Enjoy reggae twist to well-loved songs with Easy Stars All Stars

Date Published: {J}

Put some bounce and bass into your Autumn by going to see Easy Star All Stars when they come to Róisín Dubh on Thursday, October 21. The New York-based reggae outfit are best known for reinterpreting songs by The Beatles, Pink Floyd and Radiohead and they have a stellar live reputation.

Easy Star records was set up in 1996 by Michael Goldwasser, Eric Smith and Lem Oppenheim. They were united by a passion for reggae and a desire to do something different.

“We all loved reggae but we weren’t very happy with the quality of reggae that was going on in the early to mid nineties,” recalls Michael, the producer and arranger for Easy Star All Stars. “The stuff that was coming out of Jamaica was pretty much all using drum machines and was very computer and digital oriented. The stuff that was coming out of America was mostly trying to be Bob Marley.

“We thought it would be good to start a label where we make traditional-sounding Jamaican reggae using Jamaican artists, but recording in New York,” he adds. “We were young and foolish enough to think we could just out some money together and do it, but it worked.”

Easy Star began to make waves in 2003 when they decided to rework a classic Pink Floyd album.

“We were highly regarded but we wanted to do something different. My partner Len was a big fan of Dark Side of The Moon and he had the idea of ‘why don’t we do a reggae version of it?’.

Michael came up with the basic arrangements in his studio.

“We thought ‘wow, this really could work’ and then we just took it from there.”

Dub Side Of The Moon was met with great acclaim and Easy Star really took off. The Easy Star All Stars were assembled, touring the world and even getting some feedback from members of Pink Floyd.

“David Gilmour was being interview on BBC Radio and the host asked him about Dub Side of the Moon and he said ‘yeah, it’s great fun. I really wish I had seen them the last time they were in London’,” Michael says. “Roger Waters sent us a fax saying that he didn’t comment on covers of his work, so we respect that. Claire Torey, who sang The Great Gig in the Sky, came to see us play a couple of times.”

Easy Star All Stars have since gone to record their own versions of Radiohead’s OK Computer and The Beatles’ Sgt. Peppers Lonely Heart Club Band. Easy Stars’ popularity is surely down to their mastery of the reggae groove – what is it about this genre that consistently appeals to audiences?

“Well, there are several reasons,” says Michael. “Musically I find it’s hard to hear some good reggae and not feel it somehow in your body. It’s something about the beats – it all originates with the idea if the heartbeat, which was then translated to African drumming, which was then made its way to Jamaica. So I think there’s something very primal about reggae music.

“But also a lot of the messages in reggae are universal,” he continues. “Reggae started out as struggle music, in the seventies, singing about social problems and inequality, racism, socio-economic problems – and these are things most people can relate to. In fact, one of the reasons why Dub Side of the Moon works so well is the universal themes that Pink Floyd were writing about – reggae fans can relate to those as well.”

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.