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Third World

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People Productions presents Third World in concert at the Garberville Theatre on Friday, Dec. 3. Doors at 8:30 p.m. DJ Selecta Prime and High Grade Sounds open the show.

A Conversation with Cat Coore of Third World

In 1973, around the time America was discovering reggae via Jimmy Cliff’s movie The Harder They Come and The Wailers’ first major label album, Catch a Fire, Stephen “Cat” Coore jumped ship from the Kingston band Inner Circle to form a new group, Third World, fusing Jamaica’s reggae beat with shades of soul, R&B, even classical music (in addition to guitar, Cat plays cello). Within a year Third World was opening at a major Jackson Five show in Kingston; by 1975 they’d headed for Europe and signed to Island Records —  same label as The Wailers — and landed a gig as opening act for that band’s European tour.

That was just the beginning for the self-described “Reggae Ambassadors.” Thirty-five years later they’re still traveling the world spreading the reggae vibe. They just released a new album, Patriots with an all-star collection of guests, among them a couple of Marleys, Toots Hibbert and dancehall star Capleton (whose recent show in Eureka stirred some fiery controversy).

When Cat Coore called from Treasure Beach on the south coast of Jamaica last Sunday he was doing a bit of personal ambassador work. Now a Florida resident, he hadn’t come home to JA on reggae business, rather for a wedding. He’d spent the morning showing some friends around the island, “a little tourism work” as he put it.

Journal: How is the reggae business going?

Cat: Business is pretty good. We’ve been busy. We’re getting back from a big festival down in the French Islands in Guadalupe and we’re about to come out your way, then on to New Zealand. We have this new album coming out, Patriots, which features quite a few artists: Stephen and Damian Marley, Gregory Isaacs, Marcia Griffiths, Taurus Riley, Mykal Rose, Junior Reed, Dean Frazier, quite few people you know.

And Capleton…

Capleton, yes.

He played here last night. There was a protest — some people tried to stop the show.

Because of the same anti-gay business?

Yes.

I hear you. Where was the show held?

At a club called the Red Fox in Eureka.

Does the”anti-gay” controversy have any affect on Third World?

No, it doesn’t affect us. Lyrically we’re not into that kind of stuff so it really wouldn’t affect us.

When you were deciding who would guest on your album, did that come into play? Capleton is an artist who is basically on a blacklist.

I’m not sure about how much Capleton is implicated in that whole thing — he has been one of the far less implicated artists. And Capleton has been a good soldier and a good friend to us for many years; we’ve toured with him and all that. To be quite honest with you, Capleton is one of the easiest people to work with to get a project done and so forth. I understand the situation, but in his case, we, Third World, couldn’t black list him because of what’s happening there. We have to look at all sides of the coin and, although we don’t agree with gay-bashing or anti-gay sentiments, we have to be careful how we do things. We don’t want to be too much one way or the opposite. We took our chance; we made our decision and I think it’s a good one. All of the artists we have on our album are artists who are on the conscious side. We don’t have too many from dancehall. We see Marcia Griffiths, Gregory and Toots and all of them as “patriots” because they’ve been playing the music for many, many years. They are patriots and we are patriots.

I understand they have some new laws in Jamaica about the lyrical content, banning particular types of songs, those advocating violence of one sort or another. Again, I don’t imagine it affects you guys.

The thing about it is this: the business with the gay community is one thing, but we’ve also had a lot of lyrics about guns and violence. I think there’s a concentrated effort by the people in charge of concerts in Jamaica now to try and curb that kind of stuff. There’s a lot of sentiment down here that believes that a lot of the gun business is influencing the youth into moving in that kind of direction. We really can’t do that any more. Jamaica has become far too violent of a place. We have far too high a murder rate. We just don’t need any more encouragement of that kind of thing, you know. 

Do you think government intervention like that can steer dancehall in a more positive direction?

Yes, I think it can. I think dancehall artists were very surprised when they started losing their visas and started being unable to tour outside Jamaica, having tours taken away from them and so on. It made a big difference to them. So, my feeling is yes, it will make a difference. Hopefully over a period of time we’ll see a change.

You’re the Ambassadors. I guess you have to be reggae diplomats.

We try. You know we come from an era with Steel Pulse and Chalice, Bob Marley and The Wailers. Our era was really based on a Rastafarian kind of projection. We started fighting a war of words to move towards peace and harmony throughout the world, anti-racism and stuff like that. We don’t want to be disingenuous to our past; we want to keep on saying what we’ve always been saying. In terms of people and their ways, the world hasn’t changed that much since the ‘70s when we were a very young group. New technologies have come and gone, but people still have their bad ways and people still have their good ways. It’s really a matter of sticking to who you are, what you are, and being good.

I read something recently from a Jamaican psychologist, he was talking about a shift in the world of Rasta from the ‘70s-era peace and love philosophy to a lot of ‘fire pon’ this and that, condemnation of those whose life styles don’t live up to some Rasta standard. There’s a lot of ‘You’re going to bun in hell’ coming from certain artists.

Yes, I hear you. There has been quite a bit of that. The thing you have to understand is when you’re a Rastafarian, you’re actually a follower of Haile Selassie. And if you’re a follower of Haile Selassie, you’re basically a Christian. You have to identify your own reality.

Do you consider yourself a Rastafarian?

Yes, because I’m a follower of Haile Selassie and I’m a Christian. Therefore I tend to the message of Rastafari. Some others out there consider themselves Bobo Dreads or come from some other Rastafarian order. All of us have to give them their praise and their thanks for being of whatever order they choose. But my thing is, I’m a follower of Haile Selassie, who is the head of the Christian church in Ethiopia, therefore, essentially what I’m dealing with is Christianity. And in following the Bible, there are so many ways that a man can establish his own reality. So it’s very difficult to say, ‘Fire pon this and fire pon that.’ Then again, at the same time I don’t stop anyone from saying what they want to say. Every man is free to say what he wants. In Jamaica we have a saying that says, ‘Mouths mek to say anything and ears mek to say anything.’

Could you repeat that?

‘The mouth is made to say anything and ears are made to hear anything.’ So, how you process your life through those truths is very important. I want to make it very clear, I don’t have anything against the denominations of Rastafari who want to say fire pon this or fire pon that. That’s they’re way, what they want to do, but essentially Rastafarians are Christians and they’re peaceful. They’re not a condemnation group.

Are you yourself aligned with a particular Rasta order?

Yes, I’m baptized in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, but you know with all the orders, it’s all about mankind; it’s all about love. And the work we do and the songs we sing through the ages, what we do is all about love. That’s my reality right now. I give thanks and praise to the most high everyday of my life for being able to be here right now in Jamaica looking out on the beautiful ocean, and for being able to play music — that’s how I get my message out to people throughout the world. I want to give thanks; I don’t want to tear down.

That may be the answer to the question: ‘Now that we’ve found love what are we going to do with it?’

That’s exactly the question. We’re going to spread it all over the land.

Back in the day when you started out, you took reggae music, which is very Jamaican, and added elements of American soul. Was part of the idea to make it easier for Americans to understand your music?

You know Jamaican music is very American. That’s the obvious answer. Remember all the artists, like Bob, all the great original artists were influenced by R&B. Curtis Mayfield had a big influence, Fats Domino had a big influence, there’s so many people. If you went to any old session in Jamaica they’d play R&B music from the ‘60s. You’d be surprised to know how many of these the Jamaican artists covered. A lot of songs people hear Jamaican artists sing and think hey wrote them, they didn’t write hem, they were R&B songs that were done over. Take an Alton Ellis song, Dennis Brown songs, so many songs were rhythm and blues songs, some of them obscure, some hits through the Caribbean. Our artists did them over. So there’s no such thing as pure Jamaican music, it’s African music transcended and blended to create our own style called reggae music. And that became a force of music, but the influences came from ska, from jazz, from R&B, from Africa, from Pocomania drumming. One of the great indigenous things about Jamaican music is the Rasta drummer. The beat the Rastafari plays is very unique. People can’t trace it back to any R&B style; they can’t trace it back to mento style, it’s unique. So there are some elements in reggae that are straight out of Jamaica, but you have to look at the influences from all over. You have to remember that Third World members grew up with Santana, we grew up with Hendrix, Sly and the Family Stone, Earth Wind and Fire, the Ohio Players. You know all that music was super popular when I was a kid growing up so the influences are there. It’s useless to ignore all the influences coming to you, you know?

As I understand it, you have this new album out, *Patriots*, but it’s only available online. Is that the new business model you’re looking at?

It’s online only for now, but early next year it will be out in a hard copy.

And you started your own label, Jarcat…

Yes. It’s a digital record label down here. I’m trying this because the concept of the way records are sold now has changed and Jamaican artist haven’t caught up with it properly yet. We’re in an experimental stage trying to see how it can work. We know certain artists in America and Europe particularly have made it work. We’re trying our best to see how we can make it happen with digital downloads. We know downloads are changing the music world and we are putting our best foot forward to see if we can make sure things go right.

I know a lot of musicians now don’t expect to make money selling CDs. They look at the CD more as a way to get their music out to get people to come to their concerts.

Right. That’s basically what it is. What’s happening right now is there’s a great deal of attention on performance — the live thing is important again, which is great. There’s so much music available online and so many videos, but seeing a band live really makes a difference in the sound.

I’m sure Humboldt County is ready to hear Third World live again.

We’re looking forward to coming. We always love being there. We’ll see you soon.

Advance tickets for the Garberville Theatre show are $35. They can be found at Redway Liquors, at Blue Moon in Garberville, at The Works or online at www.peopleproductions.net. A portion of the proceeds go to the Feet First dance troupe. *

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