WOMAD

Steel Pulse

From United Kingdom

Whenever certain monthly music magazines run out of ideas and reheat their Great British Albums Of All Time feature, there’s one absolutely blistering record that gets overlooked time after time – Steel Pulse’s 1978 magnum opus Handsworth Revolution. It’s got everything you want from a roots-reggae record – absorbing songs, nut-tight harmonies and a sharply political agenda. And then, the following year, Birmingham’s finest followed it up with Babylon Makes The Rules, surely the most formidable four minutes that British reggae has ever produced. Still the only reggae outfit from these shores to scoop a Grammy (as well as the first reggae group – from anywhere – to play at a US presidential inauguration), they remain deeply political and understand the continuing relevance of this. “We deal with positive spirits,” explains leader David Hinds. “It means putting aside the guns, the drugs and all of the things that are ailments of society. We just can’t ignore the politics, because every life and soul that’s born on this earth is a political manoeuvre for someone at some stage.”