News : BB Seaton ready for the world

[Roots Archives]

After 19 albums, the last of which was The Anthology, vintage Jamaican singer/songwriter and producer **B B Seaton** is now Ready for The World. But this, he said, may be his last album as a singer. Seaton, now based in England, will also be coming to perform here in August on Stars R Us, his first local appearance in many moons.

The prolific vocalist of the rocksteady era and veteran studio engineer Errol Brown have once again teamed up for the production for the upcoming album on his Soul Beat Record label. The sessions were done at Tuff Gong Recording Studio.

"There is a track on it called Emancipation Time Again, and I'm coming back right in time for a nEmancipation show, you see how Father worked it," quipped Seaton.

The former lead vocalist of Gaylads said he decided to record the album here in order to be in sync with the psychological sales pitch which is given advantage to reggae music recorded locally. "The album is being mixed by Errol Brown at Tuff Gong. Because it's a psychological thing," B B Seaton explains, "For people believe that if the song wasn't mixed in Jamaica or recorded here in Jamaica, it's not the real thing. But music can be done anywhere in the world. Is just like you are saying if R&B isn't done in America is not the right thing. But it doesn't mean that Jamaicans can't do an R&B song. So I kind of dismissed that. But at the same time, if that is what it takes to sell my record, I'm going to do what the people want."

But the veteran crooner who almost 40 years ago scored with the monster hit My Jamaican Girl, hastened to point out that he is more impressed with his recordings done here in Jamaica because they are of a better quality than those he did in England.

"So far I've done two or three albums before this that was mixed in England. But the One I'm doing now I'm more pleased with the mix. It almost finish now. Left about two or three tracks. I'm doing about 14 tracks with 12 completed. The album will be called BB Seaton Ready For the World," he told the Observer.

"I keep saying that this may be my last album as a singer," he added, "I want to get more into production and writing for other people." He is currently working with Nigerian and Morrocan artistes. "I'll be doing something here in Kingston and Mandeville called Stars 'R' Us in August," he revealed.

Expressing his opinion on the current musical trend, the old-school performer had mixed feelings about the direction of the music. "If you call dancehall contemporary, I'm with the beat but I'm not with the lyrical content of some of the music," B B Seaton before adding, "on this album I did a track on a dancehall beat called My People, more in a cultural vein. The beat is not really the important thing. For the beat is just like vessell that takes the lyrics around."

The 65-year-old Cornwall College's past student born Horace Lloyd Seaton, was called Bebe by his mom. But with his musical inspiration coming from blues icon B B King, he adopted B B, attaching it to Seaton, and hence he has been performing as B B Seaton from the start of his musical career which began when he teamed up with Delano Stewart and Maurice Roberts to form the Gaylads.

"The name Gaylads was given to us by Clement Seymour Dodd (Sir Coxsone), and back then it meant happy people. But the name (because of certain connotation attach to it) now takes on a different meaning. So we now say Great Lads, instead of Gaylads."

During the Rocksteady era of the late 1960s, the trio provided a great deal of gaiety with hit tunes like Lady With the Red Dress, You Should Never Do That, No Good Girl, Chipmunk Ska, Stop Making Love Beside Me, Love Me With All Your Heart and more for Coxsone's Studio One.

Then moving on they gave tracks like Joy In The Morning for WHIRL Records, for Tip Top Hard To Confess, Over The Rainbows End, I Need Your Loving, ABC Rocksteady, then by the time the Gaylads reached Beverley's Record, they produced more winners like My Jamaican Girl, There's A Fire, We Three Kings (the Christmas song) Soul Sister among others.

In 1962, B B Seaton released his first solo recording, Accept My Apology which was an instant hit from which there was no turning back. His covers Bill Withers' Lean On Me, Persuaders' Thin Line Between Love and Hate; One Thing Leads to Another, Everyday People, Born Free, were also hits.

"I've written whole heap of songs for loads of Jamaican artistes. You know that we had the song called ABC Rocksteady, and I wrote a song for Slim Smith they putting in a forthcoming documentry and that song was called People Do the Rocksteady. I am living in England now for almost 24 years, set up my music company Metronome Music. And that's an instrument that keeps a drummer or musician steady. So I gave it that name because I think of my publishing company as something steady. One of the tracks on the forthcoming album is called Sounds of Drums," explains B B Seaton who said most of his songs in later years have been released in Europe where he tours a lot these days with the Roots Harmonic Band.

By Basil Walters
*source : [jamaicaobserver](http://www.jamaicaobserver.com)*

[anbessa]

Forward BB ! One the greatest person I ever had the pleasure to meet ! And one of the most respected characters in the jamaican music industry.