Sunday 3rd December
Recently, I watched the film Small Axe – Lovers Rock on BBC IPlayer. ‘Lovers Rock tells a fictional story of young love at a blues party in 1980. The film is an ode to the romantic reggae genre called lovers rock, and to the black youth who found freedom and love in its sound at London house parties, at a time when they were unwelcome in white nightclubs.’
Created as part of an anthology by Steve McQueen, looking at aspects of the black experience from the 1960s to the 1980s, Small Axe follows Martha Trenton (Amarah-Jae St. Aubyn) and Franklyn Cooper (Michael Ward) as they fall for each other at a house party in the 80s. The night has its ups and downs, Martha’s friend Patty leaves after she gets with Franklyn. She is also constantly followed a strange guy who ends up sexually assaulting the girl whose birthday it was. Her cousin CT shows up, and berates her for not supporting him when is mother died. However, the night still goes well, ending with the pair exchanging contact information (which is convenient as it is lovers rock).
Throughout the night, many reggae classics can be heard. Money in my pocket by Dennis Brown, Darling Ooh (Your Love is Amazing) by Errol Dunkley, Baby My Love by The In Crowd and Silly Games by Janet Kay just to name a few. There were some general oldies as well such as He’s the Greatest Dancer by Sister Sledge and Kung-Fu Fighting by Carl Douglas. The tracks are played by a DJ with an MC (Kadeem Ramsay) who really plays the role well, shouting out to the crowd, keeping the room lively while the music changes. They did not have the technology to just fade tracks, so they used a noise machine and spoke over the transitions. It was cool to see how they operated back then, replicated in such a way as I DJ. I was wondering if people just enjoyed the music on set or if they just had to act as if they were dancing.
Although there aren’t many links to my Audio paper topic, there are a few scenes that I believe match up. At one point CT gets on the mic and says “Babylon! See you. Me Nuh fear yuh. Jah! Me Nuh ‘fraid. Nobody afraid. Go, go!” Essentially saying “People in power! I see you, but I don’t fear you. Jah! I’m not afraid, Nobody is afraid”. All the while More Warning by King Tubby is played in the background.
King Tubby was an artist synonymous with dub. Starting out as a radio repairman in his teens in the 1950s, during which live music started being played on the streets. Eventually sound systems began to rule the streets, with groups travelling around setting up and performing where they saw fit (similar to the group setting up their sound system in the opening of lovers rock). They started out small but eventually larger sound systems came out and with the growth of said systems and the culture came violence which would result in the destruction of sound systems. Tubby was enlisted to repair speakers and did so for years.
Perhaps these large sound systems are a precursor to the stone love sound, which arrived in the 70s. It became Jamaica’s most popular sound system, known for its superior sound quality.