KRCL is building a new studio and so all Summer we have been building shows from home. I ‘n’ I was putting together an entirely different Smile Jamaica. It was a beautiful Sunday morning and I caught an alert on my phone from Rolling Stone Magazine:
Damn. First U Roy. Then Bunny Wailer. Now Lee. For me, Lee “Scratch” Perry epitomized what I loved about Reggae music. He was there at the beginning of ska. Brought the Wailers their riddim section and he was a giant in the Reggae mythos via his Black Ark studio.
A mad genius who marched to his own drummer. In the Secret History of Reggae music, that label took on mythic undertones without sacrificing the impeccable quality of 70’s Roots Reggae.
In fact, when I ‘n’ I upload these Reggae Radio showcases I can them the Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives in a backwards tribute to him.
The Black Ark. From the Hebrew Ark of the Covenant buried in a church in Ethiopia. Beyond cool!
In Reggae, we collector obsessives are often more interested in labels and producers than performers. When I ‘n’ I started building my collection in the late 80’s, it became very easy to just automatically add Perry’s productions/performances as the epitome of quality.
Especially through the Mango label, the penultimate releases from the likes of Junior Murvin (Police & Thieves), Max Romeo (War in a Babylon) and The Congos (Heart of the Congos).
It had everything that originally attracted I ‘n’ I to Reggae music: great lyrics about Rastafari love, the story of downtrodden Jamaicans living in the Diaspora (Babylon) and this throbbing bass.
At the Black Ark, Perry was notorious for dumping all of his instruments onto one track. It overloaded everything to the point that your monitors were over-bassed. Then he would cut that murky sound with a slicing high hat and cymbal crash. It had a sort of “stone skipping on water” buoyancy.
The vocals were on the second track. How he captured that sound on primitive Jamaican recording equipment speaks to his prowess as a producer/engineer.
There was often times when I ‘n’ I would purchase a new disk or LP and hear that trademark cavernous sound and think, “That’s a Black Ark recording.” And sure enough, even if the LP was produced by another label. Engineering credit was Lee’s
Recorded at the Black Ark. Mixed by Lee “Scratch” Perry
Another of his hallmarks was the “moaning cow”. He would do some strange flange technique that would approximate that groaning bovine. I’ve pulled the clip for you to hear:
<Lee Perry’s Moaning Cow; 21 sec.>
Lee definitely had some mental health/paranoia issues and eventually the hanger’s ons, the skylarkers, the follow fashion dreads who would hang out and shift coke and eat pork made him destroy the Black Ark Studio to get away from that bad mojo. He painted black X’s over everything. The console, the monitor speakers, the walls. Eventually I think the studio, located behind Lee’s house, burned down.
That lead to about 15 years in the wilderness. Middling releases. A lot of stream of consciousness jive with forgettable Reggae players.
Lee was sued by Chris Blackwell for calling him a vampire who killed Bob Marley for his royalties.
I am stud! I do not drink blood!
He got his second act with three major events
The return to glory with ON U Sound producer Adrian Sherwood and the album From the Secret Laboratory (another backward tribute as I ‘n’ I often call the Smile Jamaica Ark-ives the Secret Dubratory.)
Blood and Fire Label’s massive reissue of The Congos Heart of the Congos.
The Beastie Boys cover tribute from their boutique magazine Grand Royal
Perhaps I ‘n’ I favorite Reggae LP of all time. Reissued and expanded
In the wake of the Blood & Fire reissue, a lot of legit and gray market Black Ark disks and LP’s flooded the shops. Lee moved to Switzerland married a wealthy Swiss gal decades younger.
If you check him on discogs, he issued dozens of LPs and CDs of middling quality: some techno, a lot of Mutant Dub, a lot profane rhyming couplets. He definitely was the eminence grise of Reggae music and enjoyed his notoriety.
I ‘n’ I have a few stories I could tell that don’t put in a good light, but those imperfections make him human and flawed like all of us.
If you still buy those round aluminum coaster thingees. Here is the epitome of his best Black Ark work of classics and obscurities.
Jah’s Heavenly Choir has a new mixing board and you can hear Lee’s maniacal cackle lively up the place.
Bless, Bobbylon
Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives: Sept. 4, 20201 Playlist
Set 1:
Lee “Scratch” Perry – I Got the Groove; From the Secret Laboratory (ON U Sound) ‘90
Prince Jazzbo – Live Good Today; Ital Corner (Clocktower) ‘76
Candy McKenzie – Jah Knows; Lee “Scratch” Perry Presents (Trojan) mid 70’s
Lee “Scratch” Perry – Free Up the Weed; Roast Fish, Collie Weed & Cornbread (Upsetter) ’78 4:20 Cannabis Service Announcement
The Heptones – Garden of Life; Disco Devil (Trojan) ’79 comp.
As I’n’ I mentioned on-air: KRCL is building a new studio and we had to vacate our old space to make way for another four story apartment complex on the Northwest side of Salt Lake City.
That means, just like The Covid 2020, I’m back to building Smile Jamaica episodes from the cloudy living room of the Ark-Ives.
So that means it’s all digital for the summer. The black wax will have to wait. That takes about half of the usual selection out of rotation.
So I ‘n’ I decided I would do specialty Reggae programs for the interim:
Father’s Day
Roswell UFOria anniversary (July ’47)
33 Year Reggae Radio Anniversary (end of June)
Summer of Dub
Happy Birthday Haile Selassie (July)
And what I ‘n’ I played last Saturday: A chronological sampling of the Mango Records Reggae release catalog.
Our story starts with Chris Blackwell. Son of a British food producer father and a Sephardic-Jewish mother. Born in England, the family moved to Jamaica where Chris’s father was in the colonial army.
Chris Blackwell b. 1937
Instead of leaving Jamaica for a life in England, Blackwell stayed in Jamaica and started out managing jukeboxes throughout the Island. Of course, that brought him into contact with regular Jamaicans he encountered in bars and restaurants and absorbed their folk music traditions of mento, calypso and eventually horn-based ska.
If you have ever seen the movie Countryman, it incorporates part of Blackwell’s transition into Rasta cultural awareness. Chris was shipwrecked, rescued and nurtured back to health by a Rasta fisherman.
That same year (1958) Blackwell was gifted $10,000 dollars and started his Island Records label. Jamaican ska ‘n’ b, production assistant on the James Bond movie, Dr. No, which was filmed in Jamaica. Within a couple years he moved to England to become one of the first successful independent record producers.
He hit pay dirt right off the bat with Jamaican teenager Millie Small who recorded a ska version of a pop tune by Barbie Gaye entitled “My Boy Lollypop”. The record sold 6 million copies and introduced Jamaican music to the radio mainstream.
In the early to mid 60’s Island Records was a successful label releasing records from Traffic, King Crimson, Cat Stevens, Jethro Tull, Richard Thompson and many more. Quality rock and roll that sold millions of records.
Blackwell never forgot his Jamaican roots and was a major distributor of Reggae music from Jamaica into the UK.
Around 1972 he encountered the Wailers. They had been working with Lee “Scratch” Perry for his Upsetter label and many people think that was the group’s musical water shed.
Blackwell loaned the group enough money to record their first album: Catch a Fire. Catch a Fire is a foundation release. Nine tracks (six Rasta/protest tunes, three love songs.) Many of these songs were re-worked from the group’s ska era. But it is hard Jamaican, Rasta roots to the bone.
Problem was, Blackwell thought it was too “legit” for his rock audience. He wanted to sell not only to the Jamaican music scene in the UK. He wanted to treat the group like any of his rock acts.
So, he brought in some Nashville session musicians, who played on Traffic records, as sidemen. They added some psychedelic guitar and organ flourishes that really rock-i-fied their sound.
Blackwell invested in an expensive packaging release on the initial pressing. A fold-up record that opened like a Zippo lighter. Catch a Fire, geddit?
That album was one half of what introduced Reggae music to the UK rock buying public and college kid Americans in 1973.
The other catalyst moment for Reggae’s crossover was also connected to Blackwell: The Harder They Come.
Jimmy Cliff plays Ivan: a kid from the Jamaican bush who winds up in the city and turns to a life of crime. Filmed in Jamaica with a boisterous Reggae soundtrack, it is essentially a Jamaican Western showcasing the grim reality and majestic beauty of the island.
Ivan is killed in a glorious shootout and that movie made its wRay through Berkeley, Cambridge, Columbus and East Lansing college towns making a market for that inverted “chucka chucka” Reggae sound. Dreadlocks and ganja were every bit as culturally enticing as hippies and LSD were in the mid 60’s.
So, The Harder They Come (1972) and Catch a Fire (1973) allowed Blackwell to carve out a Reggae niche to fit this market. Rather than seeing Reggae lost in the promotional mix of his larger rock acts, he created the Mango Records imprint.
That label defined the non-Jamaican Reggae market: Toots & the Maytals, Burning Spear, Steel Pulse, Third World. Singers like Justin Hinds, Max Romeo, George Faith. He brought Lee “Scratch” Perry’s non-commercial, mythical and brooding Black Ark studio recordings into record huts across the globe.
***
But in the end, he was still a businessman. With The Wailers it became apparent that a trio wasn’t going to transcend out of the Reggae niche into the hockey arenas and soccer stadiums. Concerts made money and sold records.
So, alas, it became Bob Marley & the Wailers. In the secret history of Reggae music race always plays a part. Peter Tosh was too tall, too black too militant. Bunny Wailer, also too black, was too mystical. He hated touring cold cities and he bailed out on the tour after Burnin’ was released at the tail end of ’73 to cash in on the immediate success of Catch a Fire.
Bob Marley: Black Jamaican mother. White, (absent) English father. His lighter skin and angular features, especially as his dreads began to grow, made him look almost Mediterranean. He could be a brother to late 60’s era Carlos Santana
Blackwell saw in Bob an undeniable charisma. Men wanted to smoke a spliff with the dread. Women wanted to have his babies.
So, Catch a Fire and Burnin’ are credited to the Wailers but by 1974’s Natty Dread it was Bob Marley & the Wailers. Remove Bunny and Peter and supplant with the female backing of the I-Three. By the 1975 Live album, Bob Marley & the Wailers were a rock sensation selling out celebrity filled arenas and clubs across America, the UK, Europe and Japan.
Wailers’ guitarist Junior Marvin, Bob Marley, Jacob Miller, Chris Blackwell
Here is another story for the secret history. When Bob had a toe injury while playing soccer, it turned gangrenous. At one point he was advised that he should have part of his foot amputated.
But the pressure to continue releasing records and mounting his Babylon By Bus tours, Bob chose not to come off the road and have the surgery. Bob stalked the stage like a lion, how could he continue that playing guitar and moving about with a cane?
Alas, Bob died of melanoma, the ultimate gift from his absent white father, on May 11th, 1981. Some (irrationally) blame Blackwell for his passive aggressive pressure to keep building that audience of white fans and at the end he had finally crossed over into the black awareness as disco petered out in 1980.
Had Bob survived into the 80’s he would have been right there with Bruce Springsteen, Madonna and U2.
Peter Tosh called Chris Blackwell. “White worst.” Lee “Scratch” Perry was sued for defamation for claiming in his song, Judgement in a Babylon, that Blackwell was a vampire who killed Bob Marley to steal his royalties.
At the end of the day it is still a cut-throat business and Blackwell committed to Reggae music through Mango up until the Roots era of studio based, band crafted Reggae gave way to the digital electronic era of dancehall and slackness lyrics around 1985. Sporadic releases continued until Blackwell sold his record fortune to Polygram at the end of the 80’s.
But from 1972-1984, Mango Records was perhaps the best and consistently successful Reggae catalog that forms the foundation of the Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives.
So I ‘n’ I went to discogs.com and sorted the releases in chronological order: From 1972’s the Harder They Come to UK group’s 1979 magnum opus Tribute to the Martyrs.
That fills 3 hours of some of the best Reggae music that I ‘n’ I (the royal Rasta we) will ever hear.
So, thanks Chris. Without your instincts and ruthless business acumen Reggae might never have left the Island
bless, Bobbylon
Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives: June 12, 2021 Playlist
Set 1:
Jimmy Cliff – The Harder They Come; The Harder They Come Soundtrack (Mango) ‘72
Jimmy Cliff – Better Days are Coming; Struggling Man (Mango) ‘73
Lorna Bennett – Breakfast in Bed; This is Reggae Music vol. 1 (Mango) ’74 Dusty Springfield cover
Scotty – Skank in Bed; This is Reggae Music vol. 2 (Mango) ’75 dj to Lorna Bennett
Toots & the Maytals – Country Roads; Funky Kingston (Mango) ’75 John Denver cover
Burning Spear – Marcus Garvey; Marcus Garvey (Mango) ‘75
WTF? Why is my new Soob ding, ding, dinging at me? I ‘n’ I don’t have time for this. Have to get to the last in-person Smile Jamaica at KRCL.
As usual, running late and lugged this massive crate (from whence the term cratedigging…) and huffed it onto the front car seat. Soob computer thought it was an unbelted child.
So, running out of time. I just pulled over and latched my “child” safely and motored over to North Temple and 1800 West in Salt Lake City.
What do you mean the last Smile Jamaica? Salt Lake City is awash in 4 story high rise condos/apartments. Over by the airport, when the Park ‘n’ Jet next door was sold to property developers, the station is stranded in the middle and was encouraged to find alternate digs.
Luckily we did find a good spot but it isn’t developed yet. So this show will be the last live Smile Jamaica for the summer while our new home is being constructed.
The Temple of Sound: 2000-2021
For I ‘n’ I, the classic KRCL location was over on 800 South/200 West. Back in the 80’s and 90’s when community radio didn’t have as many media competitors and had a true sense of connection between station volunteers, (who did all the programming), and listeners.
But I ‘n’ I liked the North Temple spot well enough. Just give me two turntables and a mic and I’ll do Smile Jamaica anywhere.
True story: When KRCL first announced at the end of the 90’s our new location, Dave Santivasi – long time host of Saturday Sage rock mornings – drove by the North Temple spot we are now vacating.
That location has always been full of night crawlers. Dave pulled in and was looking around. All of a sudden, his passenger door flew open and a lady of the evening jumped in. She assumed Dave was looking for a “date!”
***
So, while I ‘n’ I go back to Living Room Kinda Cloudy home built Smile Jamaica’s, like I did during The Covid last March-May, enjoy this Reggae vinyl bash blowout and some pics of The Temple of Sound being de-constructed.
It was real. It was fun. Sometimes it was real fun.
Forward ever, backwards never. Soon come to a new Temple of Sound!
bless, Bobbylon
CD LibraryCommon SpaceProduction StudioPerformance Space
You are the big tree, we are the small axe. Sharpened to cut you down — The Wailers
Last month I ‘n’ I drove my parents from Arizona back home to Fort Benton, Montana (see previous blog post.)
When you make that journey, it is wise to build in some weather time. Spring in Montana lasts about a week. I remember as a youth snow storms in August.
So once we got settled I had about three days with not much to do.
Spring in Montana: Memorial Day to June 1
I ‘n’ I had been carving out some time to watch a series on Amazon Prime called Small Axe.
This is an ambitious five movie anthology put together by UK producer/director Steve McQueen. (No relation to the American actor who died of cancer in the early 80’s.)
McQueen is most known for his movie adaptation of 12 Years a Slave. Born in London to West Indian immigrants, Small Axe chronicles the lives of the Caribbean immigrants into English inner cities and the trials and tribulations that they face.
The films are not connected like a television mini series but stand on their own. Here is my audio review clipped from this episode of Smile Jamaica:
<Smile Jamaica reviews Small Axe>
UK film director/producer Steve McQueen
Mangrove
The Mangrove was a West Indian hangout and restaurant set in Notting Hill London. A place where people could play dominos, eat Island food and build community liaisons against the unremitting hostility from local cops.
Those cops didn’t see The Mangrove as a commercial community center. Instead they assumed it was a den of iniquity: gambling, drug dealing and prostitution. The bobbies (London white cops) would periodically descend on the spot and demolish the interior, roust the patrons and harass the owner. A man named Frank Critchlow.
Finally with help from the local chapter of the Black Panthers and sympathetic liberal white barristers, the club sued and was able to exist as a social, commercial pillar of Notting Hill’s black community.
The unremitting racism was very reminiscent of last summer’s Black Lives Matters protests in the US with the amplifier of 60’s and 70’s British hostility directed at immigrants.
The music was terrific late era 60’s and early 70’s Reggae and Rock Steady.
Lovers Rock
This featured the Caribbean youth phenomenon of the shebeen in London. House parties where people would gather and listen to the UK variant of Reggae called Lovers Rock. Pay a little entry fee, have some West Indian food and alcohol. Inside would be a small Reggae sound system, complete with toaster MC.
Young women were a major commercial force in the local Reggae scene. They didn’t want to hear dread and Rasta, they wanted smooth love tunes sung by Reggae songbirds like Janet Kay, the family trio 15, 16, 17 and Brown Sugar. The guys didn’t mind because it was mostly slow dances where they could “rub up a dawta.”
The women wore their best finery. The men dressed up as dandies. Same era in America as Saturday Night Fever. People hooking up, breaking up and cooling out. Highlight was a scene where the pretty song by Janet Kay runs out of the groove and the entire party breaks out the lyrics in acapella.
Red, White and Blue
Local youth breaks through the racism and lack of connections to receive a Ph. D. and work as a researcher. However, his community is being devastated because of the constant beat down of young black men by viciously racist and cruel white cops.
Therefore he decides to give up his scientific career to become one of the first black bobbies (cops) in England. The locals see him as a traitor while the white cops use passive aggression and provocation to undermine his policing to the point of not backing him up in a violent criminal confrontation.
Reminiscent of American baseball player Jackie Robinson. A proud and determined black man who broke the color barrier and was called every foul name in the book. He had the strength to let it roll off his back and not let his anger fight back physically or verbally.
You can sense the seething in the young cop about how many more times is he expected to turn the other cheek.
Alex Wheatle
Black foster kid from the countryside is dropped off in big city. Is initiated into petty crime and turns to Reggae music for salvation. His goal is to create his own sound system. Taking his weekly “winnings” to a local record shop to buy the latest Reggae singles and 12″ disco mix.
My Mom happened into the living room while there was all this great music bumping. On the wall was the usual offering of 70’s Reggae LPs imported from Jamaica.
She asked, “Do you have any of those records?” I paused the movie and counted. Yep. I had every record but one.
Wheatle eventually winds up in prison after the 1981 Brixton riots. His cellmate is a Rasta who introduces him to literature. Eventually Wheatle became a successful novelist in Britain.
Education
The consistent theme through Small Axe is the unrelenting beat down that working class blacks face, in this instance England. Racism, poverty, lack of job opportunities, disjointed families, educational discrimination. Murder and assassination: Birthday parties firebombed,
In this movie a young boy who might have a learning disability or maybe because his parents work night shifts and odd hours he never learned to read.
There was no interdiction at that time. So the youth was sent to a euphemistically titled School for the Educationally Subnormal. Black children with heavy West Indian accents were assumed to be, what would have been called then, retarded. So these kids were dumped into a nightmarish “education” environment with children who had serious developmentally disabled white kids.
Of course the kids were not retarded, and were bored silly. Left to their own devices with teachers who were either absent or wasted time playing half assed folk songs on the guitar. To be cast into those “schools” meant that those kids had no chance to advance into the work force upon “graduation.” The poverty of racism and discrimination was their fate.
The not so subtle educational segregation only served to perpetuate the lack of opportunity for West Indians and their children for a generational cycle of misery and despair that we unfortunately still deal with in America.
With 2020’s Summer of Rage after the George Floyd murder, this anthology was a perfect complement on the UK experience.
In sum: I definitely will want to watch Mangrove, Lovers Rock and Alex Wheatle at home on my Hi Fi. I think I blew out my Dad’s hearing aid battery. “Jesus Christ, do you have to listen to it so loud?”
Yes, Dad. I do!
bless, Bobbylon
Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives: May 15, 2021
Set 1:
Peter Broggs – Rastafari Liveth!; Rastafari Liveth! (RAS) ’82 DC vinyl
Black Uhuru feat. Sly & Robbie – Ion Storm; Dub Factor (Mango) ’83 US vinyl dub album of the hour
Alpha Blondy – Cocody Rock; Cocody Rock (Shanachie) ’84 Ivory Coast West Africa
Carlene Davis – Don’t You Stop the Music; 15 Classic (Sonic) early 80’s
The Ethiopians – Everything Crash; Original Hit Reggae Sound (Trojan) ’68 comp.
Ok, Karen. I ‘n’ I have no choice. I’m the eldest and tasked with the responsibility of helping my Mom with my Dad. (Temporarily dain bramaged from a build up of excess spinal fluid. Called NPH.)
Brain surgery to install a shunt drain of excess spinal fluid that flows down a tube and is absorbed harmlessly into the stomach lining.
Since the Rona Pandemic of 2020 I ‘n’ I have boarded/de-planed 10 different planes. At first they were mostly empty. Now they are packed to the rafters. Guess I’ll take my chances with a 99% recovery rate and hope for the best.
So far so good: Bobbylon 43 The Covid 0
Here’s a diary of my trip.
Day 1: SLC to Denver to Phoenix
I ‘n’ I love the cattle car of Southwest Airlines. Pay 15 bucks extra for Early Bird boarding and aim for the back corner of the plane. Didn’t matter. Both legs of the journey were full. In the airport and on the plane I felt the flight staff were more strict on mask compliance than last year or during Xmas 2020. It seems like the more people are vaxxed the stricter they have become.
I wear my mask b/c it’s a bitch when you are scolded for pulling it down to take a sip of anything. It’s ridiculous anyway b/c they make you take down your mask at TSA checkpoint. So I pass on my gamboo to the security person and he/she gives me their cooties. Lovely.
Day 2: Cratedigging
Phoenix has great record shops. Several boutique vinyl mostly shops. Their local CD/Vinyl/DVD chain is called Zia and they are terrific. Didn’t find a whole lot this time, except at one store called In the Groove. Snagged about a dozen rare Greensleeves label 12″ vinyl records. Yes I!
Spent $200 filling in gaps for the Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives. Keep the vinyl shops alive before, during and after The Covid
The other thing? Mask optional. Where some stores had finally opened back up to actual “digging” as opposed to “curbside delivery”, the staff at In the Groove weren’t wearing a mask and there was no “No Mask, No Service” sign on the door
So neither did I’n’ I. I do the old hang off the ear just in case. It was strangely self conscious and exhilarating at the same time. Wow, how quickly we have been accustomed to breathing in our own carbon dioxide and huffing microscopic boogers that accumulate on those face diapers*
*My Pops: “Jesus Christ, would you quit calling masks a face diaper.” So good to have the old cantankerous dad back in the fold which we missed for almost two years!
Pops was days away from one of Cuomo’s Nursing Home/Covid Death Houses and battled back to flash the Hairy Eyeball directed at his ingrate first born!
Except stay six feet apart and keep wearing your face diaper
That was 2020 for I ‘n’ I. Keeping my Pops dodging the Covid. Thanks to Ishtar, the Granter of Wishes! Others weren’t as fortunate.
15,000+
Day 3: 420 on 4/20; 107 sec.
Arizona legalized the hippie lettuce in 2020. They didn’t waste any time converting medical only Weed Huts into rec stores. There is a terrific shop in Sun City West that helped my Pops with CBD cream for his neuropathy, 1:1 vape cartridges for my Mom – restless leg syndrome.
Got Mom a nice vape pen for Mother’s Day* since I ‘n’ I broke hers in Dec. (For some reason I am lethal on vape pens, either lose them somewhere or they quit charging.)
*I have always been a good son!
Hey Mom! Charging you an Uber fee for our Roadtrip thru Rona-ville!
I ‘n’ I figured April 20th is like Black Friday for potheads. So I called early. Found out they opened at 8am that sacred day. Sale of 40% off cartridges. Got there by 8:20AM.
Jumped in the long line assuming that was for recreational customers. Asked the guy in front of me. Nope, that was for Medical. Spun the wheel and won a $10 pre-roll. Nice.
Walked right up to rec line like a celebrity. Got in their system and went to the budtender. Nice young woman named, wait for it!…..Marley. (Last trip thru Vegas my budtender’s name was Kaya.) I ‘n’ I was so excited I violated the six foot rule. But at least I had my face diaper on.
The Natural Mystical way to beat back the Rona
Walked out with a little bit of everything. Indica (for sleep); Sativa (for cratedigging); Hybrid (for everyday life). The most unusual thing was that they took credit cards. I ‘n’ I have bought weed in Washington, Collie-rado, Nevada and now Phoenix. Everywhere else was cash for the kasheesh. How civilized. Just like going to Mall-Wart or Olive Garden.
Well fortified, let’s get on the road….
Doing it for the Vitamin C. Beat back The Vid
Day 4: Sun City West, AZ to Mesquite, NV (350 miles)
It’s a three day drive from Phoenix to Fort Benton, Montana (North Central part of the state.) 1296 miles
Early high-light (pun intended) was the Last Chance Rest Stop on an Indian reservation just before you cross from AZ to NV.
Alien gear, weed gear and Trump gear “Still My President”. It’s a little disturbing that I’m obsessed with two of the three. Bought some alien schwag, Area 51 T shirt and a bunch of fridge magnets.
Someone call a Karen. Al Leon is wearing his face diaper below his nose!
Pull in to the Virgin River Casino. Had a nice dinner. Near miss with Pops as he went ass over tea kettle. Dude still needs his cane. Two nice bikers helped my Mom and I get him back on his feet.
Pops safe in his room, Mom and I hit the machines. Video Poker for I ‘n’ I. Headed to the exact spot where I won $1000 last fall.
Royal Flush buys a lot of Vape cartridges and pens!
Nevada is a Karen state. Plexiglass is like gambling in a phone booth. I strategically aimed for an end machine close to the bar. Even then the cocktail server doesn’t venture often into the 25 cent video poker machines.
Of course you have to wear a face diaper. I ‘n’ I fire up my Sativa cart and do a little Dr. Ted recreation. (Vaping through a mask). Mmm. Strawberries.
Alas, lightning did not strike twice. The best I ‘n’ I could muster was 4 8’s (400 quarters.) But I got to play about 90 minutes and only dropped 60 bucks. I was crosseyed exhaling strawberry essence through my face diaper (sorry Pops!)
Someone call a Karen, Jed isn’t vaping THROUGH his mask
Day 5: Mesquite NV to Idaho Falls ID (550 miles)
Time to grind out the longest and dullest stretch of the 3 day journey. Since Utah and Idaho are 2/3 thirds of the Mormon Triangle States, there will be no vaping nor gambling.
There was ice cream. It was hilarious watching my parent’s little dog Bella go through a bowl of vanilla ice cream like she was going to the dog pound for the long sleep.
Santaquin, UT. Masks for the employees, didn’t see any on the customers.
Hit Idaho Falls, check into the hotel room (so tired I ‘n’ I forgot my face diaper but didn’t need it. Utah and Idaho are coming out of it and getting on with it.) Pizza Hut in the room and half a Law & Order re-run. One toke from Blueberry Indica and I was in dreamland.
Day 6: Idaho Falls ID to Fort Benton MT (401 miles)
It wouldn’t be Montana if you didn’t have to worry about snow in April. Montana’s spring lasts from Memorial Day to June 1st.
The Monida Pass between Idaho and Montana is the stuff of nightmares. BFD. We’re going. Praise Anu, a few snow flurries, some low level fog. I give it a B+ by the usual whiteout conditions I ‘n’ I have been used to. Home sweet home.
Fort Benton, MT – aka the Birthplace of Montana….and I ‘n’ I
Chillin’ in The Birthplace of Montana
Small Axe Mini-Series, Steve McQueen (Amazon Prime)
When you long haul it that early in the spring, you have to book a few extra days before I ‘n’ I would fly back to SLC. Not much to do, so I had some binge time. My parents have Amazon Prime. I carved out the time to watch a fantastic 5 movie series from UK director Steve McQueen.
From the Wailers song: You are the big tree, we are the small axe. Sharpened to cut you down.
Five individual films chronicling the West Indian/UK immigrant experience. Unremitting racism, immigrant mistrust, depression of the daily beat down for the color of your skin, lack of educational opportunity.
After the 2020 BLM protests you could truly see that endemic racism is a global phenomenon that didn’t start with an Orange dude still selling MAGA schwag.
Smile Jamaic’a movie review soon come!
Fort Benton down with the hemp
17 down, 33 to go. Montana legalized marijuana in Nov. 2020. They haven’t started recreational sales yet but it is legal to possess. Oct. 2021 retail starts….supposedly.
Fort Benton is a town of about 1500 people. Down from about 1800 when I grew up there. Too cold for industry, kids moving off the farm.
But there isn’t a house to be had because of a local hemp processing plant. Yes, hemp. Not cannabis, but I can imagine that will be on-deck now that legal marijuana will need suppliers. They are employing 35 employees in a huge plant on the hill close to my house. They would be the largest non-school/government employer in the entire county.
Indhemp are making hemp powder for supplements, oil, seeds, CBD extraction and I understand they have expanded to process hemp fiber.
And I ‘n’ I can’t wait until recreational is legal so I can walk up to the old NAPA auto parts store downtown and buy some vape from the Fat Hippie.
Fort Benton’s local dispensary!
Rona in Fort Benton-a
So basically after a week of living out of a suitcase, the day after we get home, I wake up and am not feeling all that great. Achy, feverish, low appetite. Are you kidding me? Is it the Rona?
I’ve been talking shit for a year and now it caught me. On the road, 1300 miles of 99% time spent in a car with people/pets I have herd immunity with. In the house I grew up in?
Is the streak over? Bobbylon 43, The Covid 0. Bad news if the Rona scores at all!
I immediately took a vape hit…..waited…..yes, could it be? Strawberries! I ‘n’ I didn’t lose my sensi (pun) of taste! My Mom said to quit being a wuss and come up and empty the dishwasher.
I
I ‘n’ I didn’t get my jab yet because I knew I had this massive trip in front of me. And I have talked to a couple people who had side effects. One guy had a tingling rash up and down his arms. My sister thinks it caused her outbreak of shingles.
So, a day later a friend of Pops comes over for a beer. He was setting up for a gun show in Great Falls. His tongue felt weird. And then he had trouble breathing. His tongue was swelling. He high tailed into Instacare. Epi pen. 24 hours in ICU.
He was totally gobsmacked, a week early he had a 24 hour bout of uncontrolled hiccups that was worse than ICU.
I asked him if he had been recently vaccinated? Yep, two plus weeks earlier. Moderna. I asked an innocent question. Could his back to back adverse health incidences – uncontrolled hiccups, anaphylactic shock – be a consequence of his jab? Oh, no. Take off your tin foil hat and believe the narrative.
And that’s why I’m waiting for the Sputnik V.
bless, Bobbylon
Smile Jamaica Playlist: May 1, 2021
Jacob Miller – Each One Teach One; Classic Rockers vol. 2 (Rockers) ’89 UK vinyl comp.
Sir Coxsone Sound – Black Wars Dub; King of the Dub Rock Part 2 (Tribesman); ’82 UK vinyl dub Album of the hour
The Pioneers – Long Shot; Give and Take (Trojan) ’68 – Kentucky Derby Set
The Pioneers – Longshot Kicked the Bucket; In the Beginning (Jet Star) ‘69
The Race Fans – Bookieman; 7” (Upset) ’68 JA
Dillinger – Race Day; CB 200 (Mango) ‘76
Sugar Minott – One Horse Race; 7” (Chris & Squidley)
The Special AKA – Skinhead Symphony (Longshot Kick the Bucket); Stereo-typical A’s, B’s and Rarities (EMI) ‘80
Mr. Bojangles – Selassie I Cup; 7” (Joe Gibbs Record Globe) ‘77***End of Set 1
Roots Gwaan – Good Trees; Exalt H.I.M. (Conscious Riddims) herbtune
Bunny Wailer, b. Apr. 10, 1947 joins Jah’s Heavenly Choir
Greetings,
Crap. I ‘n’ I was still processing the loss of Reggae stalwart U Roy. I was actually at work editing a sound file when all of a sudden my phone lit up. Twitter, Rolling Stone, friends: Bunny Wailer passes of complications from a stoke he had last summer. At 73, that is far too young. But now he adds the high harmony to Bob’s tenor and Peter’s baritone.
As it was and ever shall be. Selah!
Bob was the rock star. Peter the militant. And Bunny was rightfully the mystic man of the trio. He didn’t want to fit into the rock star mold that Island owner Chris Blackwell wanted for the group. So he pulled out and re-trenched as a Rasta philosopher and dancehall pioneer. His high harmonies on Hallelujah Time*, which I lead off with today, speak to his gospel prowess.
*Great name for a Reggae radio show/podcast!
<Hallelujah Time; 32 sec.>
Bunny, Bob, Peter – locks grow in their heart!
As befit their ghetto roots that led to so much great music, they were all inter-related. Bunny’s father lived with Bob’s mother and had a dawta. Bob’s half sister. Peter had Andrew Tosh with Bunny’s sister. So even when the 3 went their separate ways, they were still and always a family.
<Why I call it Wailers Family Tree; 30 sec.>
Bunny’s father; Bob’s mother; sister Pearl
For I ‘n’ I, Bunny Wailer always means two things. The record I purchased before I was even into Reggae: Blackheart Man. Saw it front and center at the foundation Salt Lake City record shop Cosmic Aeroplane. Great Neville Garrick cover art. Gatefold sleeve, rare for a Reggae record. Of Bunny, spliff in his mouth, a lion protruding from his third eye while an extra terrestrial looking Haile Selassie sits upon his shoulder. That album helped light the fuse.
The Blackheart Man. Indeed!
<Blackheart Man, earliest addition to the Smile Jamaica Ark-Ive; 58 sec.>
The other sublime Bunny Wailer is his stepping out on lead with the 1971 recording of Dreamland. The lyrics are all about going to heaven. (The last song on this podcast edition.) Lee “Scratch” Perry brought out that terrific mysticism that is so authentic and powerful. When its my turn, I’ve asked it to be played at any gathering my would family have.
Thank you Neville Livingston for making us enriched with the power of your music and the beauty of your voice.
bless, Bobbylon
Bonus Story: How Thievery Corporation saved me in a blizzard going over Monida Pass, Holiday 2002
The worst stretch of I-15 from Fort Benton, Mt to SLC: the dreaded Monida Pass. Snow, wind, ice, bitter cold
Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives: March 6, 2021 Playlist: 2 min. 35 sec.
Set 1:
Horace Andy – Oh Lord, Why Lord; Best of (Studio One) ’72 JA vinyl; Parliament/G. Clinton cover
Jah Shaka – Institution Dub; Dub Masters Vol. 1 (Mango) ’89 UK vinyl dub album of the hour
The Wailers – Hallelujah Time; Burnin’ (Island) ’73 UK vinyl: Bunny Wailer on vox. RIP
Bush Chemists – Time of Tribulation; Light Up Your Spliff (Conscious Sounds) ’96 UK Mutant Dub
Johnnie Moore & the Skatalites – South China Sea (Take 1); 10” EP (Top Deck) ’65 UK green vinyl trumpet ska
Cocoa Tea – There’s an Herb Tree in My Garden; Mr. Cocoa Tea (Blue Mountain) ’85 herbtune/Ben E. King Spanish Harlem
Universal Speakers – We Roots + Dub; We Roots (Catch Me Time) 2012 US roots dawta group
Cover of George Clinton’s pre-funk Parliament soul/gospel ballad. Beautiful!
Set 2:
Thievery Corporation feat. Emilia Torriani – Heaven Is In Your Eyes; Richest Man in Babylon (ESL) 2002 DC dubbers
Lee Perry & the Upsetters – Soul Man; Double Seven (Trojan) ’73 cover of Sam & Dave soul
Judy Mowatt – Black Woman; Women Hold Up Half the Sky (Shanachie) ’76 comp.
Welton Irie – Man Next Door; 12” (Joe Gibbs Record Globe) ’79 FL: dj to Paragons tune
Johnny Clarke – Every Knee Shall Bow; Dreader Dread (Blood & Fire) ’78 comp.
Trusted compan+ion through a blizzard over Monida Pass: Xmas 2002
Smile Jamaica loves Jah-loween. Here is the Monster Menagerie from the Ark-ives:
Anti-christ/Mark of the Beast/666 – 7
Bats – 2
Bermuda Triangle – 1
Black magic – 9
Cemeteries & graveyards – 7
Demons – 6
Devil, Lucifer, Satan – 59
Dungeons – 6
Duppies & Jumbies (Jamaican ghosts) – 14
Exorcist – 1
Frankenstein – 5
Ghosts – 19
Halloween holiday – 5
Haunted houses – 2
Hell hounds -1
Loch Ness Monster – 1
Monsters – 4
Mr. Brown who rides around Trenchtown in a motorized coffin – 2
Mummies – 2
Obeah (Jamaican Black Magic) – 13
Skeletons – 2
Undertakers – 3
Vampires, Dracula and soap opera vampire Barnabas Collins – 63
Voodoo – 5
Werewolves – 4
Witches – 4
Zombies – 14
By my Liberal Arts math, that tallies up to over 260 Jah-loween gems. Plus all my horror soundbytes and movie trailers. (New additions in between the horrorfest such as The Exorcist, Planet of the Vampires,nNight of the Living Dead, Phantasm).
All mixed into one bubbling cauldron of grimness. Perfect for this era of The Covid. I don’t listen to a lot of new Reggae releases but next year I’m sure to add some ghouly Covid delights.
There was once upon a time when I ‘n’ I never said a word and only played station ID’s during the 3 hours. It was truly 180 minutes of drum, bass and Afternoon of the Living Dead.
But since this is Smile Jamaica, I ‘n’ I tell you some stories to embellish the tunes:
Annie Palmer – the evil Jamaican wife of a slave plantation owner who used to whip her slaves mercilessly and continued to haunt them after she died
<Annie Palmer; 26 sec.>
In Jamaica police informers were referred to as Vampires:
<Vampire = informer; 27 sec.>
Peter Tosh always felt there were hell hounds on his trail. One night he was paralyzed from the forces of a demon. He prayed to Jah to save. Jah told him, “son, use the word and you will be as free as a bird.
That word? Bumba klaat. In Jamaica, that is as rude as saying Mother F’er in the US. Bum for vagina. Klaat = cloth. Rastas want nothing to do with their queen’s “monthly visitor”. So the epithet shocked the duppy (Jamaican ghost) out of Peter’s soul.
<Oh Bumba Klaat; 1 min. 22 sec.>
And how about the corpse who put a transmission, engine and four wheels on his coffin to terrorize the denizens of Trenchtown ghetto. His names was Mr. Brown.
<Mr. Brown rides around in a coffin; 21 sec.>
curse, Bobbylon
Smile Jamaica Jah-loween Monster Bash, 10/31/2020 Annotated Playlist: 85 sec.
Set 1:
Ini Kamoze – Hole in the Pumpkin; Shocking Out (RAS) ’87 3 Hours of Jah-loween
Scientist – The Voodoo Curse; Rids the World of the Evil Curse of the Vampires (Greensleeves) ‘81
Black Uhuru – Anthem; Anthem (Island) ‘83
Ijahman Levi – Devil Disciple; Forward Rastaman (Jahmani) ‘87
The Toyes – Monster Hash; The Toyes (CD Tunes) ‘96
GG All-Stars – Haunted House; 12” (GG’s Hit!) ‘78
Set 2:
Crucial Bee – Mark of the Beast; Just a Sting (All-Starr) US Virgin Islands vinyl
Sinead O’Connor – Vampire; Throw Down Your Arms (That’s Why There’s Chocolate & Vanilla) 2005 Devon Irons cover
The Ethiopians – Obeah Book; Slave Call (Rohit) ’74 Obeah – Jamaican black magic
Ghetto Priest – Dungeon; Vulture Culture (ON U Sound) 2003 Singers & Players cover
Clint Eastwood & General Saint – Talk About Run; 12” (Greensleeves) ’81 UK duppies in the cemetery
Set 3:
Lone Ranger – Annie Palmer; Barnabas in Collins Wood (Wave) ’79 JA vinyl: Jamaican witch/ghost
Pablo Gad – Blood Suckers; Blood Suckers (Celluloid) ‘78
Chalice – Back Weh Evil Forces; Stand Up! (CSA) ’85 UK vinyl
Sky High & the Mau Mau – Cemetery Robbery; Origination (Sky High) 70’s
Moses – When the Vampire Comes to Your Neighborhood; 12” (Wackies) ’82 Bronx
Leo Graham – Voodooism; Magnetic Mirror Master Mix (Anachron) 70’s Dutch vinyl; Lee “Scratch” Perry prod’n
Set 4:
Capleton & Big Youth – Mark of the Beast; I-Testament (Def Jam) ‘97
Jimmy Cliff – Satan’s Kingdom; I am the Living (MCA) ’80 US vinyl
Easy Star All-Stars feat. Mikey General & Spragga Benz – Thrillah (Easy Star) 2012 Michael Jackson/Vincent Prince
Carl McDonald – Satan Soldiers on the Run; 12” (Makdon) ’87 Brooklyn
Set 5:
Peter Tosh – Oh Bumba Klaat; 12” EP (Rolling Stone) ’81 UK fight off demonic possession
David Lindley – Werewolves of London; Very Greasy (Elektra) ’88 Warren Zevon cover
Smile Jamaica locked out of your station that rules the nation, KRCL, till at least the end of May. So I ‘n’ I have the entirety of the Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives to peruse for the infamous, notorious, humorous, outrageous, quasi legalish 420 Cannabis Service Show.
I ‘n’ I would say 25 of the 30 or so Jah-prils of being your host, has been devoted to the Seven Leaf
I’n’ I was chatting up a friend recently: “Wouldn’t it be great if the purgative lung properties of inhaling cannabis could mitigate against the severity of the Covid?”
What if doctors were able to tell their patients. “You have tested positive for the Covid. My suggestion is to start smoking marijuana immediately!”
I mean, really. You want to go on a ventilator or smoke two joints? Lot cheaper and the mortality rate of those on ventilators is about 90%. I ‘n’ I guess we’re stuck with bleach enemas and injecting Lysol.
So all the Doom Porn I’m forced to read as opposed to news, tells us we are heading into an economic Depression. You want a leg up on revenue? Do what Lebanon did.
From the Bekaa Valley, recently liberated from ISIL tyranny. Home of the legendary Lebanese Blonde hash
They became the first Middle East nation to legalize cannabis. From the Aramaic – qanneh (reed) bossom (aromatic) – so the aromatic reed = ganja stalk
So don’t call it marijuana – that is a made up name by the 30’s anti-drug thugs in the US government: Maria + Juan = Marijuana. To stigmatize the drug with Mexican laborers so they could be easily deported during the depression.
Quick history of Cannabis:
The Scythians (an Iranian people) – were the first to throw Cannabis seeds on the hot plate to inhale the vapors.
From 5th Century BC historian, Herodotus:
The Scythians said, take some of this hemp-seed [presumably, flowers], and, creeping under the felt coverings, throw it upon the red-hot stones; immediately it smokes, and gives out such a vapour as no Grecian vapour-bath can exceed; the Scyths, delighted, shout for joy.” Yes I!
They puff puff passed it to the Medes (forefathers of today’s Kurds)
The Medes spread it to the expansive Assyrian-Akkadian-Babylonian empires.
Trade with Egypt allowed for the plant to go West through the Maghreb (Arab North Africa) and north through the Mediterranean
2020 – Lebanese blonde
So, while you are forced indoors – whether sick or healthy, enjoy this cannabliss podcast: 35 Reggae songs plus special efx, movie dialog and other seven leaf snippets.
Stay safe!
Bless, Bobbylon
Smile Jamaica Playlist: Apr. 18, 2020 – 420 Special
Set 1:
The Toyes – Green Doctor; Strange Animals (CD Tunes) ’96 LA
Eek a Mouse – Sensee Party; Skidip! (Greensleeves) ’82
John Clarke – Good Collie Weed; Visions of John Clarke (Wackies) ’79 to Only Sixteen riddim
Junior Byles – Cally Weed; Rasta No Pickpocket (Nighthawk) ’86
Gracy & the Herbman Band – Follow Up; See Mi Yah (Funfundvierzig) ’91 Germ. female
Set 2:
Black Uhuru – Sinsemilla; Sinsemilla (Mango) ’80 without seeds
Angie Angel – Sativa Info; All I Have Is Love (Easy Star) 2001
I ‘n’ I know Black History Month (February) as Bob Marley Month (Bob-ruary). Born Feb. 6, 1945 he would have been 75 had he not died of melanoma on May 11, 1981 (36 years old.)
In the Rasta community, they avoid death. So part of that Ras’pect is to say “livicate” not deadicate.
As a major Reggae collector I ‘n’ I had picked up some Marley reissues in the past year.
Boston, ’78
Plus, a CD/DVD combo that was published on the West German rock television show Rockpalast. (See image at top.)
If you were a youth in the 70’s as I was, weekend night time rock and roll TV programs, like Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert and Midnight Special with Wolfman Jack fed viewers music television fix before the advent of MTV.
The Uprising disk/DVD = Rockpalast performance was recorded in Dortmund (West) Germany on June 13, 1980.
It was haunting. Bob was at his high point. I ‘n’ I always tell people you can gauge Bob’s age by the length of his dreads. The short and wiry, athletic Bob roamed the stage like a lion. Dreads flashing. Moving about the other group members. Full of energy and passion.
Bob’s nickname was Skipper. He was an exacting band leader who would even fine his wife Rita, among other band members, if they made a mistake. This was the video performance of a man and group leading Reggae into the mainstream.
The 80’s would have seen him at the top of the pop music pinnacle alongside stalwarts like Bruce Springsteen, Michael Jackson, U2 and Madonna.
Alas, it wasn’t to be. Almost 3 months later Bob collapsed running in New York’s Central Park. He performed one more show in Pittsburgh, PA (Sept. 23, 1980). And made his Exodus to Jah’s Heavenly Choir less than 8 months later.
As someone with a Ph.D. in Bobology, I was stunned. On stage in front of thousands, this was not the look of a many being ravaged by cancer.
<Bob’s Rockpalast performance; 72 sec.>
Bob’s passing shocked the Reggae world as well. In Jamaica, and elsewhere over the decades since May ’81, I ‘n’ I have culled nearly 50 Bob Tributes.
One thing about music when it hits you, you feel no pain. Artists exacted their grief in an expression of platonic love. Every Bobruary, I’n’ I rinse out those songs throughout the 4 weeks of Smile Jamaica editions.
<Marley Tribute phenomena; 40 sec.>
***
For the past several months I ‘n’ I have been tracking through the Wailers’ early pre-Island label catalog. We are on the 1970 recordings for Chinese Jamaican restauranteur, Leslie Kong
The Wailers had huge ska success with Coxsone Dodd’s Studio One label. But they would sell 80,000 copies of a record and be compensated $25.
Studio One owner made thousands on sales. The Wailers made $25 on 80k sold
So the group quit Studio One and created their own label: Tuff Gong. However, the Jamaican music business was cut throat. DIY groups like the Wailers couldn’t get their songs into the shops or on the radio as independents. So the label folded.
Thus they turned to one of Dodd’s competitors, Leslie Kong. Beverley’s, his label, was a successful Rock Steady label selling thousands of records in the UK, especially.
Record producer is the guy that funds the sessions.
Recording in a music studio; pay for time
Paying the musicians
Paying the sound engineer
Paying to mix the tape recording
Paying to press the records
Paying to distribute the records to shops domestically and internationally
Payola to get the song on the radio.
The Wailers recorded about 10 songs. What to call it. Since Kong knew the group was hot, but records by the Wailers were hard to find, he wanted to call it Best of Bob Marley and the Wailers.
The group were hostile to that notion and felt they were being ripped off again. These weren’t their best songs. “Best” signifies the group was at its end, not a re-boot. The album is not exactly filler, and there are some great performances. But Best was a misnomer…at best.
The group wanted the album to be called Caution. This is where the Reggae apocrypha sneaks in. The Wailers were sighting up Rasta. With all that mystical and magical revelation, they warned Kong this offense would not go unpunished….Caution indeed.
Here is how Bunny Wailer described what happened in the liner notes of the Bunny album I have introduced on this podcast edition of Smile Jamaica. As part of I ‘n’ I Wailers Family Tree selections.
<The mysterious death of Leslie Kong; 2 min. 48 sec.>
As Bunny noted, Kong wanted to exploit the group’s sales potential: notoriety + scarcity = $$$. Call it Best Of and watch the records fly off the shelves.
He wasn’t interested in “art” but commerce. The Wailers took their craft seriously. Here was another rip off. Call it black magic obeah, divine justice or just the eerie circumstance of timing.
On the very day the records were to be sent to the shops, Kong died of a brain aneurysm. He was 38 years old. Caution indeed!
Caution – the road is wet. Black soul is black as jet. Caution the road is hot. You can do better than that
How about one more story:
Haile Selassie visited Jamaica in 1966. For Peter Tosh it was a foundation moment in the development of Rastafari worship.
I ‘n’ I was fighting glaucoma with my bredrins Mike and Aqua Boy. I was laying out my Presidential strategy for taking down The Cheetolini in 2020:
Tulsi-Bernie
America’s only hope in 2020
With the JFK coup anniversary looming: Was it Bin Laden on the Grassy Knoll? Discuss!
But then the discussion took a turn. When baseball season is over, I ‘n’ I turn to a new time suck: Ancient Aliens on the History Channel.
I was talking about the documentary’s 2 hour tribute to Erich von Daniken, the Father of Ancient Astronaut Theory. His book, Chariots of the Gods, lit the fuse for a whole generation seeking a connection between ancient astronauts mis-labelled as Sky Gods by mankind.
I took to the alternative cosmology of Ancient Astronaut Theory late in life. But I should have been into it for 40 years….
I grew up in a small farming community in North Central Montana called Fort Benton. Beautiful little river city. We had a theater and a drive in. It was a short bike ride from my house to go see a movie to get out of the sun.
Fort Benton, Montana – the Birthplace of Montana and cattle multilations
It was sometime, summer 1975. I was ten years old. The movie was Young Frankenstein: Mel Brooks, Marty Feldman and Teri Garr. But, in the lobby was something that really intrigued me: a whole display of cut outs, movie stills and placards describing Chariots of the Gods. The movie.
One of the stills described a picture in Ancient Assyria; my mother’s homeland in the Fertile Crescent. I was totally enthralled and could not wait to see it in two weeks!
Coming soon to a farm implement dealership
The following week, the movie theater went out of business and became a farm implement manufacturing business. Cursed!
****
Wheel it forward to last weekend. I was regaling my mates, between bongrips and bourbon, of the story von Daniken described from the Bible: Ezekiel and the crystal ship. A wheel within a wheel.
Ezekiel 1:14-28. Ancient Astronaut Theory
14And the living creatures ran and returned as the appearance of a flash of lightning.
15 Now as I beheld the living creatures, behold one wheel upon the earth by the living creatures, with his four faces.
16 The appearance of the wheels and their work was like unto the colour of a beryl: and they four had one likeness: and their appearance and their work was as it were a wheel in the middle of a wheel.
17 When they went, they went upon their four sides: and they turned not when they went.
18 As for their rings, they were so high that they were dreadful; and their rings were full of eyes round about them four.
19 And when the living creatures went, the wheels went by them: and when the living creatures were lifted up from the earth, the wheels were lifted up.
20 Whithersoever the spirit was to go, they went, thither was their spirit to go; and the wheels were lifted up over against them: for the spirit of the living creature was in the wheels.
21 When those went, these went; and when those stood, these stood; and when those were lifted up from the earth, the wheels were lifted up over against them: for the spirit of the living creature was in the wheels.
22 And the likeness of the firmament upon the heads of the living creature was as the colour of the terrible crystal, stretched forth over their heads above.
23 And under the firmament were their wings straight, the one toward the other: every one had two, which covered on this side, and every one had two, which covered on that side, their bodies.
24 And when they went, I heard the noise of their wings, like the noise of great waters, as the voice of the Almighty, the voice of speech, as the noise of an host: when they stood, they let down their wings.
25 And there was a voice from the firmament that was over their heads, when they stood, and had let down their wings.
26 And above the firmament that was over their heads was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a sapphire stone: and upon the likeness of the throne was the likeness as the appearance of a man above upon it.
27 And I saw as the colour of amber, as the appearance of fire round about within it, from the appearance of his loins even upward, and from the appearance of his loins even downward, I saw as it were the appearance of fire, and it had brightness round about.
28 As the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness round about. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. And when I saw it, I fell upon my face, and I heard a voice of one that spake.
That, my friends, is the description of nothing other than a space ship which travels by gyration, the wheel within a wheel!
What the Prophet Ezekiel saw in the Old Testament
<Ezekiel’s crystal ship>
My bredrin Aquaboy, who reads dinosaur media like the New York Times and The Nation magazine, was not having it. He was giving me the red eyed hairy eyeball.
The hairy eyeball
So I’n’ I zone in on the kill shot: The Ancient Aliens episode devoted to Chariots of the Gods’ legacy talked about one of the original NASA scientists who thought von Daniken was a crank and set out to use physics to debunk the wheel within a wheel.
His name was Sidney Blumrich…
I ‘n’ I, who does not read the New York Times nor the Nation, never got to finish…Aquaboy was full on scoffing. I ‘n’ I held up my hand and calmly said,
“Your perception is not my reality.”
They’re here. They’ve always been here. And they’re coming! Scoffing won’t save you!
bless, Bobbylon
Bobbylon’s Top Ten Biblical Alien Encounters
Moses and the burning bush – spaceship
Ezekeiel and the Crystal Ship: the wheel within a wheel aka a gyroscopic spaceship
Stairway to Heaven – walkway to a spaceship
Enoch – Noah’s grandfather who walked with God and then was not
Lot’s wife – turned into a pillar of smoke, not salt after Armageddon was destroyed in a nuclear attack
The New Jerusalem – Borg cube massive space ship
The Nephilim – Biblical giants describing the Anunnaki who created mankind and mated with their women
Noah’s Flood (1) – Utnapishtim in a tessaract spaceship to wait for the flood waters to recede (Sumerian origin story)
Noah’s Flood (2) – Ziusudra in a submarine to wait for the flood waters to recede (Sumerian origin story)
Jacob’s Ladder – spaceship walkway (see #3)
How about some examples from Islam and Hinduism:
Magic/flying carpets
The Prophet Muhammad’s midnight journey to Heaven on the back of a winged horse Al-Buraq. Buraq means “lightning” in Arabic (one man space capsule)
Descriptions of flaming minarets in the sky (missiles)
Hindu Vimana’s: space chariots fighting battles
Shiva’s Trident – missile
Al-Buraq “lightning”. Took the Prophet Muhammad to heaven from earth….spaceship!
Smile Jamaica Ark-Ives: Jah-vember 16, 2019 Annotated Playlist: 73 sec.
Set 1:
Mikey Dread – Voice of Jah; Dread at the Controls (Trojan) ’79 UK vinyl
Aggrovators – Dread Locks in Jamaica (Attack) ’76 JA vinyl dub album of the hour
Chachi feat. Sister Carol – Natty Dread; (Kariang) ’99 Ethiopian dawta cover Bob Marley
Sister Carol – Natty Live Up; Lyrically Potent (Heartbeat) ’96 Bob Marley’s Natty Dread
Jah Thomas – Tribute to the Reggae King; In Disco Style – Entertainment (Midnight Rock) ’81 Bob Marley tribute
Sublime – Legalize It; Hempilation (Capricorn) ’96 Peter Tosh cover; 4:20 Cannabis Service Announcement
Junior Murvin – Bad Weed; 12” (Upsetters) ’78 UK – Lee “Scratch” Perry prod’n; herbtune over Police & Thieves
Set 2:
Zema – Joy in the Morning; Black Sleep (Melchizedek) 2003 Culver City, CA dawta
Linton Kwesi Johnson – Sonny’s Lettah; a capella live (LKJ)
<UK sus laws against “vagrancy”; 28 sec.>
The Eagles – Country Living; Reggae Classics (DCC) ‘73
Tapper Zukie – Black Man 12”; I Can Hear the Children Singing (Blood & Fire) ’78 dj to Prince Alla
Barry Brown – Release the Chains; 10” (Rockers) ’80 UK; Augustus Pablo prod’n
Set 3: Best of Smile Jamaica 30 Years
Martha Velez – Get Up Stand Up; Escape From Babylon (Sire) ’76; Wailers cover
Mighty Diamonds – Gnashing of Teeth; I Need a Roof (Hitbound) ‘76
Aisha – Give a Little Love; 7” (Rockers International) 7” Jamaican Jukebox Set
Richard Ace – Supernatural Thing; 7” (Clocktower) 70’s Ben E. King cover
Madoo – Jamming So; 7” (Crazy Joe) ‘79
The Lions – Roll It ‘Round’ 7” (Lions Bread) 2010 LA roots group*
Sly & the Revolutionaires – Cocaine; Bill Laswell: Dub Massive Chapter One (Trojan) 2005 Dub Album of the Hour
Set 7: Wailers Family Tree
Bob Marley & the Wailers feat. Bunny Wailer – Dreamland; Marley, Tosh, Livingston & Associates (Studio One) ’66 JA vinyl
<Dreamland – Bunny Wailer’s vision of heaven; 1 min. 23 sec.>
Bunny Wailer – Natural Mystic; Hall of Fame (RAS) ’95: 50 Bob songs for Bob’s 50th birthday
Peter Tosh – Get Up Stand Up; Wanted (bootleg) Sept. 29, 1981 at the Ritz, NYC
Ziggy Marley – Live on Mars; Fly Rasta (Tuff Gong) 2013 UFOria
Bunny’s vision of heaven
Set 8: UFOria
Tena Stelin – Flying Saucers; 7” (Mascot) ’99 UFO-ria
Unity – Stargazing; Heat Your Body Up (Virgin) ’83 UK
Thievery Corporation feat. Sleepy Wonder – Stargazing; Culture of Fear (ESL) 2011
Ancient Astronauts feat. Akua Naru – Last Night; Into Bass and Time (ESL) 2010 w/ female vox alien love song
Rockers Hi-Fi – Dick From Outerspace; Rockers to Rockers (Gee Street) ’95 UK
Spiritual Rez – Let’s Go Out With a Bang; Apocalypse Whenever (Spiritual Rez) 2014
Smile Jamaica is hosted by Robert Nelson on 90.9 FM KRCL in Salt Lake City, Utah (Saturdays, 4-7 p.m. MT). Ark-ives available weekly here at the Smile Jamaica blog.
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