Four years later, Bob Marley crossed over to a rock audience to become reggae’s first international star with The Wailers’ peerless Catch A Fire LP. In March 1969, it went mainstream in the UK – where thousands of West Indian immigrants had settled in the postwar years – when Desmond Dekker & The Aces scored a Number 1 hit with the skinhead-friendly The Israelites. After that, reggae got fatter and funkier, splintering into myriad different forms and sub-genres. First came the loping sounds of ska artists such as Prince Buster and The Skatalites, followed, in the abnormally hot summer of 1966, by the sweet, slowed-down pop of rock steady. Electricity being a luxury in Jamaican homes, 45s were played to huge crowds on outdoor sound systems, creating fertile rivalries among the DJs who spun them. Its supreme invention – reggae – emerged after the country gained independence from Britain in 1962, when bands started giving the jazz, swing, pop and rock’n’roll tunes they performed to US tourists in resort hotels a quirky local twist – notably a jerking off-beat guitar rhythm and patois-rich vocals. FOR A SMALL CARIBBEAN ISLAND, Jamaica has had an extraordinary influence on music.
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