Near Perfect Albums: Funky Kingston -- Toots & The Maytals

Reggae has been winnowed down to a one man genre. There is no question that Sir Nesta Robert Marley took reggae to every guy-who-sold-weed-in-college's dorm and tacky beach town t-shirt kiosk, but as is often the case, when a multifaceted musical tradition that covers half of a century is placed on one man, the titans on which a genres shoulders stand, are forgotten.

It's sort of confounds the extent to which reggae gets devalued. I blame the 80's (a decade that murdered balls out guitar solos, the saxophone, and authentic sleaze-bag rockstars), because awful production and a charisma vacuum swarmed on the Jamaican music genre following a decade that was the fully realized apex of a golden age. Bob was dead, rich organ tones were traded in for cheap Casio winces, and percussion, the secret...or not-so-secret soul of reggae, went from crisp rim taps and fat down beats to those weird hexagonal synth drums that sound one dimensional no matter how much echo effect is glossed on top. After that, reggae became a caricature of itself. It was all drinks with umbrellas, red-yellow-green hats with dreads stitched in them, and cone sized joints. One of the most important genres ever, reduced to a gift shop curio.

There are few international genres that have such easily recognizable character as the four subsets of Jamaican music, and it's not possible to overstate the importance of the Islands contribution, but if not for the musical perspicacity of an island smaller than Connecticut, we probably wouldn't have remixes, cover songs, punk rock, and rap music, at least not as we know them.

History:
Toots and his Maytals, a backing band that I would put up against Booker T and the MGs, The Funk Brothers, and The Spiders from Mars any day, laid down Funky Kingston in 1972 for Mango records. There's a whiff of confusion around this particular album because there are two separate pressings in circulation. One was released in Jamaica and England in 1972, and a second from 1976 that was released in the US with more tracks added and a different track order. The additional tracks were harvested from the follow up album to Funky Kingston called In the Dark, but I like the flow and construction of the original 8 songs intended for Funky Kingston. People seem to think that "In the Dark" is the better record, but people also think that the movie The Graduate is 'brilliant', so yeah, decide for yourself. But all of those words later, it's a totally moot point. If you buy this album now, in a lazy but enjoyable compromise, it's sold as a 21 song album titled Funky Kingston/In the Dark that features the original 8 and 12 song track orders respectively plus the addition of the always critical "Pressure Drop". Which, quick aside here, if your life is about to collapse in on you and you refuse to abide by those circumstances; blast this track, sing as loud as you can, and dance with out compunction. Feeling bad will never feel so good.

Sound:
This is a vintage roots reggae blueprint. It's an inelegant and simple formula: one drop rhythm, staccato punches on guitar, warm brass flourishes, organ honeyed tones to shade the edges, and Toots' wild snarl punctuated with the Maytals crystalline call-and-response harmonies. Within that frame, this album crosses moods from ebullient, to militant, to solemnity without conceding an inch of the danceable charm that is the blood and bones of reggae music. The ragged edges of these gritty sessions show, but the pure soulful will still blossoms around the indomitable grooves. Equal parts soundtrack to the revolution and dance party tableau, Funky Kingston sticks to your ribs like a good plate of food.


Signature Track:

Funky Kingston -- The title track for a reason, one of the best reggae tracks ever written, and a tune that rests comfortably in my top tier of all time songs. The structure is flawless. A snare crack like the cadence of a battle march and a militant piano line form the bristling nucleus of this song. Toots howls and snarls as the music churns around him. This is Toots war cry. The war for music, the war for his purpose, the war for himself, the war for his beloved home. The lyrics play like instructions for a primordial dance, but the appeal to 'shake it, shake it, baby' aches with a sense of urgency. Toots has torn his angry heart from his chest, begging to give it away, because to not do so would be his death, he would defy his purpose and his gift, but that thing, once cut out of him can never be replaced. Toot's calls for the funky guitar, grunts possessed by the sound, cues the piano, chokes out half-syllables, a dense crescendo rises, and erupts over a hard scrabble growl. This song may be Toots transcendent effort from his musical peak, but that notwithstanding, this track is one of those moments where a movement, a time, and a sound are distilled down to their purest essence.

The Space Between the Notes:

Pomp and Pride -- Toots is grossly underrated as a songwriter. Reggae is charged and political and socially relevant, but where others press the urgency of immediate issues, Toots seems to espouse a wider view of the whole self. Not just the struggle of the man that's hungry in the streets, but the importance of the man who is hungry in his soul. In that regard, this is one of those refrains that I always keep in my heart shaped locket.

Everybody's just crying crying
sighing sighing
dying to see the light
and when they see it, they see it's not bright
can this be right?
Everybody just
calm down (calm down)
Off your pomps and pride

The measure of enlightenment can be the size of a whisper, and sometimes it might be easier to miss than it is hard to find.


That One Moment:

Redemption Song --Why do we love music? For moments like the one between the 1:27 and 1:38 mark. Words aren't gonna get us there, and listening to it out of context won't do it either, you should just treat yourself to a listen. Because it really is the words that God speaketh from his mouth that hurt our hearts... (And easy there, outlaw. Everyone knows you own a copy of Legend, but this song was record eight years before Bob laid down his mega classic that has towered over three decades of smelly-white-kid-sing-a-longs)

Subcutanea:

Louie, Louie/I Can't Believe -- As influential as reggae is, it is very much beholden to America's black music culture. In that tradition, reggae is home to some of the most inventive and colorful 60's rhythm and blues covers in existence, and Funky Kingston features two nut-cutters. "Louie, Louie" is a 5 minute 46 second dance party built around a skin tight session style jam where the Maytals really get to flex their muscles. If you have a sense of this sort of thing, the next time your dance party is almost at a rolling boil, and hips and thighs are about to careen into each other like waves into tidal walls, turn off the A/C, turn up this jam, and watch the sweaty grind fest unfold. Also, bonus points for the solo at the 5 minute mark that sounds like it was recorded underwater...in outer-space. "I Can't Believe" is one of those catchy 'don't think about how sad and painfully autobiographical it really is' Ike and Tina songs. Toot's offers a pretty faithful rendition, and though it's undisputed fact that Ike Turner is a piece of shit, he can write some damn catchy songs. Need a playful rendering of that halfway in, halfway out summertime fun relationship? Toots has got you covered. 

Simple. Pure. 35 minutes of unfettered, sun dappled sincerity. This album was perhaps one changed note or rephrased line away from sublimation, too good for us to have, but instead it's just flawed enough to be profound, and that's what is so special about a near perfect album.