INTERVIEW
Interview by : Benoit Georges
Pictures by : Karl Joseph
on Wednesday, March 17th 2004 - 25 141 views
Reggaefrance met Winston McAnuff, aka Electric Dread, during his visit to France for the release of the reissued album What a man a deal with on the French label Makasound (see review). A musician, singer and composer, Winston McAnuff has released only three albums in some twenty years, but he has toured extensively since the early 1980s, notably in France and Japan. He also announces a tour in April 2004 with the Bordeaux group Niominkabi and Linval Thompson, the release of a Niominkabi album that he produced, and a new opus in collaboration with Linval Thompson. Determined to climb back aboard the " reggae train ", Winston McAnuff looks back for Reggaefrance on the great moments of his career and on his projects.
Reggaefrance / Could you introduce yourself and give us the broad outline of your career?
Winston McAnuff / My name is Winston McAnuff, aka Electric Dread. I started singing from a very young age, in the family church, since my parents were pastors. When my father fell ill, I left for Kingston, where I auditioned for producers like Joe Gibbs and Derrick Harriott. That's how I began professional recording, writing songs for Dennis Brown, for Earl Sixteen, recording and writing for Derrick Harriott.
Where does your nickname “Electric Dread” come from?
Well, it was during one of my stage appearances: some guys who were there went to Derrick Harriott's shop the next day. They told him they had seen me on stage and that I was as lively as electricity ("moving like electric"), that they had wanted to take photos but it wasn't possible because I never stayed still for a second. So they told him: “this guy moves like electricity”, and Derrick Harriott had the idea of nicknaming me “electric dread”. That's how I got my name, from my movements on stage.
What year did you arrive in Kingston?
I left for Kingston in 1972, because my father had a stroke and my mother, on her own, couldn't cope with the 5 children. So my big sister suggested that I live with her in Kingston to ease my mother's load.
Who did you link up with in Kingston?
First, I met Earl Sixteen, at the first school I went to, and then I went to high school and there was Franklin “Bubbler” Wall. Early in the morning, before prayers, we would sing and play on the school piano, and when the headmaster arrived we would turn it into religious music (laughs). That's how we started, we went to auditions. I dragged them to the studio, to Joe Gibbs first, where we did “Malcolm X”, our first song, me and Hugh Mundell. Because he too recorded his first song that day. It's called “Natty dread is not on first street”, do you know that song? No? Well, even Joe Gibbs doesn't know he has it, even he doesn't remember that song.
You are also known as a lyricist. How did you end up writing songs for other singers?
Actually, I was very inspired when I was in high school. I wrote lots of songs, the ideas came by themselves. When I set foot in a recording studio for the first time, I must have had 30 or 40 songs written. Derrick Harriott needed material at that time. There are songs like “Roma”, “Heavenly love”, “Mr Wind Bag”. I wrote all those songs. For Earl Sixteen, I wrote “Charming” and “Dreadlocks unite”; he also had a version of “Malcolm X” and a song called “Africa is calling” which never came out.
Did you write the lyrics and the melody of “Malcolm X”?
Yes, but at that time I knew nothing about Malcolm X, I'd just heard of him. I had no knowledge of his struggle, I was young, and even someone like Dennis Brown didn't really know who Malcolm X was. But after doing the song, he went on tour and when he came back to Jamaica he told me: “Winston, I didn't know there were radical militants in the United States! It was only after playing “Malcolm X” that I saw them coming to my concerts.” It's thanks to the song “Malcolm X” that certain figures of “black muslim” radicalism started coming to his concerts, and he was astonished! He had no idea there were people like that in the United States. You could say that song was a bit like a vision, something I had a premonition of, which allowed me to write it, something I heard.
What was the first song you sang and recorded?
“Ugly days”. In fact, I composed that song for Earl Sixteen to sing, but while I was doing it with the other musicians they told me I should sing it myself, that it suited my voice. I tried one take just as a test. They told me: “that's good, that's the right version” and I said: “no, it was just a test” and they said: “no man, you won't be able to sing it like that again, that's the take!” So that was my first recording. I wrote that song around 1975, like Malcolm X, but it was only recorded in 1977.
Did you want to keep it?
No, it just happened that way. At that time producers didn't have as much money. Most of the time they waited to get paid: for Derrick Harriott it was stage rights and publishing. Then they reinvested the money in the studios, and we had to go along with it.
You produce yourself too, don't you?
Yes, I also do production. This year, I'm producing for Souleymane, a singer from Senegal who lives in Bordeaux (better known as the singer of Niominkabi)! He opened for me a long time ago, in 1982-1983. It was in Bordeaux, and nobody knew me back then. And we carried on sharing stages. We even went as far as Italy. So he came to Jamaica this year and I helped him make his album. It's original, it's a very good album. We did three tracks entirely in my studio and did the rest from riddims. Riddims by Horace Andy, Burning Spear, Johnny Clarke. A mix of good riddims, wicked riddims. Even Joe Gibbs, where we recorded one track, wanted to get him to make an album because he liked the African blend with the Jamaican roots sound. Even if we didn't understand what he was saying, it made us travel just to hear it. You feel like you're on holiday.
You released an album, "Diary of the silent years". What did you do during those silent years?
What did I do... Simply think about the right direction to take and wait for something good to come along. Sometimes you have to wait at the station and not get on the train. It's the same in life, sometimes you have to wait for the right person. But there was something else too, many of my friends died. My close friend Jacob Miller died, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh. I wondered what was going on in Jamaica. It looked like plots to eliminate certain people: Hugh Mundell for example. And for that reason I chose to keep a low profile until it blew over. After all, I had written “Malcolm X”, so you never know. And then, I met this guy, Nicolas (from Makasound), and other people when they came from Jamaica. I told them I had an album and they wanted to hear it. I played it for them and they wanted to know the producer's name, so I told them I was the owner of the album and that I would give it to them so they could release it. They refused at first, saying they weren't ready. I insisted: “you're going to do it, you take the tape and you bring it back to France!” A few months later they called me to say it wasn't going anywhere, and I told them not to worry and to carry on. Shortly afterwards they called again to tell me they had found a distributor.
There is a reissue of an older album, "What a man a deal with"...
...which was pirated.
Pirated, how so?
Ah, you didn't know? We went to court over that album. There was a big trial last year: Hélène Lee and the newspaper Libération against this guy, Hanson Hamilton, of the Culture Press label, who was suing them for defamation because they had written that he was a thief. The court needed proof of that claim. He released this album in 1995, saying that it had been produced by Tommy Cowan. And I have never worked with Tommy Cowan, never in my life, not even on a single! I went back to Jamaica and asked Tommy Cowan to write a letter explaining this. I brought the letter back to the court to prove that this man is a thief and to stop them selling that CD. That's why I was able to have this album reissued with Nicolas (Makasound), it's the result of a court decision. Because justice is a very slow train, but a sure one.
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