“Oh Jill, Oh Jill, Oh Jill! Don’t mess with Jill” was a constant vibe on MBC Radio in the 1980s. Broadcasters like Davies Mussa, Patrick Khoza, Gerald Nyamacharenga and others would constantly play the mellifluous reggae piece on Malawi’s sole radio station, alongside other reggae great hits by Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Toots, Bunny Wailer and later Yellowman. “Don’t Mess With Jill” was by a Jamaican reggae stalwart called Winston Rodney, popularly known as Burning Spear.
Spear has been an outstanding reggae performer since the early 1970s. He was born Winston Rodney in Jamaica’s St. Ann Parish, the same Parish that was Bob Marley’s birth place. The latter has had a profound influence on the former, musically speaking. Another well-known and influential Jamaican who was born in St. Ann Parish, albeit half a century earlier, was Marcus Garvery. Garvey’s “back to Africa” message was to have a deep influence on Burning Spear and his music.
As he was working in the field in rural St. Ann, Winston Rodney met a young man who was driving a donkey one morning. The young man introduced himself as Robert Nesta Marley, known to the world as Bob Marley. That time Marley was already a national hero, with a string of musical hits to his credit. Winston asked his friend if he could help him get introduced to the music business. Bob asked him to appear for auditions at Studio One, the studio that Bob himself was using. Winston passed the auditions and got launched into the music industry as Burning Spear, performing roots reggae music.
Burning Spear, a name he picked from Kenya’s founding President, Mzee Jomo Kenyatta, initially was the name of Winston’s band. As time passed the band leader himself became increasingly associated with the band’s name. Eventually he adopted it as his performing name.
Burning Spear has had a stellar music career over the past five decades, releasing classic hits like “Don’t Mess With Jill”, “Marcus Garvey Words Came To Pass”, “African Teacher”, “Don’t Kill A Lion”, “Identity”, among numerous others. His musical arrangement is as mature as any can be. He normally performs with a whole legion of instrumentalists, complete with a saxophone or two and throbbing percussions that include rattlers. The instruments will usually accompany his solo voice, which is powerfully projected in a high-pitched mellow timbre.
Spear’s Wife, Sonia Rodney, is his manager. The two met in 1975 at his concert in Queens. They were officially married a few years later, and have had a son, Kevin Thompson, together. They sadly lost Kevin to a brain tumour in July of 2010. He was 35 at the time of his demise. Spear wrote a song titled “Cure” in loving memory of his son.
The Jamaican superstar has won a number of accolades in his musical career. He has, for example, bagged two Grammy awards for best reggae album. These were “Calling Rastafari” in 2000 and “Jah is Real” in 2009. Besides these, he has been nominated a whooping twelve times for Grammy awards. He is, therefore, not a push over in reggae music. The reader may also wish to know that Spear received the Order of Distinction award from the Jamaican Government, in recognition of his weighty contribution to Jamaican music and culture.
What I admire most about Burning Spear is his unwavering commitment to his roots reggae identity, even in the face of pressure to adapt to more “modern” styles of reggae. His song “Identity” beautifully articulates his steadfast refusal to alter his musical essence.
Like his compatriots, some of who have been mentioned earlier, Burning Spear has toured practically every major continent on this planet, including Africa. Notably, he performed in Cape Town along with Joseph Hill of the celebrated Culture Band in 2002. In 2005 he performed in Ethiopia at a function to commemorate the 60the anniversary of Marley’s birth. Other internationally recognized reggae greats also performed at that function.
Barring unforeseen negative developments, Spear is on his way to Africa again this year again. This year’s tour will include Malawi. He is scheduled to perform in Lilongwe on the 26th of October.
Malawi has hosted a number of reggae artists before, including some from Jamaica. However, not one of them was from the tradition of the reggae fathers who gave us unadulterated roots reggae. The closest performance by an original roots reggae performer to Malawi was Bob Marley’s in Harare, Zimbabwe, in 1980. The next closest was Peter Tosh’s in Mbabane, Swaziland (Eswatini) in 1983. There are not many of these reggae fathers left now. Burning Spear is one of the very few still standing.