GET UP, STAND UP

GET UP; STAND UP

LINTON KWESI JOHNSON Making History (Mango)

by Richard C. Walls

Frankly, I'm getting tired of albums that aren't saying anything. It's gotten so bad that last year when Sting offered some ultra-simple lines about A-bombs and dinosaurs some critics shamelessly gushed as if the guy had re-invented relevance or something. And take the Alarm (please) —12 songs about cranking it up for the big struggle ahead but not a clue on the horizon about who's struggling against whom and why and why are we supposed to care, anyway? Even the Clash, bless 'em, though they at least attempt to deal with some specifics, have only scored big three times, twice with the dopiest of love songs, and once with one that sounds like it might be political but nobody's quite sure (Rocking The what?). Meanwhile there's Culture Club and Michael Jackson, interesting pop images, sure, but please don't tell me these guys are saying anything. Don't even pretend. What else is there? Macho posturing from the Motley right-wing, internal stuttering from Laurie Anderson, tedious self-seriousness from postpunk poseurs, and only God and some guy who writes for the Village Voice know what R.E.M. are muttering about...

O.K., so I exaggerate a little to make a point, which is that part of what makes Linton Kwesi Johnson's first album in four years so exceptional is the clarity and sharp focus of the political ideas herein. Johnson is a Jamaican-born British-based poet who sings/recites his songs in the manner of the reggae DJ toasters— and though the Jamaican patois may give some U.S. listeners a bit of trouble at first, it doesn't take long to get the hang of it. Also off-putting to cool American types may be the titles which tend to be at first glance either hieroglyphic ('Di Great Insohreckshan,' 'New Craas Massahkah') or embarrassingly to the point ('Wat About Di Working Class?'). But get past that and you'll discover, for example, that 'Working Class' is a swinging jazz piece about worker exploitation in both the Western and Soviet systems—which also, manages to touch upon how the ruling class depends heavily on the middle class blaming the lower class for all the problems of the system (and all this class stuff is especially timely in a year when the Reagan administration is making a craven appeal to the class insularity by resurrecting the cowardly question 'are you better off than you were four years ago?' The more relevant question, the one they're too chickenshit to ask, is 'who isn't better off and why?').

Other specifics on Making History include a different approach to the nuclear threat in 'Di Eagel And Di Bear,' which points out the arms race's irrelevancy to third world and all other peoples whose energies are totally taken up with day-to-day survival, 'Massahkah,' a grim but impassioned poem about the New Cross massacre, and 'Reggae Fi Dada,' a bluesy eulogy for Linton's father—unflinching, unmaudlin, but very moving all the same.

Lyrical sharpness and Johnson's often low-keyed but always rhythmically precise delivery are only half the story, the other half being the imaginative work of the accompanying Dub Band whose efforts have won over even these reggae-resistant ears. The approach mixes dub and jazz and blues and some things not so easily pinpointed, each listening revealing some new aspect as densely textured as Johnson's analyses are stripped-down and lean.

A good one, then, for those who are feeling a little impatient with the wispy lyrical content of much current popular (and semi-popular) music. Or those have been looking for a good reggae album to help them find out what that's all about. Or those believe that, Linda Ronstadt notwithstanding, not everyone can afford to be ignorant. Or all of the above.