INTERVIEW : SLY & ROBBIE
Pictures by : DR
on Friday, December 07th 2012 - 12 675 views
Between them, they are behind several revolutions in Jamaican music. Sly Dunbar (drums) and Robbie Shakespeare (bass) have not parted for more than 35 years. For Reggaefrance, the "Riddim Twins" agreed to take part in a participative interview: we put your questions to them.
Many of them were devoted to Serge Gainsbourg and to their exceptional career. Workaholics, the best rhythm section in Jamaica is always on a project. Having just finished Khalifa's new album, due in early 2013, they are currently producing the album of Guillaume "Stepper" Briard, the French saxophonist of the Taxi Gang. When we hand over the questions, Sly & Robbie are smiling. Here we publish their answers.
Reggaefrance / What does it mean to you to play with Ernest Ranglin, a true reggae legend? (Pauline, Paris)
Sly & Robbie / Robbie Shakespeare: When Guillaume Bougard suggested it to us a year and a half ago, we really liked the idea, because we've known and worked with Ernie for decades. But we'd never had the chance to perform on stage with him. Guillaume had pitched Japanese promoters the concept of bringing together a quartet blending jazz over a Jamaican drum and bass foundation. The week of concerts in Tokyo was sold out. People loved it: a jazz pianist, Ernest with his guitar sounding like George Benson, and Sly and me bringing it back towards a reggae sound... We wanted to present this show in Europe, but Monty Alexander fell ill and couldn't join us. We replaced him with Tyrone Downie last summer, and finally Robbie Lyn. Ernest Ranglin has his rightful place in the history of Jamaican music. It's fun to play with him, he moves like a 20-year-old, we have a blast and above all we don't take ourselves too seriously. We're musicians who are lucky enough to make a more or less decent living from our art, and we're happy to be back together.
What memories do you have of your collaboration with Serge Gainsbourg? Do you have an anecdote about it? (Samuel, Caen)
Robbie Shakespeare: Serge turned up with a suitcase full of cigarettes. He used to say: "You see, women can let you down, but cigarettes never will". At the time he was with Jane Birkin and their relationship had its ups and downs, seen? Musically, we were young back then, we didn't know this guy, he turned up with his hands in his pockets, with no songs... We said to ourselves that the man worked like a Jamaican! His entourage was a bit annoying, but he was nice. We got properly fleeced on the royalties and so on, because we produced everything, the music, the arrangements, the melodies... and we got 25 or 50 dollars per song, then nothing more. When I found out he'd gone gold, I asked him to send one for Sly and one for me. We never received anything. Afterwards, he sent us a Polaroid of the gold disc in the post (laughs). But when we came to Paris, he was nice, he'd take us out to restaurants... Frogs' legs (laughs)!
Sly Dunbar: He introduced me to Repetto shoes, great for playing drums!
With Gainsbourg, who came up with the melodies? ('Puc Rugby')
Robbie Shakespeare: It was us. He wrote his songs and we did the rest. Apart from his albums with us, we haven't seen Gainsbourg do reggae, have we? When you see the credits saying it was produced by who-knows-who, it's good for a laugh... But when people show me how badly we got ripped off when we were young, I say: "You pay to learn..."
 On est bordéliques, on perd les numéros des Puff Daddy et autres méga stars. 
Would you be ready to work with a French artist again to make an album, if the project seemed interesting to you? (Frédéric, Colmar)
Robbie Shakespeare: We've just finished producing "(G)Riot 13", Khalifa's album. It's a project I took really to heart. He came to Kingston with Guillaume, and we recorded some thirty riddims for him, for the songs and song ideas he had brought. When he finished his vocals, I took it all up again, I redid lots of parts, added guitars myself, asked Darryl Thompson of the Taxi Gang to come down from Atlanta, where he lives, to do lead guitar parts that only Americans know how to do. Then I asked Lenky to do some things I had in mind. I could have done them myself, but with Lenky it goes faster. And he has great ideas too. I mixed the album with Guillaume and Godwin Logie. So there you go, I really did the job I used to do with Peter Tosh or Black Uhuru, from A to Z. Because I love Khalifa. We took him to Morocco three years ago and he tore the place up. He has a great voice and killer lyrics. He sings in French and there, I don't know what he's saying... But when he sings in English, it's bad! Last week he went to the Palestinian camps to run workshops with the local youngsters, and I say respect to this guy, because he talks, but above all, he acts. Not like the clowns who shout "Rastafari" or "Fyah Bun Dem" or "Down with apartheid" and don't do a damn thing. This guy has some Peter Tosh in him, in his own way. He's a good youth. Have you seen his video shot in Palestine, with the kids, on our riddim? Rasclaat, I told him, no problem, man, it's bad. I told him to go back to Israel and shoot a second video with Israeli children this time, so that he can't be claimed by either side. We need more guys like him.
Did you know Bob Marley? Why didn't you work with him? ('Andrew')
Robbie Shakespeare: Yes, we saw him often. Bob had me play the bass on Concrete Jungle and Stir it up on "Catch a Fire", and then he had Sly play on Punky Reggae Party.
Sly Dunbar: We did sessions at the Black Ark. Lee Perry wanted me to play a one drop, and Bob said: "No, do your thing, Sly". So I played something militant and really ruff. I don't know what Scratch did with it. There was Punky Reggae Party and another cut, I think. Anyway, it's cool. Jamaican music was varied enough that Bob didn't need Sly & Robbie, you know what I mean? There were so many great musicians at the time. Afterwards, Bob came to see us to do things together, but we weren't that keen. Then he went off on tour and never came back. Anyway, we wanted to develop our own thing, the Taxi sound, to produce different artists every day, not to be exclusively with Bob.
Robbie Shakespeare: And besides, I can hardly see myself taking Familyman's place. He's the one who mentored me at the start, so you don't touch Familyman. I don't know if you've noticed, but everyone who worked with Bob came out of it... let's say not unscathed, or worse, they died! They're all at war, split up, bitter or whatever, seen? We're alive, in good health and we have our own thing, our sound, our story. In the end, maybe it's better that way, don't you think?
When can we expect a return to a roots album in the vein of "Sly, Wicked & Slick" and far from the offering of an album like "Language Barrier"? ('Life Comes')
Robbie Shakespeare: Both of those albums represent us equally. Just because we're Jamaican doesn't mean we have to make only reggae music. "SWS" dates from '78, almost 35 years ago. "Language Barrier" was a long time ago too. We record things every day, even now. The other day, we did funk and hip hop riddims with Guillaume, then the next day we did roots riddims with him. He knows our history and he knows there's no little box in which you put Sly & Robbie and that's that. Since he likes African music, funk and so on as well as reggae, we try to experiment with him. It's cool. Every time I come up with a new bassline, he puts on his serious, bothered look and says to me: "Robbie...". So I laugh, and I come up with another line. The other day, we did about fifteen pretty rocksteady and one drop things, but with Tarrus Riley's guitarist and keyboard player, to give young musicians who aren't used to recording live in the studio a chance. It was nice. But we'll never make an album like "SWS" again because it's no longer possible: the mixing desks are different, the microphones, the tape machines... And even if we had the technical means to do it, we wouldn't, because we want to move forward into uncharted territory, you see? Imagine if we did like some other artists who've been putting out the same album for 30 years (laughs). No star! We want to do fresh things.
Sly Dunbar: Bitty McLean's next record will be pretty roots, anyway, we played everything live. Otherwise, at the moment, I'm looking for new sounds. When we did "Anthem" (which earned them a Grammy in 1985, editor's note), the sound of the album was completely new because I had just bought the new model of Simmons drums. Now I'm looking at the new MPC. It's going to be killer! I've set up a kit at Anchor and we're making classic reggae riddims. We're going to send them to Khalifa and Bitty, and we've just made some for Tarrus Riley too. Guillaume sent me a CD of percussion from Morocco and another of Chinese flutes... The other day in Dublin, I came across some bagpipes. It makes you want to cook up a new sauce with sounds from all over the world, but that sounds Jamaican. I remember making a beat with Brazilian percussion during a tour of Brazil. It reminds me I have to find that beat on my hard drives... You see, we're lucky to be able to travel easily these days, so I take advantage of it to listen to the local stuff, or ask my friends to bring back things they hear. I sort through it afterwards. Every day, I make beats on my machine. From 6 in the morning until 11 at night, I punch beats. You never know, one of them might be a killer. So I never stop!
What do you think of Snoop Dogg aka Snoop Lion coming into reggae? Would you be ready for a collaboration? ('Life Comes')
Robbie Shakespeare: He sampled Ken Boothe's Artibella for his single. It's the trend to take things from the 60s. Studio One, Treasure Isle, and so on... Bitty McLean made an album like that... I hope the rest of the album will be original compositions. With Sly, we've done quite a few covers of Studio One riddims, but I don't really like samples. Sly loves them, you should see him with Bitty when they're in the studio, they look like two kids looking for which sample they could use... Me, I prefer making fresh, new riddims. That's why on the next Bitty album, I don't want any samples.
Sly Dunbar: Snoop is a great rapper, and we're here, we're ready. We've recently made beats for Wyclef Jean and Busta Rhymes and Michael Franti, so we have an idea of what could work for Snoop. Reggae or hip hop, we've got things for him.
Robbie Shakespeare: One interesting thing is that he called on an American producer to make his album, and not a Jamaican... That means Jamaican producers have to wake up and take back the leadership. We let ourselves slide into rubbish and cheap hype. Whereas we should be careful to make ourselves available to international artists. Soon, if this carries on, you'll have Jamaican artists going to China to have their riddims and albums made.
When you've recorded so many tracks with so many artists over the years, do you still dream of new collaborations? If so, with whom? ('Truth')
Robbie Shakespeare: We were supposed to work with Michael Jackson but it never happened. It's a shame because he loved our vibe, and we were fans like everyone else. But honestly, we don't have a plan to conquer the music planet, if you see what I mean (laughs). We're disorganised, we lose the numbers of the Puff Daddys and other megastars, we're bad at that side of things, the music business. With Guillaume, we manage to have a bit of coherence every now and then, but he pulls his hair out. I've been trying for ages to track down my friend Keith Richards because we'd like to make an album with him, the kind of thing knocked out in one night, and then tour with him. Except that right now he's tied up with another band, what are they called again? Ah yes, the Rolling Stones (laughs)... We played for them in the mid-80s, very cool.
What is left for you to achieve? (Thomas)
Robbie Shakespeare: Every day, we're happy to be living our lives. Who would have said 50 years ago, when we were kids, that we'd be at the Concorde Lafayette in Paris today doing interviews? It's wonderful and we're blessed. Me, I'd be very happy to play with Bob Dylan again, a great guy. But otherwise, we don't care whether the singer is an international star or not. We've always wanted to produce young unknown artists who come from the worst ghettos, and we're still doing it. We cut a track with Johnny Builda the other day with our friend the producer Bravo. We spent as much time on it as if it were a cut by Sinead O'Connor, for example. You never know, it could be a killer. When we took care of Beenie Man, who would have predicted he'd become a star? And even Chaka Demus & Pliers, when we made Murder She Wrote for them, it was just like that, with nothing behind it. And the thing sold millions of albums. We didn't believe in it... So you see, there are plenty of things left to achieve, especially as we have no plan of attack. We do things, we have a blast in the studio and we tour from time to time.
Don't you feel you know each other too well after all this time? Do you feel like working independently on projects? (Bastien, Beauvais)
Robbie Shakespeare: We know each other well, but we're not at all alike in life. We respect each other's private side.
Sly Dunbar: We've already worked on projects without each other, but it's with Robbie that I find the best ideas. He's fresh, and every time I hear him play bass, I say to myself: "Bombo claat, this youngster delivers!"
Robbie Shakespeare: Same for me. I played quite a lot with Santa (Carlton Santa Davis, editor's note) in the days of the Aggrovators, a bit with Carly (Carlton Barrett, editor's note). But with Sly, it's as if I become even better. In fact, 1 + 1 makes 3 when we're together: there's Sly, Robbie and Sly & Robbie, seen?
Right now, who do you consider good representatives of reggae? (Eric, Bourg-la-Reine)
Robbie Shakespeare: In Jamaica, there's Bitty McLean, Tarrus Riley, U Roy... DJs are a purely Jamaican thing, but they've gone daft. I love Ninjaman because his lyrics are funny, and sharp. And then there's my great friend Shaggy, who's a really top artist. He's capable of doing hyper-commercial stuff that isn't vulgar or cheap, and also of doing roots. We're producing an album for him right now, as it happens. Otherwise, there are plenty of others... They just need to stop putting autotune everywhere and get real musicians to produce them, because right now it's often cheap... They also need to focus on the music, instead of focusing on their "brand". Because if they want their "brand" to be at the top, that comes through killer cuts internationally. Far too often, the guys talk about things the rest of the planet couldn't care less about. You have to be careful about the lyrics, about the attitude, but know how to stay yardie.
How do you see reggae evolving? (Alex, St-Malo)
Robbie Shakespeare: We'll see, it's hard to predict. There's a search for new ideas at the moment, that's clear. When you look to the future, you often don't see much. It's rather by turning to the past that you're able to read trends, after the fact... The market for paid music would still have to pick up again to feed the industry, otherwise it'll be poor. Without money, it's hard to achieve your ambitions. In the days of Bunny Lee and Channel One, or at the start of Taxi, you put out a single, and you sold 10 or 20,000 copies, which was enough to keep a small system going. Now, it's a total void.
Do you smoke ganja? What do you think of the legalisation of cannabis in the USA? (Stéphanie)
Sly Dunbar: I tried it once during a Peter Tosh tour, and never again! I wasn't in control of anything and I told myself: "If you want to get where you're aiming, you can't afford the slightest weakness."
Robbie Shakespeare: I stopped a very long time ago because in the long run it makes you stupid. You see, smokers are always slower, you have to repeat things to them 107 times. They catch on less quickly, and make less effort to come up with new ideas. Weed these days is incredibly strong, it destroys brain cells. You see young people at gigs, it's pathetic watching them get in such a state. But well, that's their business. So if you want to smoke, be my guest, no problem for me, but take Robbie Shakespeare's advice: don't turn up stoned to a session, you'll be less good.
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