks, and skanks, with some Jamaican tunes of thanks. Here’s a selection of songs of thanks, and though the artists may be thanking and praising Jah, we too can celebrate this spirit this time of year and always, by being kind to each other and embracing one another in love and unity. Feel free to chime in below and add yours to the mix–after all, that’s what this post is all about.

Bob Marley–Give Thanks and Praises

Hortense Ellis and General Roy–Give Thanks

Derrick Morgan and The Scorpions–Give Thanks

The Abyssinians–Satta Massagana (Give Thanks)

Sugar Minott–Give Thanks & Praises

The Versatiles–The Thanks We Get

U Roy–Give Thanks Continually

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Pata Pata Patsy

April 8, 2016February 22, 2023 haugustyn

So thrilled to see that Pasty Todd will be performing with Stranger Cole, her longtime vocal partner after Derrick Morgan, in Minneapolis May 13-15th accompanied by Phil Chen, Dennis Sindrey, and the Prizefighters! I will be there for sure! More information on this show is located here. So today let’s celebrate that talented woman who was one of the few, along with Millie Small, Yvonne Harrison, Hortense Ellis, and a small handful of others, to break the gender barrier in the 1960s. I found the lovely photo above of Millicent “Patsy” Todd in a 1969 issue of Swing Magazine in the National Library of Jamaica archives in Kingston this past February. And the following is the chapter of my book, Songbirds: Pioneering Women in Jamaican Music, which I have written on Patsy, which you can purchase here:

Pata Pata Patsy: Millicent Todd

Millicent Todd was just a teenage girl when ska hit the town. She was born on September 23, 1944, grew up in Fletcher’s Land in West Kingston and was Prince Buster’s next door neighbor. She attended All Saints School and left at age 14. Although she wasn’t raised in a particularly musical home, and the Catholic Church she attended didn’t have much to offer in the way of music since the program was still presented in Latin in those days, she did listen to the music coming from America. “I’m somebody who liked to listen to the radio, and I really got interested in this group, Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers. I used to hear them singing and I used to sing after them,” she says.

Her mother, Miss Kitty, realizing Millicent’s talent, helped to get her daughter’s start. Miss Kitty approached Derrick Morgan on Orange Street and told him of her daughter’s talent although today Patsy says she has only heard the story from Morgan and didn’t know the details. “Derrick told me the story because I didn’t know anything about it. He said he saw this woman and she told him she had a daughter that could sing. And I saw this guy came to my gate, knock on my gate. I’m looking at him and he’s saying he’s Derrick Morgan, and I say to myself, ‘So?’ And he said, ‘I heard you can sing,’ and I’m looking at him wondering what he’s talking about. And he said, ‘Could you sing something for me?’ and I said, ‘Why?’ And he said, ‘I just want to hear something.’ And I did. But as far as I’m concerned, I didn’t know who this guy was, what he wanted. Somebody just come appear to you, telling you he hear you can sing and if you would do a song with him. And at first I was kind of, something ain’t right here. But then he told me a story about another artist that the song was about, and this guy, I hated him, still do. And when he said that, I was ready to sing that song. And I did. And we have this producer, Duke Reid, God rest his soul, a nice man, and he start shooting up the place. My God! I was so scared! I ran! And they said, ‘No! That’s a good thing! When he hears something that he likes that’s going to make a hit, this is what he does!’ So that experience was great for me and after that it was history. The song was ‘Love Not To Brag,’” says Patsy. The man who inspired the song was Eric “Monty” Morris who grew up with Morgan and was known to be boastful. He and Morgan were vocal competitors. Millicent recalls the scene after the take, “We have this producer, Duke Reid, God rest his soul, a nice man, and he start shooting up the place. My God! I was so scared! I ran! And they said, ‘No! That’s a good thing! When he hears something that he likes that’s going to make a hit, this is what he does!’ So that experience was great for me and after that it was history.”

Derrick and Patsy in their early years.

Millicent was young and the music industry could be an unkind environment, especially with so much skilled talent, professional musicians in the studio and producers wanting to get one take down on acetate for play at the sound system days later. “It was hard. Very hard,” says Millicent. “I was 15, 16 years old. And it was hard because you didn’t have a say. I didn’t get the chance to go to rehearsal and things like that. I would go to the studio and my partner would tell me, ‘This is so-and-so and so-and-so,’ and I would write it down, and I would sing from the paper, that was it. I don’t remember what it was, what I did or how much record I did. I didn’t have a say, to say to the musicians, ‘Would you play this,’ or “Would you play that.’ They would kill me. You just take what they give you and that’s it. The musicians that we had were great musicians. I think they could play with anyone in this entire world. They knew music, they knew what they were doing. They were absolutely fantastic. But they were very egotistical. You know, it was either just them or nothing. The problem when you have a band that every musician in that band could be the leader, it’s very hard. That’s how great they were,” Patsy says.

Millicent Todd

She was young, innocent, naïve, but her talent transcended. Graeme Goodall recalls her work in the studio. “I loved her dearly. She was a very nice person, very pleasant to work with, very polite. She was not so much a leader, but she was very very good and she, like most of the vocalists of the day, understood that this was her big break,” Goodall says. Derrick & Patsy continued to record hit after hit as a duo, including “Feel So Fine,” “Are You Going to Marry Me,” “Crying in the Chapel,” and countless others. Perhaps the most well-known song the duo recorded was “Housewife’s Choice” in 1962 for producer Leslie Kong. This song was originally named “You Don’t Know How Much I Love You,” but Marie Garth, legendary radio host, had so many housewives call in to the station to request the tune that she renamed it and future pressings reflected this name change. The song also became popular in the United Kingdom as West Indian immigrants played the tune which was released on the Island Records label. Derrick & Patsy were a hit. They were the perfect boy-girl duo singing sweet songs of love and romance. They were so big that when popular American artists came to perform in Kingston, so too did Derrick & Patsy as part of the Jamaican spectacular. They performed at shows with Ray Charles, Ben E. King, and Sammy Davis Junior. Derrick would record with a number of female vocalists in duets including Gloria Franklin (who also performed as Gloria & the Dreamlets), Naomi Phillips (who also recorded with Doreen Shaffer), Hortense Ellis, Paulette Morgan (Derrick’s sister), Yvonne Harrison (also called Yvonne Adams), and Jennifer & the Mohawks (Jennifer Jones).

Derrick Morgan performs in Chicago in 2013. Photo by Heather Augustyn.

When Derrick Morgan left to go to England to try his hand at success overseas, Patsy was approached by another singer with the offer to perform duets. She recalls, “Stranger [Cole] came to talk to me. He said that Duke Reid sent him and he said he wanted to do some record and the only way that Duke Reid would record him if I sang with him. And it kind of hit me off guard because Derrick was in England, and I said to him, ‘I don’t know about that, I have to think about it,’ and then I saw this guy really needed to do this. He believed he could make himself better and do something that he love and getting paid for it, you know, a charge was in him. And I said okay, I tell him yes. And that’s how Stranger Cole and I came about.” One of their biggest hits was the song, “When I Call Your Name,” which they recorded for Duke Reid. Other classics include, “Down the Train Line,” “Yeah Yeah Baby,” “Give Me the Right,” “ Love Divine,” and plenty more. The tunes were also classic boy-girl duets, inviting and harmonious. Most were recorded in 1964 for Sonia Pottinger and Duke Reid. Stranger remembers his days with Patsy. “Mr. Reid was the one who asked me to sing with her. He told me to go to her and asked me to sing with her. So ‘When I Call Your Name’ we recorded and we do many many more songs together. She was not shy, she was much braver than I. She make hit record before I do, with Derrick Morgan, so she was a more limelighted artist than I was. I think that was a blessing for me to have a lady with more hit songs before me. I am very lucky to sing with her, and I think she is very lucky to sing with me,” says Stranger.

Patsy wasn’t just a duo artist. She was also an artist in her own right—Queen Patsy. At a time when women weren’t doing much solo work at all, Patsy paved the way for strong female vocalists. One of these tunes, “A Man is a Two Face,” is not a ska or rocksteady song, but true to the American R&B tradition with soulful vocals, music by Lynn Taitt & the Jets. The lyrics offer advice from a mother to a daughter that she shares with other women about how a man will smile and sweet talk but leave you singing the blues in the night. It was not the submissive songs of innocent love she sang with Stranger and Derrick. It was a song of empowerment and knowledge and sisterhood. It was Patsy’s take on “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” both in sound and in spirit. She was physically without a man by her side as in her duos, and she, as a solo artist, was all woman. Her voice transforms in this song from her duos. She is no longer the little teenager—she is informed, guiding, warning. The flip side of this recording on Sonia Pottinger’s Gay Feet label is “It’s So Hard Without You” where Patsy sings that there is nothing she can do without her man, so what do we make of this paradox? Certainly these songs reflect the emotions women feel in relationships—the phases and complexities.

Stranger Cole performs in Chicago in 2012. Photo by Heather Augustyn.

Two of the other solo songs that Patsy recorded for Producer Sonia Pottinger were “Fire in Your Wire” and “Pata Pata Rock Steady” which were unique in their content. “Fire in Your Wire” is a soca tune originally written by Calypso Rose of Tobago, another pioneering woman, whose lyrics are the typical sexual innuendo of calypso and soca, but certainly not typical of those sung by a female up to this point. “Pata Pata Rock Steady” was also a song written by a female artist in 1957 by Dorothy Masuka for singer Miriam Makeba, both South African artists. “Fire in Your Wire” and “Pata Pata Rock Steady” were songs that showed Patsy’s take-charge side and celebrated the creativity of other women. Of “Fire in Your Wire,” Patsy says, “I wanted to prove a point that I could do other styles. I would take chances to see what I could do. I never had a say in any of the songs I sang with the duets, so this was an opportunity to try different things.” “Pata Pata” was not the only Miriam Makeba song Patsy covered. She also recorded “The Retreat Song,” also titled Jikele Maweni, which had a distinct African feel, especially since it was sung in the Xhosa (KOH-suh) language whose lyrics tell of a vicious stick fight. Not the typical teenage love song.

Patsy traveled overseas to share her talent, to the U.S. with Byron Lee & the Dragonaires and to Belize. She sang on over 100 recordings. But she left it all behind in 1969, as the music left ska and rocksteady behind. She simply grew tired of the industry and moved to New York to start a new life. Since the Legends of Ska Concert, organized by Brad Klein in Toronto in 2002, Patsy has occasionally returned to the stage to perform, alongside her duo partners, Stranger and Derrick Morgan, as well as on her own.

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Vere Johns is Santa

December 4, 2015February 22, 2023 haugustyn

It’s December, and so the winter holidays are right around the corner. It’s a time of celebration, so why not celebrate Vere Johns, that Santa himself whose show, the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour, gave the world a gift by launching so many musical careers?! Here is our Santa, or a sketch of him, in 1961 in the same newspaper, the Star, where he had his column in which he discussed various aspects of Jamaican culture and life–everything from politics to medical care to labor issues to the mistreatment of the “bearded men.” The column was called “Vere Johns Says” and he always spoke his mind, sometimes eliciting readers to write in their opposing thoughts and maybe throw a barb or two.

In the column from which the illustration above was taken, Johns weighs in on the “gifts” that he would like to give to local leaders in the year before his country would gain their independence. And when I read about the “referendum” I can’t help but cue up Lord Creator’s “Independent Jamaica” in my musical mind.

This is a pretty typical Vere Johns column, and I think it’s interesting in light of the independence on the horizon. On the “crossroads” Jamaica certainly was during this time. And Vere Johns was involved as conduit or a discriminator and analyst of the events, just as he was with the musical acts that came across his stage. He presented this cultural revolution as it was happening, a conduit of the music that would go on to change the world.

Here is Vere Johns and his wife, the lovely Lucille whose idea it was to host a variety show on the stages of the movie theaters the Johns managed.

This is the same Lucille Johns who appeared with Margarita (Anita Mahfood) in the film “It Could Happen to You” which I had the pleasure of sharing with Margarita’s daughter last week. Incidentally, Margarita won the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour herself in 1952 at the age of 12. Below is an excerpt from my book Songbirds: Pioneering Women in Jamaican Music that sheds a little light on this powerhouse couple.

Ask any vocalist from the 1950s and 1960s where they got their start and they will often tell you that they either participated in or attended the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour. This talent show was responsible for launching the careers of a great percentage of Jamaican vocalists during the time when studios were looking for talent. It was a test, a rehearsal, a springboard for further success. They began the show in April, 1939. After the first show, Lucille told a reporter, “Everybody wishes to be a singer,” and she was nicknamed “Lady Luck.” The Daily Gleaner, July 25, 1939 gave a review of the Opportunity Hour series which had just wrapped up for the season. It stated, “At the close of Friday night’s finals of the popular all-Island ‘Opportunity Hour’ at the Palace Theater, Mr. Vere Johns and his popular wife ‘Lady Luck’ received tremendous compliment for their very laudable efforts of unearthing the talent of Jamaica in the entertainment world and for the undoubted success achieved. . . . with the close of the ‘Opportunity Hour’ we say to Mr. and Mrs. Johns ‘THANK YOU!’ We hope Friday night’s close will not bring an end to such fine efforts. We hope that with Friday night’s close the work of unearthing Jamaica’s talent will continue by this pair, and we hope that by their effort bigger and greater things will be achieved for Jamaica in this respect.” If ever there was a statement of prophecy, this was it.

Music historian and journalist Roy Black said of the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour, “It goes without saying that stars such as Millie Small, John Holt, Bob Marley, Jimmy Cliff, Alton Ellis, Hortense Ellis, The Blues Busters, Derrick Harriott, Derrick Morgan, Lascelles Perkins, Higgs and Wilson, Bunny and Scully, Laurel Aitken, Wilfred ‘Jackie’ Edwards. Jimmy Tucker, Girl Satchmo, Lloyd ‘Sparrow’ Clarke, and musicians Roy Richards, Charlie Organaire, and Rico Rodriguez, who all came under his wing, played significant roles in shaping Jamaica’s popular music. They came in droves – hopeful actors, dancers, tricksters, singers, kneeling at his feet for an opportunity to become popular entertainers. There was hardly a performer who grew up in Kingston who didn’t come into his fold. To them it seemed that only one man held the key to the door of success. The city’s famous theatres – The Palace, at the corner of East Queen Street and South Camp Road; The Majestic, which faces Maxfield Avenue from the Spanish Town Road intersection; and The Ambassador, along Seventh Street in Trench Town – were the venues that Johns found logistically convenient to host these shows. The events took on a carnival atmosphere following auditions held mainly in the hometown of the aspirants. With the winners being decided by crowd reaction, competition was fierce and intense.”

Black describes how the idea for the talent show came about. It was a team effort with his wife who also acted as emcee of the events alongside her husband. Black states, “According to Colby Graham, who did extensive research on Johns, the idea for a Vere Johns talent show was born out of a request by the boss of the Savannah Journal newspaper with whom Johns worked, to devise a strategy to boost attendance at cinemas. With the help of his wife, Lillian, they came up with the idea for the show which began in Savannah, Georgia, in 1937, before the couple moved the event to Jamaica in 1939. In the late 1940s, he began a long-running STAR newspaper column ‘Vere Johns Says,’ mainly on the topic of music. But half the story has never been told as, in the 1950s, Johns added another dimension to his already illustrious career where he was a talent scout, impresario, journalist, radio personality, elocutionist and war veteran, by venturing into the world of movies. He played roles in the 1955 adventure thriller Man Fish, which also featured Eric Coverly, and returned a year later in the 26-minute documentary, It Can Happen To You, in which he played the role of a father of two sons who had syphilis.” That film was the same documentary in which Margarita (Anita Mahfood) portrayed a rhumba dancer who performed in a club as patrons watched and caroused with one another.

Not only did Vere Johns encourage other performers to have a career through his talent show, but he himself was a performer on stage and screen. He even dressed up as Santa Claus at some of his holiday shows. He and Lucille performed a comedy radio show in 1943 called “Razzle Dazzle.” Lucille was also a stage actress, “Lady Luck,” who conducted the talent show band and sang at the talent performances. In 1940 on New Year’s Day, Lucille danced in a troupe that performed a production of “Show-Boat,” which was described as a vaudevillian presentation. An article in the February 18, 1941 issue of the Daily Gleaner states, “The cast of ‘Pagan Fire’ stage presentation at popular Majestic tomorrow night is hard at work and will be ready to give of their best. They comprise the following: Mrs. Vere Johns (Jungle girl)—returns to the Jamaica stage and will be seen in two dance specialties . . . Vere Johns (Chief Crandall)–veteran actor and director in a stirring dramatic role. . . . ‘Pagan Fire’ is an original playlet by Mr. Vere Johns. Place: Kango Isle in the South Seas. Production and direction by Mr. Johns, dance sequences by Mrs. Johns.” In 1943 Lucille Johns wrote a play called “Fool’s Paradise” that was directed by Vere Johns. It was performed at the Ward Theatre and was billed as “A Rich Action Packed Drama of Our Every Day Life in 3 Acts.”

Lucille and Vere Johns had served as supporters, mentors, and directors to the Caribbean Thespians, a group of actors from various theaters around the city. An August 5, 1941 Daily Gleaner article stated, “Vere Johns, well known locally for his many talents, has been heard only too infrequently in the one role in which he excels as a truly great artist. Vere Johns is a Shakespearian actor of extraordinary power. His grip and understanding of the dramatic possibilities of the Shakespearian tradition will amaze and delight his audience, sustaining at the same time the lyrical beauty of the Elizabethan English,” showing that both Vere and Lucille were greatly involved in the theater community.

Another article from the Daily Gleaner on June 22, 1939 with the headline “Play at Palace,” detailed another one of the plays presented by the Johns that Lucille herself had written. “’When a Heat Wave Hit Breadnut Bottom,’ a one-act comedy written by Mrs. Vere Johns and directed by her husband, and in which both took leading parts, was presented, at the Palace Theatre last night to a very appreciative audience. Like their ‘Opportunity Hour’ progammes, this presentation was a further endeavour of Mr. and Mrs. Vere Johns to present to the Jamaica public, Jamaica talent, and they succeeded in no uncertain way in this respect. Throughout its 40 minutes duration, the presentation was followed with interest, interspersed with the applause of the audience. Apart from Mr. and Mrs. Johns, outstanding performers in the play were little golden-voiced Frederick Stanley, who sang three very delightful songs, little Lester Johns (son of Mr. and Mrs. Vere Johns), and Ranny Williams, who as Tom, the headman of Mass Charlie’s (Mr. Vere Johns) plantation did justice to his part.” Lucille and Vere also had at least one other son, Vere Johns Jr., who went on to emcee in 1984 for the Vere Johns Opportunity Hour where Bunny and Scully performed. This event took place at the Odeon Theater and Vere Johns Jr. was billed as the “Ace from Outa Space.”

Here is a link to the article I cite from Roy Black, the legendary music columnist: VERE JOHNS

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National Ska Day

June 1, 2015February 21, 2023 haugustyn

Did you know that there was a National Ska Day? And it’s not a new creation! I found this advertisement for it in a Star Newspaper from September 12, 1964 which proclaims that National Ska Day is on September 13th, the following day, and it is the fifth birthday of the ska, which is interesting. In 1959, Theo Beckford’s “Easy Snappin'” was released, but not sure which month it came out, and not sure if that is what this anniversary refers to–plus, that song was actually recorded in 1956, so it’s even fuzzier. And then there’s Prince Buster’s mug up there at the top of the ad. But look at the lineup–can you even imagine being there back in the day to hear these guys and gals! To jump on a bus at the Ward Theatre and head to this show to hear the drums of Count Ossie and Drumbago, and the horns of Sterling and Alphonso, and the sweet sounds of Hortense and Doreen Shaffer, here called Madam Dorene, love that! And then Eric Monty Morris, Derrick Morgan, Roy Panton, Toots and his crew, Alton Ellis–and the sound systems of Duke Reid and King Edwards, Prince Buster, and a guy from Spain named Ruddy! Chills. I’ll wait for my time machine and punch in September 13, 1964 first thing!

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A Horse Named Ska

January 2, 2015February 21, 2023 haugustyn

This horse has a name, Ska, so take that America (the band, not the country)! I came across this article that was written during the summer of 1964, when ska was all over the Daily Gleaner after finally being accepted by the colonial newspaper. Apparently, ska was such a rage that owner Jacques Deschamps named his horse after the genre! It got me thinking about Jamaican music and the horses. I’ve previously written about Jamaican music and boxing, which you can read about here, and there is definitely affair between the Jamaican culture and boxing, but there is also one between the Jamaican culture and horse racing.
Perhaps the most well-known song about a race horse is that classic, “Longshot Kick De Bucket,” by the Pioneers. Before this song was made, the Pioneers recorded their song “Longshot (Buss Me Bet)” which was written by Lee “Scratch” Perry, according to Dave Thompson in his book, Reggae & Caribbean Music, and was produced by Joe Gibbs. This racehorse, Long Shot, had a long career, yet never won. “He gallop, he gallop, he gallop, but he couldn’t buss [bust] the tape.”
Their more popular sequel, “Longshot Kick De Bucket,” was about that same horse and begins with the same horse track trumpet call. According to Kevin O’Brien Chang and Wayne Chen, it was producer Leslie Kong (Beverley’s) who first heard about the death of Long Shot and so he had the Pioneers write and record a song about it and it was not only an immediate hit, but it has been covered many times over, namely by The Specials, as a staple of Jamaican music. The song references Caymanas Park which is the popular horse track in Kingston. The lyrics tell of the death of Long Shot, and the details of his death are told here, in this article I found in the Daily Gleaner on April 1, 1969, along with a photo of Long Shot! There he is folks, before he kick de bucket! And here’s Rameses who also met his demise that same week. The article states this horse was voted the “Horse of 1968.” Naturally, he became the subject of the Pioneers “Poor Rameses,” which has a similar sound to their previous horse homages. A post mortem conducted on Rameses revealed that he died of a heart attack. There is a trophy called the Rameses Trophy which is named in his honor and is still awarded today at Caymanas Park.

Yet another Jamaican music and horse race connection comes with Vincent Edwards, better known as King Edwards, who ran a sound system with his bother George called The Giant. It was one of the big three sound systems along with Coxsone Dodd’s Downbeat and Duke Reid’s The Trojan. But did you know that King Edwards was also involved in horse racing? Today, King Edwards is the president of the Jamaica Racehorse Trainers Association (JRTA). In an interview with Michael Turner and Brad Klein in February 2013, King Edwards told him of his work with horses. “I’m a politician. And a race horse trainer. I’m training horses now. For forty nine years. Even when I was a member of Parliament I was a trainer,” Edwards said. You can read the entire interview here, and I would recommend you do—it’s fantastic!

There have been plenty of songs referencing horses and horse racing over the years, including “Race Horse Touter” by Leon Wint which was later covered by Ranking Roger, and “Horse Race” by Derrick Morgan and Neville Brown. There were horse songs full of innuendo like “Small Horse Woman,” “Horse Tonic,” “Ride a Cock Horse,” and “Ride a Wild Horse.” There were horse songs full of metaphor like “Death Rides a Horse,” “Selassie Rides a White Horse,” and “Can’t Flog a Dead Horse.” Then of course, there was the record label called Horse, a sublabel of Trojan Records, appropriately!

Share your Jamaican music and horse connections in the comment section below!

Rude boys

Real Rude Boys

February 8, 2014February 28, 2023 haugustyn

Rude boys—to those who didn’t live among them, myself included, it’s easy to think of these gangsters as the stylized suave icons we see in illustrations with sunglasses and suits. Or we might think they were like Johnny Too Bad, looting and shooting, but still the stuff of legend, the stuff of myth, the Rhygings or Ivanhoes. Rude boys were real, and many of them were real bad, not as in bad/cool but as in bad/murderers. Rude boys were known align themselves with a sound system operator and defend his turf from opposing rude boys, which is how they came to be associated with the music. Plus, they became part of the music itself by becoming the topic of numerous songs, which I will address in a moment before I share an article about a real rude boy crime.

But first, Historian Garth White wrote in 1967 that a rude boy is a “person, native, who is totally disenchanted with the ruling system; who generally is descended from the ‘African’ elements in the lower class and who is now armed with ratchets (German made knives), other cutting instruments and with increasing frequency nowadays with guns and explosives.” White noted that rude boys had similar characteristics, such as similar shoes, hats, music, and stripped motorbikes which served to bind the rude boys together in a community. Rude boys committed minor crimes, such as jumping on the back of a streetcar for a free ride, but other times they were much more violent and committed severe crimes such as murder of fellow rude boys or innocent schoolgirls. Well-known rude boy gangs were the Charles Street Spanglers, Phoenix, Skull, and Vikings.

Now, to the music—perhaps the most well-known rude boy songs were made between Derrick Morgan and Prince Buster who shared a rivalry, a musical stick fight. Derrick Morgan’s “Tougher Than Tough” addresses rude boys directly with a judge speaking at the beginning of the song to the gangsters brought in for using ratchets and throwing bombs. Their reply to the judge that “rudies don’t fear” inspired the marginalized youth in Jamaica who turned to crime, and egged on Prince Buster who responded with his Judge Dread songs. Judge Dread was a character in Prince Buster’s songs who sentenced the rude boys, regardless of their pleas for mercy and even crying, to such unreasonable sentences as 400 years behind bars.

While Morgan and Prince Buster had their share of back-and-forth songs referencing rude boys and Judge Dread, there were plenty of rude boy songs that either supported the rude boy culture, or denounced it. They reflected the violence of the times, asking the youth to simmer down and put away their ratchets, or they glorified gangsters and stylized criminals with songs like Prince Buster’s “Al Capone and “007 (Shanty Town),” “Rude Boy Train,” and “Rudy Got Soul” by Desmond Dekker, but there were many more that warned of the rude boy lifestyle. “Cry Tough” and “Dance Crasher” by Alton Ellis, “No Good Rudie” by Justin Hinds, “Cool Off Rudies” by Derrick Morgan, “Don’t Be a Rude Boy” by the Rulers, and dozens of others.

Without further ado, I would like to share an article from the Daily Gleaner, December 10, 1968, that tells of a real rude boy crime—a murder, which began at a sound system dance. Alton Ellis’s “Dance Crasher” apparently fell on deaf ears when it came to these two brothers, Eddie and George Fraser and their rude boy friends.

Inquiry begins into shooting of coconut vendor

A preliminary inquiry began in the No. 3 Sutton Street on Tuesday before Mrs. Myrtle Mason, Resident Magistrate, into the fatal shooting of a coconut vendor, Artell Brown, 29, of a Stephen Street address, in August of this year.

Before the Court were, Eddie Fraser, Aston Young, George Fraser, John Graham and Harvey Reid, charged with murder and robbery with aggravation.

Joscelyn Coot of Tivoli Gardens gave evidence that he went to a dance on King Street on Friday, August 23, where he saw Aston Young and the two Frasers–Eddie Fraser had a gun in his hand and George Fraser said that no one could harm them. Eddie and George Fraser, and Aston Young left the dance and the witness said he left with them too.

Coot said that they went down to King Street and on to Heywood Street where Eddie Fraser said that he wanted a coconut and bought it while he, witness, and Aston Young stood at the corner. The man asked for his money and witness said that the man moved towards Eddie Fraser and he was shot by Fraser.

Cross-examined by Mr. Maurice Tenn, counsel for Eddie Fraser, witness said that he too was arrested and taken to the Denham Town police station, but was released.

Explosion

A domestic servant, Nonna Smith, said that she was going to buy cigarettes when she heard an explosion. She went to where she thought the sound came from and saw a crowd there. Someone whom she knew as Artell was lying on the ground, she said. Smith said she saw two men running up Rose Lane, but could not recognize any of them. Smith said she later attended an identification parade and picked out Harvey Reid as one of the men who she saw walking along Heywood Street.

Carlton McBridge told the court that he was the man who operated the sound system at the dance at 145 King Street on August 23. He saw Eddie Fraser and George Fraser there that night. Eddie Fraser had a gun in his hand in front of a girl. Fraser spoke to her and she ran. Both Frasers then went outside. Witness said, when cross-examined by Mr. Tenn, that he did not see Coot there that night. Re-examined by Mrs. Shirley Playfair Clerk of the Courts he said that if Coot was there he would most naturally have seen him.

Dr. Noel March, pathologist who performed the post mortem examination deposed as to the injuries he found on the deceased.

Iona Eldermire, office maid of 26 Stephen Street, Kingston, told the court that it was she who identified the dead body of Artell Brown.

Julius Vassell, a coconut vendor, told the court that both he and Artell were buying coconuts when a man came up to Artell and told him to give him what he had. He heard a voice saying to “bum the man” and Artell was shot. Vassell identified Eddie Fraser as the man who shot Artell.

Robbed

Continuing, Vassell said that Artell fell to the ground after being shot and both he and Artell were robbed. Cross-examined, Vassell said that no one ordered nor drank a coconut.

Raymond Boucher deposed that George Fraser, whom he knew as Danny, slept at his house three nights. On a Friday morning Danny got up and sat at the doorway with a gun. He pulled “a thing” from the gun and put four “little things” in it. Danny then left the house.

The next day, Boucher said, Danny called him and told him that he knew about the shooting; that it was not he who had done it but Eddie. Harold Williams also gave a deposition. The hearing will continue December 30.

Counsel who appeared at the inquiry were Mr. Tenn, who appeared for Eddie Fraser, Mr. Anthony Spaulding for Aston Young, Miss Gloria Thompson for George Fraser, Mr. W. K. Chin See for John Graham, and Mr. Ian Ramsay, Q.C., for Harvey Reid.

Incidentally, the counsel for Aston Young, Mr. Anthony Spaulding, is the very same defense attorney, along with P.J. Patterson, who represented Don Drummond in July, 1966 in his murder trial. And Pathologist Noel March who is cited above is the very same Noel March that the defense, Anthony Spaulding and P.J. Patterson, used in Don Drummond’s murder trial to present testimony on the examination of Anita Mahfood’s wounds.

Eddie Fraser was found guilty of the murder and was sentenced to death, hanged on January 19, 1971. George Fraser, his younger brother, was sentenced to 12 years hard labor. Mr. Justice Parnell, the judge in No. 1 Home Circuit Court, made comments in sentencing George Fraser might remind one of Judge Dread issuing his sentences of 400 years to Lord Grab and Flee, although it is a bit more based in reality rather than fantasy.

“What we are lacking in Jamaica today is strong discipline. I may be old fashioned but that is what I have been brought up on but the young boys and girls of today decide to take charge of the country and do it their way. They get their guns and knives and walk about and terrorize people, shooting and killing, and when they come before the court and are convicted, their youth is urged as strong ground for dealing leniently with them. As far as this case is concerned, I can see no ground why I should not pass a salutary sentence on you. This man’s life was snuffed out in a jiffy while you and the other man were pursuing your wrong,” said Judge Parnell in the Daily Gleaner, June 4, 1969.