Reggae Britannia Documentary Part 1 How music travel. (Focus on the context of Reggae in the U.K.)

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Reggae Britannia Documentary Part 1 How Music Travels
Reggae music was first heard in the late 1960s when a music group called Israelites produced songs that had pop and reggae beats. These songs by Israelites established a good ground for the advancement of reggae music in Britain because apart from entertaining the audience they inspired a generation of artists who would start making reggae music. The next stage that Reggae music went through is that of establishing music records. Previously Jamaicans were making reggae songs, and individuals were distributing these songs. However, with music records with the example of Island records Jamaicans started making reggae songs for the Jamaican audience in Britain.
Power- Reggae music started to be used as a tool for expressing blacks’ opinion in Britain. Previously reggae music wasn’t being played on radio and blacks were limited to few things, and they lacked freedom of expression. However, with the growing reggae music, they were not only able to express ideas but to spread their culture and preserve traditions through this music.
Identity- Reggae artist started remixing their reggae songs to appeal the audience in Britain because their music wasn’t being played on the radio and wasn’t being taken seriously (Ex. Reg. Brit. 14:40-15-20). By doing so, they enabled this genre of music to gain identity and to penetrate the market. For instance due to remixing the song titled “Young, gifted and black” by Bob and Marcia became famous.

Commodification- To market this reggae genre in Britain the reggae artist resulted into using sound music system to bring their music closer to the audience. Dennis Bovell a commentator in this documentary acknowledges that it’s through these homemade monster speakers that the audience fully accepted the reggae music (Ex. Reg. Brit. 20:14-21-40). With speakers, artists didn’t depend much on the radio to spread their music, and they found it easy to take their music to different parts of this region. Lastly, artists started making unique songs with informative lyrics thus achieved to inform the audience what they wanted to know (Ex. Reg. Brit. 25:34-26-40). With such quality songs, reggae records started selling good cash, and reggae artists began becoming music stars.
Work Cited
Spencerone. Reggae Britannia Documentary Part 1. 14th May 2012. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQXyK1uxTps