Winston McAnuff hits airwaves with 'A Bang'

Howard Campbell, Gleaner Writer

Just hours before a recent trip to France, singer Winston McAnuff busily shopped his latest album, A Bang, a collaboration with French pop star Camille Bazbaz's Bazbaz Orchestra.

A Bang is McAnuff's first studio album since Nostradamus, which was released in 2008 by Makasounds Records, a small, independent French company that masterminded his remarkable comeback.

Makasounds filed for bankruptcy early this year, but such is McAnuff's profile in France that he quickly picked up distribution for A Bang through Sakifo Records which is based in Reunion, a French dependant located in the Indian Ocean.

European tour

McAnuff, 54, is scheduled to begin a European tour on Saturday, with a show in Castres, France. There are proposed dates in Britain where he hopes to duplicate his French success.

"Wi waan go out more an' dat's why wi going to England," he said. "Wi get a lotta benefit from French radio an' TV, so the music is out there."

The success McAnuff has enjoyed in France started in 2002 with Diary Of The Silent Years, a collection of songs he recorded during the 1980s with some of reggae's top session musicians, such as keyboardist Harold Butler and guitarist Lebert 'Gibby' Morrison.

It set the pace for eclectic albums like A Drop, his first collaboration with Bazbaz; Paris Rockin' and Nostradamus. The Bazbaz Orchestra handles most of the musical duties on A Bang, but it also features respected French guitarist M, who produced the last album by Vanessa Paradis, girlfriend of American film star Johnny Depp.

Drummer Lincoln 'Style' Scott and bassist Errol 'Flabba' Holt of the Roots Radics band, and Sly and Robbie, are the Jamaican musicians on A Bang. The 'Riddim Twins' worked on Mary Mary, a mid-tempo reggae ballad, while Scott and Holt are in fine form on Angela Davis, a world-beatish ode to the American Black Power leader.

McAnuff said he got the idea for 'Angela' over 30 years ago when Davis was a leading firebrand in the United States.

"The Marcus Garvey album (by Burning Spear) was out at the time, an' I thought it would be good for a song about another prophet," he explained.

"But I couldn't go no further than the first verse, but a youth come up wid a 'riddim' fi dis album an' the lyrics jus' flow."

The reggae beats of Sly and Robbie, and Scott and Holt, play second fiddle to the Bazbaz Orchestra whose smooth French rhythms complement McAnuff's rootsy delivery on songs like Mr White Shirt and Settle Babylone.

Until the link with Makasounds came 10 years ago, Winston McAnuff was in danger of being labeled a has-been. The Manchester-born singer's career had started encouragingly in the mid-1970s with the song Ugly Days, which was produced by Derrick Harriott.

He also wrote and recorded the song Malcolm X, which became an underground hit for Dennis Brown and producer Joe Gibbs. In 1978, McAnuff hooked up with the Inner Circle band which produced his second album, What The Man a Deal Wid.

boost

Both album and artiste languished for over 20 years until McAnuff met Nicolas Maslowski and Roman Germa, two French youth who were big into roots-reggae from the 1970s. They not only transformed his unreleased album into Diary Of The Silent Years, but helped fund the follow-up, Paris Rockin', a world-beat project that helped establish him throughout France.

Paris Rockin' yielded the title track and Ras Child, songs which remain part of McAnuff's live set.

The Makasounds/McAnuff tandem was as fruitful as the connection Heartbeat Records and Ras Records had with Burning Spear and Israel Vibration during the 1990s. McAnuff's work with Maslowski and Germa earned him star status on some of the largest festivals in France, Germany and Italy.

McAnuff admits there was a time in the 1990s that even he thought of giving up the music business. But fate has dealt him a good hand.

"I hear Chris Blackwell sey the other day dat, when yuh mek it too fast, things will spoil 'cause when yuh young yuh do stupid things," he said.

"So things work out the right way fi mi."