While documenting or searching for data, references about Rocksteady, another musical genre of that beautiful island of Jamaica, I noticed that there were bands, soloists, that sang it, but three main bands stood out: The Gaylads, The Maytals and The Paragons..
And on each of them I will treat my next post as a continuation, so in this second part, I will begin with: The Maytals.
This group is originally from Jamaica, were created in the early '60s, were people as keys in making popular reggae music.
Frederick "Toots" Hibbert, Henry "Raleigh" Gordon and Nathaniel "Jerry" McCarthy together formed the vocal trio The Maytals. In 1962-63 they recorded the album "Never Grow Old - presenting the Maytals",
Frederick "Toots" Hibbert.
But there was a bad time when Frederick "TooTs" Hibbert,, was imprisoned for drug possession in 1966 and 1967 spent 18 months. When he got out of jail, the group met again, but this time they changed their name, now they were: "Toots & The Maytals" , their first musical success: "54-46 that's my number" as a reference to the time Toots was in jail. Let's listen to it while they continue reading the post.
But that was not the only musical success of Toots & The Maytals, it was followed by others such as: "Pressure Drop" or their first international success "Monkey Man".
In Jamaica they had festivals, which this group also participated and won. With the song "Pomp & Pride" they won the third festival in 1972.
Their songs were heard on the big screen of the cinema, as several of their songs: "Sweet and Dandy" and "Pressure Drop" were part of the soundtrack of the film."The harder they come", starring Jimmy Cliff, and was of great importance for the worldwide spread of reggae. Two of his songs, "Sweet and Dandy" and "Pressure Drop", made up the film's soundtrack.
They remember in a Ska post, the third part which spoke about: 2 Tone, they were also present. In the 90's Toots & The Maytals come back again and give concerts all over the world.
Some of their tracks with some changes have been included in the musical albums of bands such as: Sublime and 311 in the United States or Los Pericos in Argentina.
It is a group that has remained active, so much so that in 2004, for its album
"True Love" won the Grammy for the best reggae album.
And of course to finish, let's listen to another musical theme of this band, with the GRAMMY winning song.
So far a short story about Toots & The Maytals I hope in the other post, the continuation of this.
