The JA Live/Valley Roots Todmorden Bandstand Gala event
Dub, Reggae, DJs, Live music, Drum workshops, stalls and more…
Alan Dearling reflects on seven hours of mostly skanking entertainment
Sometimes the ‘backstories’ behind the artists performing at an event are well worth delving into. Exploring. Not all musicians are solely musicians or singers. And so it was for the headline acts at this gala show. The event took place in the Centre Vale Park, deep in a valley, and the vibes were mega. Massive from a soundsystem which sent the music echoing, with a couple of seconds time-delay, bouncing between the hills either side of the park. Impressive.
The E&I Collective are based in and around Manchester. They describe themselves on Facebook as: “A Collective of Musicians providing live Reggae/Rocksteady/Ska and Dancehall music! Original & Covers.” They are actually a well-loved and respected reggae band and on this occasion, Marcus Hercules was one of the featured reggae singers with the E&I Collective. Marcus has already amassed a varied, diverse range of experience and accomplishments. He is a charismatic, on-stage performer and presence.
Marcus is an actor and runs the Hercules Productions Drama and Music events and workshops. He has created, written and performed his one-man shows: Different Perspectives, Rasta Liv and Prison Game. He has also appeared in TV shows such as: Holby City, Shameless, Coronation Street, New Street Law, Brookside, Doctors, Mobile, Casualty and Northern Lights.
Prison Game is a contemporary take on the ‘Kitchen Sink Drama’, with themes stemming from socialist realism of the Black community in inner city UK.
Live and Direct, the E&I Collective were extremely popular with the crowd and I’ve received a number of very positive comments about the ‘good vibes’ and the communal fun that was generated.
The E&I Collective’s music is available on Spotify.
Apache Indian in the Park
It had been many years since I last saw Apache Indian perform live. Back then he was very much the new, rising star of British reggae. Reggae with a Punjabi rap-twist. His first couple of albums were released on Island Records in the early 1990s, and given his background, raised in Handsworth, Birmingham, Steven Kapur was controversial. During his live show at the Gala he talked about his own life in music, and as an actor in movies and on TV, his own songs, influences in music and cultures and the fact that he recently married Yasmin and that they now lived in Glasgow. It was a very personal performance, presented with humour and with lots of energy. A hi-energy show that epitomises reggae, bhangra, dub-step and dancehall riddims.
During the show, Apache Indian got the audience singing along and dancing with many of his hits. He has had seven top forty UK hits, including ‘Arranged Marriage’, ‘Chok There’ and ‘Boom Shack-A-Lak’. Indeed, Apache Indian was the first British-Asian artist to have had any substantial success in the mainstream charts and as a BBC Radio Asian Dj.
For me personally, ‘Arranged Marriage’ was the highlight – it’s a brilliant piece of musical social observation – from a unique, insider perspective of Punjabi life and culture. And, he remains controversial today.
In an interview available on social media, Apache Indian talked at length and in depth with Bobby Friction. Bobby describes how Steve blended reggae and dancehall to create a new genre that has seen him become a platinum-selling artist.
And Bobby hears how Steven Kapur went from Steve the steel worker, to Steve -the-man-with-a-van, to eventually Apache Indian. He also talked about how he was breaking barriers even before entering the reggae world when he became an 18-year-old unmarried father, which was hugely shocking to a deeply conservative Asian community in the 1980s, to then entering the world of Jamaican soundsystems where he was the only Indian face.
First broadcast in 2014, presenter Bobby finds out what makes a ‘good Indian boy’ immerse himself in a West Indian environment, grow dreadlocks, learn the language of patois, to being signed by legendary label, Island Records to becoming the UK’s number one reggae music export.
On-line, I learned that Apache Indian collaborated with his cousins, Simon and Diamond, and with them Steven Kapur introduced a new hybrid sound of bhangra called bhangragga, or bhangramuffin, with his 1993 debut album, ‘No Reservations’, recorded in Jamaica and produced by Simon and Diamond, Phil Chill, Robert Livingston, Bobby Digital, and Sly Dunbar. This was followed by ‘Make Way for the Indian’ (produced by Sly & Robbie, the Press, Mafia & Fluxy, Pandit Dineysh, and Chris Lane), which featured rapper Tim Dog and spawned the hit, ‘Boom Shack-A-Lak’. By 1997, Kapur had parted ways with Island, and his next album, ‘Real People’, was released by Warner Brothers. Sweden.
Since those early days in the spotlight, in 2018, Kapur co-hosted the Brit Asia TV Music Awards with Preeya Kalidas. He also performed during the closing ceremony for the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.
Apache Indian was nominated for an Ivor Novello Award for best contemporary song for ‘Arranged Marriage’ as well as for a Mercury Music Prize for his debut album, ‘No Reservations’ in 1993. In 2021, he was awarded the British Empire Medal for services to music and young people.
Video for ‘Arranged Marriage’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3TLbs6Tf_A
Todmorden Bandstand commented on-line: “Huge thanks to all the great performers, organisers JA Live, Todmorden Town Council and all the smiling and skanking folk who made this such a fantastic afternoon!”
During the afternoon, in addition to the headline acts, there were also live and Dj performances from: Pepperjam; Beana – Sista B; Zam Phonics; Nicky General and Bt3k-beat freak.
