Jimmy Cliff and Elvis Costello Duet

Here is one that shows the great range of Mr. Cliff. This is a duet with Elvis Costello on the song "Seven Day Weekend". It's a great little rock and roll track featuring two musical legends ripping it up together.

http://www.nutsie.com/music/Elvis%20Costello%20&%20the%20Attractions%252FJimmy%20Cliff#

Jimmy Cliff on Pandora

A great way to enjoy Mr. Cliff's music is to log on to the Pandora site. You get to create your own Jimmy Cliff themed radio station. It will play Mr. Cliff's music, as well as other artists with similar musical styles. Here is the link you need to do this:

http://www.pandora.com/music/artist/jimmy+cliff

Turn this on and enjoy some great reggae music on your computer.

Cliff Already in Jamaican Hall of Fame

The quest will continue to get Mr. Cliff inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. But it is worth mentioning that the good folks of Jamaica have already inducted their native son into the island's Hall of Fame. Here is the listing for that, with a very nice little bio of Mr. Cliff.

http://www.jamaicans.com/culture/jahalloffamejimm.shtml

Blast From The Past- Jimmy Cliff Against Apartheid

The 1980's was a popular decade for artists to get together in the form of supergroups to sing songs for various worthy causes. The most noted projects were Band Aid and USA For Africa. Both of those efforts raised money for famine relief in Africa by selling tons of records. But from my perspective, the coolest project was Artists United Against Apartheid. They got together and did a song/video called "Sun City". Jimmy Cliff was one of the artists involved in this very worthwhile project. Here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjWENNe29qc

For those of you who don't know, the Sun City area in South Africa was a "whites only" resort region where the controlling white minority in that country could go on vacation and not have any contact with black citizens other than those who worked there. While this was happening, pop artists from all over the world were earning LOTS of money by performing for the white guests in Sun City. But since apartheid was nothing more than blatant, brutal racism peppered with homicide and other criminal activity to defend its existence, a number of performers decided to say no to the big paychecks provided by performing at Sun City. This song was their statement. I am still blown away by the roster of artists who participated, and it is such a cool thing to see Mr. Cliff in the video.

And let me finish by saying this...anyone reading this who is too young to remember apartheid, you are lucky to have been born into a world where this isolated instance of organzied criminal intolerance no longer exists. If you want to learn more, start by watching the movie Cry Freedom and doing the appropriate Google searches.

Jamaica's Daily Paper Does Feature Story On This Site

Many thanks to the good folks at The Gleaner, Jamaica's daily paper, for their feature story in today's edition about my efforts to get Jimmy Cliff into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. I have no doubt that the good folks in Jamaica know what a great artist Mr. Cliff is, and now thanks to The Gleaner they know about what I am seeking to do on his behalf. Here is a link to the online edition of the story:

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20090423/ent/ent1.html

Those of you who are devoted reggae fans may have read Catch A Fire, the wonderful biography of Bob Marley written by Timothy White. He mentions in the first paragraph of the preface that The Gleaner was one of his main sources for the book. It is truly the paper of record for Jamaican people, and I am happy to have been featured there.

Easily The Strangest Jimmy Cliff Cover Ever

Kids Incorporated was a television show in the United States that ran on NBC for a couple of years in the mid 1980's, and then moved over to the Disney Channel for several more years. The show basically consisted of teens and tweens learning "valuable lessons" from their interactions with classmates, friends, teachers, etc... and then performing bland versions of popular songs to sum up their weekly dose of wisdom. For those of you who remember the popular "Afterschool Special" of many years ago, Kids Inc. was an even more poorly acted version of that show with the pop music as the intended hook to get young viewers to tune in and learn why it was bad to lie, cheat, etc...

There were a few actors/performers on the show who actually went on to stardom later in life. One of those folks is Black Eyed Peas member and solo artist Fergie. I am attaching a link so that you can see a very young Fergie performing "Trapped" on Kids Inc. The song was obviously included because Bruce Springsteen made it quite popular at the time. Seeing a child sing the powerful lyrics is downright laughable. But in a sense, that kind of makes this clip worth watching. Enjoy...as best you can. As I said, strangest Jimmy Cliff cover ever!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMlU9CdExfg

Many Covers of "Many Rivers"

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Jimmy Cliff must certainly feel good about all of the great artists who have recorded covers of his song "Many Rivers To Cross". I had mentioned this in a previous posting, and I decided to go ahead and list some of these performances and ask each of you to comment on which one is your favorite. Here we go:

UB40
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CktlPIlsBdw

John Lennon and Harry Nilson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgzWqfZo8fY

Lenny Kravitz
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr1S8HWSWf4

Elvis Costello
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0IAkrAmrpU

Joe Cocker
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-NK93kcCS9Q

Government Mule
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0MCJLNgICM

Cher
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcJCCtZRxCk

And, of course, Jimmy Cliff
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGeCeK85sUg


Personally, I think it is hard to beat the original version. However, the Lenny Kravitz cover is pretty spectacular.