Sugar Minott

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Sugar Minott at the Winnipeg Ska and Reggae Festival (2008)

Sugar Minott (actually Lincoln Barrington Minott ; born May 25, 1956 in Kingston , Jamaica ; † July 10, 2010 ibid) was a Jamaican reggae singer, musician, producer and sound system operator.

Life

Minott began working on various sound systems as a child, initially as a selector . Barely in his teens, he founded his first own sound system, Gathering of Youth . In 1969 he founded the trio The African Brothers together with Tony Tuff and Derrick Howard and now began to sing. In the early 1970s they took part in amateur talent competitions and recorded some records. Their music, inspired by the Rastafarian movement, showed a clear musical influence of the Abyssinians .

After they brought out Mysterious Nature with producer Rupie Edwards in 1974 , the music label Studio One took notice of the young musicians. The debut song for the prominent label No Cup No Broke , however, remained the last, the African Brothers broke up in order to try their hand at being a solo artist. Studio One boss Coxsone Dodd recognized Sugar Minott's talents, who in addition to singing was a good guitarist and drummer and, as it turned out, was also talented at writing lyrics. Dodd "took him to the apprenticeship" - he hired Minott as a studio musician to build him up further. His first releases with Studio One went largely unnoticed by the audience, that changed in 1978 when the single Vanity became a hit in Jamaica.

The breakthrough in Jamaica and Great Britain came with the solo debut album Live Loving that followed in the same year , which is considered by many to be the first real dancehall album and which helped shape the early dancehall of the 1980s. Showcase followed in 1979 , in an equally revolutionary style. Sugar Minott then left Studio One. Never Too Young , a single produced by Prince Jammy , became another hit and with Prince Jammy came the next LP, Bittersweet . Minott's fourth album - and the third in 1979 - Ghetto-ology surprised audiences with a return to strong roots and was quite successful. With the LP Black Roots that followed in 1980 , he continued this stylistically. The following LP Roots Lovers stayed true to roots, but also shows clear tendencies towards Lovers Rock .

In 1980 Minott started his own labels Youth Promotion and Black Roots in Jamaica , as well as a sound system called Youth Promotion . Among the first songs he produced himself for his new labels was Hard Time Pressure , which became a huge success in the UK. After Roots Lovers had met the taste of the British public, Minott's popularity in Great Britain soon surpassed that in Jamaica, which probably prompted him to move to London in 1980 after performing at Reggae Sunsplash . Out of the other successful songs of 1980 and 1981, Good Thing Going stands out, which became a hit in Great Britain, reached number 4 on the UK singles chart and was awarded a silver record . Minott got a contract with RCA for the next album of the same name, which was also a huge success.

In 1983 he returned to Jamaica, he celebrated his return with a renewed appearance at the Sunsplash Festival. In the meantime, dancehall had developed in Jamaica and now dominated the scene. Minott was dying to be a part of it and after a two year hiatus brought out the album Dance Hall Showcase . In 1984 he returned to top form, releasing three albums and a series of hit singles. Herbman Hustling was the first, it came up with a successful mixture of dancehall with the sensitivity of the roots, with a dash of Lovers Rock. The LP Slice of the Cake was overshadowed by the success of its predecessor, followed by Wicked a Go Feel It .

Sugar Minott maintained a high productivity in the following years up to the 1990s, released numerous albums and hit singles, and appeared many times at major festivals such as reggae Sunsplash . He worked with well-known other musicians and producers, such as Donovan Germain , Sly & Robbie , George Phang , Leroy Smart , Gregory Isaacs , and others. In the 1990s also with Junior Reid , Frankie Paul , Shaggy and Mutabaruka .

In 2005 he worked with the German dub producers Moritz von Oswald and Mark Ernestus . The track Let Jah Love Come was released under the project name Rhythm & Sound w / Sugar Minott , which was also released on the album See Mi Yah .

He also organized his sound system, which gave young singers the opportunity to perform. With the most talented, he recorded records released by his labels. Tenor Saw , Ranking Joe , Daddy Freddy and others started their careers like this.

On the gentleman album Diversity , released in April 2010, he took part in the song "Good Old Days".

He died on July 10, 2010 at the age of 54 in the University Hospital of the University of the West Indies in his native Kingston. Minott has suffered from heart problems since 2009.

He was married and the father of 14 children from various relationships.

Other tracks with recordings by him were published posthumously, such as Beat Down with the Swedish group Leafnuts in 2011, Scrubadub Style with DJ Rasfimillia in February 2013 and the split single Soundboy Killing / Catch A Fire with Junior Dangerous in 2014 .

In February 2015 the reggae band New Kingston released the album Kingston City , on which Sugar Minott can be heard in the piece Certain Girls .

Discography

  • Live Loving (1978, Studio One )
  • Showcase (1979, Studio One)
  • Bittersweet (1979, Ballistic)
  • Black Roots (1979, Iceland )
  • Ghetto-ology (1979, Trojan )
  • Roots Lovers (1980, Black Roots)
  • Give The People (1980, Ballistic)
  • African Girl (1981, Black Roots)
  • Good Thing Going (1981, RCA)
  • Dancehall Showcase (1983, Black Roots)
  • With Lots Of Extra (1983, Hitbound)
  • Herbman Hustling (1984, Black Roots)
  • Slice Of The Cake (1984, Heartbeat)
  • Wicked a Go Feel It (1984, Wackies)
  • Leader For The Pack (1985, Striker Lee)
  • Rydim (1985, Greensleeves)
  • Time Longer Than Rope (1985, Greensleeves)
  • Rockers Award Winners (1985, Greensleeves)
  • Inna Reggae Dance Hall (1986, Heartbeat)
  • Sugar & Spice (1986, taxi)
  • Jamming In The Streets (1987, Wackies)
  • Double Dose (1987, Blue Mountain) (Sugar Minott & Gregory Isaacs )
  • African Soldier (1988, Heartbeat)
  • Buy Off De Bar (1988, Sonic Sounds)
  • Sugar Minott & Youth Promotion (1988, NEC)
  • Lovers Rock Inna Dance Hall (1988, Youth Promotion)
  • Sufferers Choice (1988, Heartbeat)
  • Ghetto Youth Dem Rising (1988, Heartbeat)
  • The Boss Is Back (1989, RAS)
  • Ghetto Child (1989, Heartbeat)
  • Smile (1990, L&M)
  • A Touch of Class (1991, Jammy's)
  • Happy Together (1991, Heartbeat)
  • Run Things (1993, VP )
  • Breaking Free (1994, RAS)
  • Showdown Volume 2 (1995, Channel One) (Sugar Minott & Frankie Paul )
  • International (1996, RAS)
  • Musical Murder (1997, VP)
  • Easy Squeeze (1999, World)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b to Allmusic Guide, see under web links. Retrieved April 25, 2009.
  2. ↑ Sugar Minott in the Official UK Charts (English)
  3. ↑ Music Sales Awards: UK
  4. ↑ Sugar Minott dies aged 54 , BBC News, July 12, 2010. Retrieved February 10, 2012.
  5. ↑ Discography at Discogs.com . Retrieved March 10, 2015.
  6. ↑ Brief review of the album Kingston City , Popshot.over-blog.de from March 5, 2015. Accessed March 9, 2015.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Minott, Sugar
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Minott, Lincoln Barrington (real name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Jamaican reggae and dancehall artist
DATE OF BIRTH May 25, 1956
PLACE OF BIRTH Kingston , Jamaica
DATE OF DEATH July 10, 2010
Place of death Kingston , Jamaica