A Salute to Late Reggae Legend Jimmy Cliff

Yesterday we lost another great musician, the reggae legend Jimmy Cliff passed away. So it only feels right to dedicate a Three Tune Tuesday the some of his greatest songs. He may not be quite as big a name as Bob Marley, but he wrote and sang some huge hit songs over his long career. And unlike Marley he lived to the ripe old age of 81, hopefully I'll make it that long!

pastemagazine.com

Cliff was born in Jamaica in 1944 and kicked off his career in music as a teenager having his first hit "Hurricane Hattie" at age 17. He continued to write and record throughout the 1960's becoming one of Jamaica's most well known reggae artists. His career spanned throughout the 70's, 80's, 90's and into the 2000's as he continued to perform and tour. Today I picked out three of his biggest hits that I have always enjoyed, I hope you do to.

Before we get going, first off I want to say thank you to Hive account@ablaze for starting and continuing to sponsor this fun weekly event where you can share three songs that you enjoy. One lucky participant will win some HSBI units, you can't have too many of those! So if you don't already participate feel free to jump in, just use the tag #ttt or #threetunetuesday and it's never a bad idea to do a shoutout to Hive account@ablaze .

I Can See Clearly Now

I remember this song the best from the movie "Cool Runnings". Originally it was written by the late Johnny Nash, but became a huge hit for Cliff in 1993 when the movie was released. It just goes to show how long his career spanned. This is a great song, enjoy this live version from Woodstock of 1994:

Many Rivers to Cross

I think the first time I heard a version of this song was from UB40's cover of it in the 1980's. It was first written and performed by Cliff in 1969, before I was even born! It has been covered by many other musicians over the years including Cher and Annie Lennox of the Eurythmics. But I like the original version best by Jimmy himself, have a listen to this great classic song:

Wild World

The first time I remember hearing this song was in 1988 when it was covered by Maxi Priest. In reality it was written by the great Cat Stevens in 1970 and Jimmy Cliff made a cover of it only a few months later. It was a huge hit for Cliff in the UK and ironically Stevens version wasn't released in the UK (even though he is from there), otherwise it might have been huge for him. At any rate, this is a great song, have a listen:

That will do it for this Tuesday's edition of Three Tune Tuesday. Jimmy Cliff was a great musician that influenced many generations and will be sorely missed. May he rest in peace. Please feel free to leave any comments or questions below and thank you so much for all of your support! I really do deeply appreciate it. Make it a great day everyone!

References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Cliff

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_World_(song)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UB40

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxi_Priest

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_Stevens

Disclaimer

The video links I am sharing are not mine, I am only sharing the link to the copyright owner's video. No copyright infringement is intended. Used under fair-use section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976.