Get Irie Mon

Johnny Too Bad – The Slickers

Off the album The Harder They Come

One of the drummers from my old band went to Emerson college and is now a radio DJ, he turned me on to reggae while he was working on an all reggae radio show in Boston a few years ago. Since he showed me this album I’d say I listen to this song (and a few others off the album) at least once a week. Johnny Too Bad is originally off the album Breakthrough by the Slickers, but is most well known for being apart of the soundtrack album for the movie The Harder They Come. The Harder They Come is known as one of the first films to became popular in the United States that was written, directed, and produced entirely by black people. It’s also the most popular movie ever produced, set and filmed in Jamaica. It stars legendary reggae artist Jimmy Cliff who produced much of the music for the film, however the soundtrack features many other extremely influential reggae artists from Jamaica including the Slickers, Toots and The Maytals, Desmond Dekker, Scotty and The Melodians. The movie and it’s equally famous soundtrack are credited for bringing reggae to the world. If listening to reggae is something you enjoy, or you’d like to experience reggae at it’s roots, listen to the album The Harder They Come, I guarantee you’ll love at least some of the tracks on it (The movie is really entertaining too, it’s on youtube).

Despite the fact that this song is apart of one of the most revolutionary reggae albums ever produced, it’s distinctly reggae because of it’s instruments, and instrumentation;

• The palm muted, chucking guitar method that keeps a steady rhythm is overwhelmingly present in reggae music from The Wailers to Peter Tosh.
• The melodic and catchy bassline, another typical for reggae music, helps keep the tempo and create a percussive movement to aid the drums.
• The drums have an emphasis on the drop beat, rather than be heavy on the snare like in Rock music, the drummer skips the first beat and uses a combo of high-hat and bass drum to keep time, with snare only during fills. This type of laid back simple drum beat is called the One Drop, and is one of the three most common reggae beats.
• The Organ, one of the best parts of this song, is common in reggae music and is often used to emphasize the drop beat, in this case it’s used to add to the melody. For more amazing reggae organ listen to this Toots and The Maytals song. – Another song I can’t get enough of.
• The vocals have a calming, sing-songey vibe to them, also very common in reggae. There’s a lot of layered background vocal to help add depth to the music and emphasize certain words and phrases (‘too bad’). Many reggae songs also have vocal parts that aren’t words but sounds that are like vocal melodies, they often repeat throughout the song, in this case it’s the ‘wo-wo-woy’ after each line of the chorus. Bob Marley often used many vocal features like this in his music.

Why does this song and genere speak to me? Reggae is one of the most fun and happy types of music a person can listen to or play, and it’s a blast to reggae jam with a bunch of musicians (particularly when someone brings some weed). I love listening to reggae when I’m sad because it makes me feel happy all the way down to my core, it makes me calm when I’m angry and it brings me down when I’m stressed. This song is a perfect example of how reggae can be complex and simple at the same time, and it’s a great example of how reggae can be a mood booster regardless of the lyrical content. (if anyone needs suggestions for great reggae ask in the comments and I’ll respond, or email me mikegrasso0@gmail.com)