ABSTRACT
Reggae artists enjoyed a smattering of popularity outside of Jamaica throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, but it was not until 1972 and the release of the film The Harder They Come and its accompanying soundtrack that the music seemed primed to cross over into the American market. Reggae sounds have been drifting into the US off and on for several years, and the music is well-known in Britain with its large West Indian communities. In its purely musical form, reggae is an outgrowth of ska, a Jamaican style popular in the early ’60s. For years before that, Jamaicans had fed on American R&B records; when the rock-and-roll boom slowed R&B exports, Jamaicans began going it alone. The Jamaican Prime Minister, Michael Manley, is said to prefer European classical music to reggae, but his advice is sound enough. Jamaican kids tap distinctive reggae rhythms when they idly and unconsciously hit a stick against a rock in play.
