BG 012

12" x 20" 1966

A beautiful, very early poster by Wes Wilson....he even put his phone number on it, so give him a call!

"The Wailers" on this poster weren't the Wailers with Bob Marley...at least I don't think so!

I played with Chairmen of the Board on tour in England in 1972, where we were top of the bill everywhere behind the group's hit, "Elmore James."

Our last gig was in Kilburn, north London, and we supported Jimmy Cliff, who was top of the bill and very big with his reggae hit, "The Harder They Come."

When you are touring, keeping a mad schedule, sometimes you don't even know what town or city you are in...everything is such a rush.

The leader of the group, General Johnson, was unaware that we were the support band, and as we were touring the country, we heard a lot of reggae music which was just making it onto radio in England, but had not made the leap to America, yet.

The reggae we heard on the radio was pretty "pop-y" stuff and lightweight, and didn't sit well with these soulful, get-down cats from Detroit. They hated it. These salty Detroit guys were James Brown men.

As we were playing to a completely black audience for the first time, the General must have felt especially at ease, and coudn't help but comment, between numbers, on the music we heard as we were on the road all over England. He unbelievably said to this audience who were there for Jimmy Cliff, "You know, we've been traveling around your beautiful country and hearing a lot of this reggae shit...now what's that all about?"

I couldn't believe what I just heard from my monitor behind me and dropped a beat in surprise. After that, it was a fight to finish the set...the audience went totally cold. I was the only white guy in the place.

When the curtain thankfully closed after our last number, General Johnson came up to me and asked, "What happened?"

I told him, and he said, "Jesus, we gotta get outta here!" and dashed to the dressing rooms downstairs.

As I was taking the cymbals off the cymbal stands, Jimmy Cliff came up to me and said, "Hey, mon, dat was some kind of drumming you did, dere!"

He pulled me aside and said softly, "We're in a jam, man, our drummer didn't show up."

I looked at him like he was cobra snake. I knew what his next utterance would be and I didn't want to hear it because I had never played reggae, and the whole structure of it (the accent on three, rather than two and four) was counter to the blues and rock and soul and everything I knew about playing drums.

He asked.

I shook my head and continued twizzling off wingnuts to free the cymbals.

Jimmy put his hand on mine and said, "Come with me."

I followed him down to his dressing room where he lit a HUGE splif that was more of a cigar full of dope, and picked up a bottle of 151 rum.

I don't smoke, hated dope, and never drank spirits. But Jimmy is a very compelling person and he smiled a big smile and handed me this ridiculous joint, which I took a hit off of, then he took the bottle by the neck and poured straight rum down my throat, glug-glug-glug.

I remember his huge smile, followed by the words I'll never forget, "Now, mon, you can play de reggae!!"

That's all I remember, other than I know the gig went well and I can remember encores...but the rest of it is a total blank.

This very early poster is perfect.