INTERVIEW
Interview by : Benoit Georges
Pictures by : Karl Joseph
on Friday, January 09th 2004 - 15 356 views
Iqualah is an atypical figure on the Jamaican music scene. He himself does not claim to be part of it. Before the interview he explains to me that he never wanted to make a business of his music and never sought honours: " I will never leave my farm, because my farm gave me everything. If I was able to get the money to make records, it's thanks to the farm. My mission is to open doors to showcase the Rasta way of life. My mission is not to be famous or to seek popularity through music but to teach people the universal foundations. And that is what we are still doing today.".
He tells how, after turning down many offers for nearly 20 years, he let himself be convinced by his friends and by the French women of Kaya Production. So here he is in Paris to finalise the release of his 5th self-produced album " Rasta 4 ever ", also announcing his appearance at the next Jamaican Sunrise in Bagnols. A convinced Rasta, Iqulah has always sought to put his faith into practice, to act on his ideas. It is therefore with wisdom and humility that he draws the lessons of a life already well filled. To make for easier reading, some passages have been reworked, quoting Iqulah's words. The audio interview, for its part, has hardly been edited. Words, sound and power.
Reggaefrance / Could you introduce yourself to the French public, as it seems they don't know you well?
Iqulah / "Yes, I am Iqulah, Iqulah Rastafari. It's an abbreviation: the I is for Integrity, the Q for quality, the U for Unity, the L for love, the A for Africa and the H for Home. Rastafari!"
Where did you grow up in Jamaica?
"I grew up in St Ann, Jamaica. St Ann is considered the first capital of the new world. St Ann's Bay, where I live and where I grew up, is the place where the slave ships arrived, it's also the place where Christopher Columbus landed, but it is also the birthplace and the place where the Honourable Marcus Mosiah Garvey grew up. So it is a parish of particular importance and it is called 'the garden parish'."
When I ask him how he became a Rasta, Iqulah recalls the day in 1966 when, still a child, he saw the Emperor of Ethiopia Haile Selassie (Ras Tafari), then visiting Jamaica, at Montpellier station. He recounts that mystical moment when he was able to "behold the King of Kings":
"When I arrived at the station where His Majesty was due to arrive, the train was pulling in. They had laid a red carpet on the ground. And when the train door opened, I saw the left foot come out and I realised that this left foot had not touched the red carpet. And I saw this little man, barely 5 feet tall (a little over 1.50 m), standing there. Then there was a gust of wind, the signs in the station began to move. The policemen's hats flew off, the dust rose. The police knew what was happening because all the Rastas were trying to jump the barriers to get to the King. The police threatened them with their weapons, hit them to stop them. Then His Majesty simply raised his right hand and everyone calmed down."
Deeply affected by this experience, he began a long spiritual quest that continues to this day. In 1968, he started growing his dreadlocks, much to his mother's dismay. He was expelled from school, which at that time was still steeped in colonialist teaching. He nevertheless finished his studies at the "Marcus Garvey Technical High School":
"After two years, I decided that this place was not for me. I wanted to leave and learn at 'greenfield university', which is what we call life in the mountains. I realised that Babylon's teachings were not made for me, it was always the same colonialist teachings that they tried to instil in me. I said to myself OK, I want to go to 'greenfield university' to live off nature, to be closer to nature, closer to the Creator, so that I can learn from nature.
That is why I found myself farming the land. My brother also left school and came to join me, we began to make a field for ourselves and to work, planting papayas, yellow yams, sweet potatoes... everything that Rastas eat."
Other young people joined them, and for 7 years the little community lived off its crops without money, by bartering. They were the first Rasta community to grow organic rice, which they swapped with other communities.
The farm's output soon made it possible to sell vegetables and fruit. The community built up capital and bought a small truck to deliver food all over the place.
A little anecdote for football fans: during this period Iqulah and his friends, all excellent footballers, set up a team they called Wadada. They decided to challenge every Jamaican team and every visiting team to prove the superiority of the Rasta way of life. The result: the amateurs, among whom Bob Marley sometimes figured, inflicted heavy defeats on the pros, notably a memorable 3-1 against Zico's Brazilian national side. As Iqulah played the kette drum (a small solo drum) and sang before the matches, he was advised to take up music:
"There was always someone knocking at my door to get me to make music. Augustus Pablo once said to me 'Iqulah, you've got a vibe, you should do something in music' and I would answer 'cool man, when Jah permits, no problem...'"
Builder, a former classmate and the team's coach, managed to persuade Iqulah to write songs. He wrote two songs, which were self-produced thanks to the farm. They then decided to make an album and devoted a year to farming in order to buy instruments and rehearse the songs. They hired the Groove studios and recorded "Rasta Philosophy" in 1988 with guest appearances from Judy Mowatt, Marcia Griffiths and Ras Donovan. Again with money from the farm, they decided to head for Europe to make their music and message known. Two records recorded live in Switzerland bear witness to this journey.
"We decided to go to Europe. (...) We formed a band with 14 of us. We bought our tickets, we didn't know anyone in Europe! (...) and we decided to take a positive first step and we landed in Geneva in Switzerland. (...) We were lent a house in the mountains, some of the musicians were seeing snow for the first time! (...) While we were in Switzerland we were invited to come to the university to take part in a class. The young people gathered around us, so we did a kind of Rasta workshop: we taught the young people the history of Rastafari, we explained our way of life, we gave cooking classes, we played football (...) We had a really good time in Switzerland and it was Rastafari who made that possible.
We played as support to famous bands like Umoya from Germany (a roots reggae group). (...) The first big concert was in Berlin (...), at Theomensa. When we came on stage people didn't know what to expect, but when we started playing the nyabingi and everything else, the audience didn't want to see us leave the stage. (...) People were banging everywhere, making noise to say that this group had to stay: I played for three and a half hours! The headliner came over after the show and said: 'I can't accept you playing before me. I should be playing before you because people love your music.' I replied 'thank you, but it's Jah who allowed it, there was nothing planned.' (...) Then we went to Amsterdam for a concert at the Paradiso. And people were hooked. We moved all over the place with our green, yellow and red flags and we were told we were the only ones, since Bob Marley passed through, to move like that all together with the flags. On stage we had a Rasta presentation: that was our aim and our objective."
After this stint in Europe, the group returned to Jamaica to resume their farming activities and record a third self-produced album, The Mission. And it was precisely this mission that drove Iqulah to Africa:
"The first time I went to Africa, it was a great feeling, because I grew up as a Rasta hearing the elders, our seniors, talk about Africa, about repatriation, Marcus Garvey said 'Look to Africa where a king shall be crowned'. The first time I returned to Africa, when I set my right foot on its soil, I realised I had completed my cycle. I began to rise spiritually. I said to myself 'yes, I was taken from this land by force but I managed to return home (...)'. I felt a certain power.
But we also saw the political fragility, for example in Rwanda. When I was in Rwanda, I saw what they had done, I saw feet, hands, heads, cut off on the ground. It made me think, I said to myself: 'what can cause all this, (...) when the people seem peaceful, when this land is fertile and beautiful. (...) The UN peacekeepers wanted us to leave because it was dangerous and we refused because Rastafari had brought us there and we weren't going to leave just like that. So we brought brothers together, including a Rwandan Rasta, Bongo, to organise a festival (...) and bring the people together. They were tense, very tense. We brought over Bob Marley's mother, it was very warm, very powerful.
We went to Uganda, Kenya, Malawi. We were invited to Mali by the government to play at a gala. There too I brought Bob Marley's mother (...) So we were very active in Africa.
But Ethiopia was truly special. When we arrived in Ethiopia, the green, yellow and red flag with the lion had not flown since 1974, and the Ethiopian authorities kept an eye on us. But we organised a festival, which we called 'Reggae unites Africa'. When we put up the stage with the flags, the authorities didn't like it and people were tense, but we were working through divine power, so we weren't afraid. (...) There were 80,000 people! It was at Meskel Square and that's very important, because this square was built by His Majesty so that people could gather; meskel means 'return of the true cross'. So when we presented our Rasta project we brought together 80,000 people. I have it on video! (...) So you could say that Africa has been good to me."
What was the Africans' reaction on seeing you?
"A warm welcome! When I showed my passport at customs they said to me: 'Welcome home my brother, you have returned home.' Because they too know the history, that we were torn from our land against our will. But in the long run, I say it's also a good thing that we were taken from Africa, because we preserved Africa outside of Africa. Because today Africa is politically fragile. We come from very varied ethnic groups and we all live in Jamaica and you will never see ethnic rivalries. That's what being Rasta is: taking the best of the best of varied ethnic groups and raising this Rasta way of life to the highest degree. So there are no cultural or religious rivalries. (...) As I often say: 'a Rasta can be a Muslim, but a Muslim is not necessarily a Rasta, a Rasta can be a Christian, but a Christian is not necessarily a Rasta'. Rasta is above religions. It is not a religion, it is a way of life."
In 1997, after his many journeys, he returned to Jamaica with new projects: to build a memorial to the history of St Ann and to that of two emblematic figures born there: Marcus Garvey and Bob Marley. For five years, he and his brother built the Rastafari Unity Center, and he sought to bring all the Rasta chapels together around the project of the Ethiopian World Federation:
"Seven years after the King's coronation (1937), he established what he called the Ethiopian World Federation. This federation was meant to allow the black diaspora to come together. (...) A piece of Ethiopian territory was given to the Jamaican Rastas (...) This territory is a legacy of Haile Selassie, as if he had wanted to prepare a government for us. So I began to mobilise the different Rasta communities of Jamaica. (...) Because the Shashamane grant was no longer considered legitimate by the Ethiopian government. So if a Rasta wants to go to Shashamane, he can only do so through the EWF. I am in charge of the Shashamane development programme within the federation, the aim being to make it a model town (...) but not a concrete jungle, (...) a place that could be like a place of pilgrimage, a sanctuary for the Rasta movement. (...) So I want to organise a series of concerts, with the right artists, artists who are conscious and who want to get involved collectively to raise funds and start this project. That is our mission."
When I ask him which artists he is linked with in Jamaica, Iqulah first mentions Kulcha Knox and Chrisinti, whom he took to play in Africa. Many people also visit him at the Rasta centre, or in the hills of St Ann. He is, however, particularly close to the Marley family:
"Steven is a brother in my heart, the same goes for Junior Gong. We even did a project together on the CD (Rasta 4 Ever). Steve Marley has always welcomed us with open arms (...) so we recorded a bit at Tuff Gong, a bit at 56 Hope Road, the family home studio. It's a family project. (...) As for Kymani, let me tell you something (...): I was there when Kymani was born, at the hospital, I saw him even before his father. (...) He's like my son. I've always been there for them and they will always be there for me. Rastafari. Give thanks."
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