Desmond Dekker was perhaps most well-known for his rude boy songs, the lyrics that celebrated rude boys, but also told them to keep a cool head. His songs also told of the problems of everyday people, those who slaved for bread so every mouth could be fed, how it is very hard sometimes for a man to find his own meal and sometimes he has to go out and steal. He told of how money is so hard to get and so easy to go. Even though there were troubles and misery, he encouraged us to live in unity and since we were one creation we should live as one nation.
But then there were Desmond Dekker’s women, or more accurately, the girls and the themes of love and unity didn’t seem to apply to the male and female sexes. Sure there were sweet love songs in the tradition of American rhythm and blues, but then Dekker had a definite opinion when it came to relationships. They were bloodsuckers, cannibals, seducers who lured men to evil. Women were either the recipient of troubles, or the creator of troubles. In “You’ve Got Your Troubles,” Dekker isn’t feeling much sympathy for the subject of this song, a recipient of troubles, identified only as “girl.” He sings, “You’ve got your troubles baby, I’ve got mine.” It’s not a shared misery, a community of support. He is exhausted, tired of hearing this girl’s troubles as he sings, “What’s wrong with you? Lord knows. . . . Don’t come running to me baby with all your troubles.”
Women are the creator of trouble and problems. In “This Woman,” Dekker doesn’t mince words when he sings, “Oh yeah, here is a Jezebel, more like a lion, here is the root of all your pain, she is a Jezebel, more like a lion, she is the root of all your pain, don’t let she rotten you, don’t let she get to you, and when today she’ll try to come into your heart. Here is a Jezebel, no, you are a cannibal, you are the root of all the evil, you are a Jezebel, like a parasite, you are the root of all your pain.” He is advising other men to resist this evil creature who will create misery and devour them, like Jezebel, the biblical character who, through her made-up beauty, seduced her husband into worshiping false gods. Jezebel is a symbol of sexuality and trickery, a woman who was evil and cunning. She is also invoked in Justin Hinds in his song, “Carry Go Bring Come,” a song that Dekker covered with The Specials.
In “Carry Go Bring Come,” women are gossipers, stirring up trouble, creating problems. Carry go, bring come, is the act of spreading gossip. “This carry go bring come, my dear, brings misery . . . You’re going from town to town making disturbances, It’s time you stopped doing those things, you old Jezebel . . . It needs no light to see you’re making disturbances . . . It’s better to seek a home in Mount Zion high, Instead of keeping oppression upon innocent man . . . Time will tell on you, you old Jezebel.”
In Dekker’s songs “Mother Pepper” and “It’s a Shame,” he again sings of women as gossipers and trouble makers, insulting them with the same phrase in both songs, “Just stand and look at your mouth, it big as the Gulf of Mexico.” “Mother Long Tongue” is also about a gossiper as Dekker sings, “In the morning when you wake, you don’t wash your mouth, you just lippy lippy lippy gal, wha wrong with you.” A lippy lippy gal is one who talks too much, a blabbermouth.
There is no unity and equality in Dekker’s “A Wise Man,” when he sings, “A wise man keepeth his life, and the life of his wives and kin . . . Take the tip from me yeah, and you will see Lord.” What Dekker means by keeping his life is subject to interpretation, but it is evident that if the man, or the wise man, is the keeper of the life of his wives (multiple) and kin, then the man is certainly in the seat of power, and Dekker is offering his advice to his listeners on this subject as the man with the wisdom.
In “Dracula,” Dekker’s female subject can either be a monster of novelty in this humorous song, a reference to a duppy, or a metaphor for a blood-sucking creature. It may, in fact, be a little of all of these possibilities. Dekker doesn’t sing of a vampire, but he sings of Dracula, the most popular vampire, an icon of pop culture and movies, so there is a bit of fun play present in this song. But there is more than just whimsy in Dekker’s song. He is also being quite nasty about the woman about which he sings. She, a vampire, is a thing of evil. The vampire does appear in Caribbean folklore as Old Higue, a duppy. But some Jamaican musicians, namely Lee “Scratch” Perry and Peter Tosh, have used vampires to describe people who are leeches, who suck the life from others, who exploit and take from others. Dekker sings, “One rainy night, as I was walking on the beach, I meet a girl, believe me folks she was fabulous. I held her hands, she held mine too, she smiled at me, believe me folks, she was a Dracula. So beware my friends, for she’s pretty smart, she has a face like an angel, and eyes like blazing fire. Her teeth is gruesome, ready to stick your veins, do not fall in love for that girl, she is a Dracula.”
Dekker’s women could also be useless, inept, unworthy of being an obedient wife. In “Get Up Edina,” (sometimes spelled Adina) this “girl” is lectured and warned by Dekker, and it is important to note that Edina is referred to as a “girl” instead of a woman, meaning that her status is below his, she is subservient and young, still needing some tutelage and education. She is not yet mature and he is commanding her, “Get up Edina . . . I said to get up Edina, girl. I send you a school, you won’t learn, I send you a church, you won’t hear, I’m gonna send you back to your mama’s house, I’m gonna send you back to your papa’s house, I’m gonna send you back where you come from, I said to go home, go home, Edina,” scolds Dekker. He ends with an insult, “I say you down a di gully,” meaning she is to be thrown out into the street, into the gully, the gutter, where the garbage and waste water run.
According to some claims, there are two songs in which Dekker speaks to his younger sister, as an older brother, correcting her for her mischievous ways. Lorna Dekker In “Pickney Gal” his little sister steals money from him and he tells her to “come here,” likely for a scolding or to be corrected in some way for her transgressions. Colin Larkin in his Encyclopedia of Popular Music writes about Dekker’s song, “It Mek,” which was originally titled, “A It Mek,” which means “that’s why it happened,” that the song “was inspired by Desmond’s sister Elaine, [sic. Lorna] who fell off a wall at her home and cried ‘like ice water.’” It wasn’t the first time he had counseled children. In “Honour Your Mother and Father,” he tells all children to do as the title suggests. It is a song about obedience. Although the song “Parents,” which seems like a counterpart to “Honour Your Mother and Father,” advises them to “take my advice and you will find your reward, parents do not provoke your children to wrong.”
Speaking of parents, in “Licking Stick” Dekker sings of a young girl who has been corrected by the rod, beat, given a “licking” with a stick at the hands of her father and she pleads to her mother for mercy. “Papa, papa, papa; do not lick me with that; mama, mama, mama; it licked too hot; I’ve got the flipping hiccups, mama; I’ve got the flipping hiccups, papa; mama, mama, mama; are you feeling sick; papa, papa licked me; with the licking stick . . . mama, please tell daddy; do not hit me with that; mama, I’m feeling pain; I’m really, really feeling; mama, help me tell my daddy; to help me, I can’t stand it, I can’t; no, I can’t stand it; no, no, I can’t.” If the song weren’t so upbeat and lively, and if Dekker’s voice weren’t so beautiful, the song would almost be too painful to listen to.
He gives more advice and warning to a young girl in “Mother Young Gal,” by using a poem and a proverb. He sings, “’Come into me parlor’ said the spider to the fly, long run, short catch, mother young gal.” The Spider and the Fly is a poem by Mary Howitt that tells of a cunning Spider who ensnares a naive Fly through the use of seduction and flattery. The poem is a cautionary tale against those who use flattery and charm to disguise their true evil intentions. “Come into my parlour,” has become an aphorism used to indicate a false offer of help or friendship that is in fact a trap. He sings of a “long run short catch,” which is a Jamaican proverb meaning that it may take a long while for you to be caught and punished for wrong-doing, but you will be caught one day.
But Dekker was far from perfect in his songs. Here he was, doling out guidance, reprimanding, scolding, even name calling, yet he himself was guilty. In “Baby Come Back” he sings, “There ain’t no use in you crying, ‘cause I’m more hurt than you, I shoulda not been out flirting, but now my love is true.” Dekker was unfaithful to his partner, yet he is telling her that he hurts more than she does, so he is the victim of his own actions.
Dekker was and always will be the “King of Ska,” undeniably a beacon of Jamaican music. He did worry about what would happen to the “Young Generation” and he appealed to those in his own country, in the UK, and now, people all over the world even almost a decade after his death. His voice is sublime, his songs are infectious. His lyrics represented generations. As a woman, I do not think any differently of Dekker knowing his struggles with the female species. Perhaps here, again, he was a mouthpiece for the people, a reflection of what he saw, a conduit through which the music and society flowed.
Heather Augustyn 