The power of 'One'

The Sunday Gleaner asked Junior Reid if he referenced Bob Marley's One Love when he was writing One Blood and he said no. However, Rita Marley, Bob's widow, pointed out that there were quite a few songs by Jamaican performers with 'one' in the title which have hit. Among them are Oneness (Jimmy Cliff), One Bright Day (Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers), One Draw (Rita Marley) and One Big Family (Half Pint).

"She draw it to my attention. I never realised so much power in the one. That's why we have to stay as one, live as one," Reid said.

There is also another 'one' factor. One Blood came on the trailing edge of Junior Reid's stint with Black Uhuru, which included three albums - Brutal, Positive and a live album. He went into the group with an already established solo career, his first release at 14 years old being the Hugh Mundell-produced Speak The Truth and subsequent recordings including Human Nature and Babylon Release the Chains.

Strength

"The Black Uhuru connection came out of being born and growing in Waterhouse and them watching my work over the years and see me grow. True is an area affair, when they were going through their problems I never want to see it just go down. I put a strength to it," he said.

But when that version of Black Uhuru started having its problems, and Reid pressed ahead with his solo recordings, he returned with popular songs, among them One Blood, Married Life, Banana Boat Man and Ra Pa Pam Pam.

He relates that to the current security situation in Jamaica, saying "Right now, with all wha a take place in we country and the world, with all the fighting whe a gwaan a jus' blood a kill blood. And the lifegiver give us life to live. When a youth from the garrison dead is a mother cry. When a soldier dead, or is a police dead, is a mother cry. Me want them ease down and ease off the shedding tears and funeral."

"The whole killing thing is a business," Junior Reid said. "It's not good. It's time for us to unite, whether you black or white. That is my message. We down here all innocent ... . We have to find back weself and find out who we really is, then we nah go shoot dung one another."

"Try keep the God inna yu an' flush out the evil out of your system," he advised.