JAMAICAN ARTISTS SEE AFRICA, “THE MOTHERLAND” IN DIFFERENT LYRICAL WAYS!

“Mi check fi yu such so mi nah go do yu dat

Woman inna mi life a part a mi comfat

Natural African girl she cool an she black

Wid a lot a tenderness fi make de Terror kick back”

Marcus Garvey

Longing For Return

Then there is longing for Africa and hopes of return to the continent, which Fredlocks makes the centrepiece of his song Black Star Liner. Fredlocks references National Hero the Rt Excellent Marcus Garvey and his plan to have a shipping line to return persons from the diaspora to Africa, capturing the excitement of seeing the ships sailing into harbour:

“Seven miles of Black Star Liners coming in the harbour

I can see them coming

I can see idrens running

I can hear the elders saying

These are the days for which we’ve been praying”

The hero gets direct mention as Fredlocks sings:

“Marcus Garvey told us

Freedom is a must

He told us the Black Star Liners

Are coming one day for us”

There is no shortage of songs that refer to specific African countries, overwhelmingly about South Africa in the apartheid period and Ethiopia as the country of Haile Selassie. Jah Bouks’ Angola, in which he sings “call Angola”, is one of the songs made in the post-apartheid era that refers to a particular African country. In Sudan, Buju Banton expounds on the then crisis in that country:

“Woe be unto the United Nations

They’re nothing but a front

Claim they’ve been observing so long

Many moons and months

Why you never see the suffering nation…”

Buju Banton

He encourages resilience, in “going through our struggle/Like how you help those fight to that armed struggle/Help Sudan not for personal benefit/Help Sudan even though she’s not rich.”

Morgan Heritage

Morgan Heritage gets even more specific, referring to a celebration in Meskel Square, which refers to part of the Ethiopian city Addis Ababa. It is a spiritual gathering as the family band sings:

“In Meskel Square there is a gathering

Celebrating the finding of the true cross

Year to year in honor of the savior”

Dennis Brown

There is reverence for the continent in Promised Land (Dennis Brown) and a re-imagining of specific African countries in Land of Promise (Nas/Damian Marley) the naming of royalty (Mutabaruka figures in both Great Kings of Africa and Great Queens of Africa) and the use of Amharic in Satta Massa Gana (The Abyssinians).

The Abyssinians