Notes From The Week #14

Welcome back everyone. As always hope you had a good week. This week is going to be a tad bit different so please bare with me. I was at a party this weekend and after a spectacular arrangement of songs—a song finally took us over the edge and a rewind was requested by all of us in the crowd. I’d like to hope that you’ve all experienced the euphoria of a rewind in a party. There’s nothing quite like it. That moment had me thinking on the way home as to the genesis of the rewind so this week we’re taking a deep-dive to explore the rewind.

I also saw an amazing set of pictures by the late Kurt Markus. I couldn’t take my eyes off the shots. They say a picture paints a thousand words so I’m interested to hear what you think the picture says to you. Comment or hit me up. Would love to hear your thoughts on those shots.

The History of the Rewind: Wheel It Up

This one is going to be fun. Well I hope so.

Music informs so much of my life. I love discussing it, learning about new artists and genres and of course listening to it at both parties and in more intimate settings. As a born and bred Londoner whenever I travel I remember just how much I can take the diversity of London for granted. London is home to one of the most ethnically diverse populations in the world. Approximately one third of Londoners were born abroad and over 300 languages are spoken in the capital. These Londoners do not only bring their language but they bring their culture helping to create a rich experience for all of us who reside in the capital—who just by walking down a road in London can experience a culture from every part of the world.

Among the rich tapestry of London culture lies the unequivocally important contribution of Jamaican sound. Jamaican sound is the heartbeat of modern music. Mento, Rocksteady, Reggae, Ska, Dancehall and Dub music have uniquely informed multiple genres including Hip-Hop, Reggaeton and Afrobeats. Jamaican music has not only influenced music sound but also many of the practices that has a hold across music genres; with one practice in particular having a special relationship with the city of London. The rewind.

The origins of the rewind are widely debated but in my research it seems the most plausible beginning came in 1968 in Kingston, Jamaica. But to understand further the dynamics of the rewind it’s imperative that we rewind (forgive me, I had to) twenty years back to the first introductions of the sound system in the parish of Kingston. The sound system concept first became popular in the 1940s—DJs would load up a truck with a generator, turntables, and huge speakers and set up street parties. At the offset, the DJs played American rhythm and blues music but as more local music was created, the sound adopted a more local texture. The sound system gained the support of the community as the conservative, BBC-modeled Jamaican establishment radio maintained a strong stance against playing the people’s music. As legendary producer Bunny Lee states sounds systems were “the people’s radio station"

Now with that context we can get back to 1968 Kingston. A sound system operator by the name of Ruddy Redwood takes a visit to Treasure Isle studio to cut dubplates in preparation for a dance (street party) that he will be DJing. The engineer, Byron Smith, forgets to include the vocal track on one of the dubplates. Redwood accidentally takes this instrumental to the dance but to his surprise on playing the crowd loses it. An account has him playing it for more than 30 minutes straight. Reggae historian David Katz affirms this account as a credible beginning for the reward. He states that the rewind is determined by the popular demand factor largely facilitated by the shock of something new.

As Jamaicans began to migrate to the UK throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the rewind accompanied them. As the people’s radio aka pirate radio came to characterise the sound for the ghettos of Kingston. In the late 1980s, the pirate radio came to characterise the sound of the high rises in the more deprived parts of London. In London, pirate radio became a crucial medium for the local music being produced. In the same way that establishment radio in Jamaica shunned much of the local music the major radio stations in London did not have the proximity or the appetite to feature the local music bubbling in the inner-city London communities. This helped to give a natural monopoly to pirate radio. There were two key features of the sound system culture defined pirate radio in the British capital: the MC and the rewind. As jungle became the prevailing sound of 1990s London pirate radio, technology enabled the rewind to be felt in greater effect.

Fast forward to the party this week and it’s the exact same thing. The beauty of the rewind is in the dialogue that takes place between the DJ and the crowd. The DJ arranges songs in our time that keeps our frequency and we respond by keeping the tempo and acknowledging each song being chosen. In some special moments the song selection or transition is so good that we lose it and ask the DJ to stop and reintroduce the song. I’m sure we lost it in the same way as the crowd under the sounds of Ruddy Redwood did in 1968.

On being Nigerian

If I was to come back in another life I would ask God to come back as a Nigerian again. I was in Nigeria for the first time in 15 years earlier this year and it was such an interesting experience. Interesting in both the incredible and wayward sense. I spent time with some founders building incredible products to serve the continent and I also spent an hour on the side of the road being apologised to by a man that had crashed into our car—on further investigation it was revealed that the car had no brake pedal. He had been driving the car for a few weeks in that state. He told us this was the first time he crashed. I was in equal parts furious and impressed.

Being Nigerian has informed so much of my life. It’s the reason why I’m fascinated by politics. All the conversations I overheard between my parents and their friends about the state of affairs in the country they had left but still allowed to consume so much of their being. My mother has lived in the UK for the best part of 30 years but her accent still carries the sound of a Lagosian who has spent much time sharpening one’s negotiation skills in Lagos markets. Tejuosho market to be precise, where she spent her adolescence helping to serve her mother’s stall.

Looking back on his relationship with Nigeria—Chinua Achebe reflected that “being a Nigerian is abysmally frustrating and unbelievably exciting.” I academically understood this dichotomy but it wasn’t until that I went back that I understood how accurate his reflection was. Nigeria is endowed with all the necessary attributes to be a major player in the world but is riddled with problems that signal the mark of infancy in the self-centredness of its’ leaders.

Over the last year, I have realised that the state of Africa is so inextricably linked to the experience of the African Diaspora that is a worthwhile endeavour to spend a lot of energy there. As someone who has spent all of their life in the UK—I’m not in any ways looking to spur a movement. Frankly I have no place to. There are competent, savvy and resourceful people already on the continent helping to push for a better Africa. For now I’ll do the relevant reading to have a better understanding of the current context of Nigeria and what events have contributed to this present moment: economically, politically and socially.

Kurt Markus: 1947-2022

Until next week. Peace.