The Maytones - The Best Of The Maytones + 6 Bonus Tracks - CD Album

Format: CD

There are many styles and fashions within the multi-faceted sound of Jamaican music and while some are internationally celebrated, others, despite regga's worldwide popularity, are not always given their rightful recognition. Kingston's teeming ghettos were the acknowledged birthplace of ska, rock steady and reggae, and many of the music's creators migrated from country districts, including Bob Marley, who traveled from the parish of St. Ann to the zinc fenced, pot holed streets of Trench Town to find fame and fortune. A number of performers preferred to remain in the tranquility of the country and a style of reggae, designed for the rural population popularly known as country reggae, typified by a gentler style of rhythm, a less aggressive vocal style and pinpoint harmonies, gradually came into being. Its leading performers included Justin Hinds & The Dominoes, The Starlites and The Maytones, and all enjoyed huge popularity, usually with the rural audience, but on numerous occasions the sound of the countryside would gain the attention of Kingston's discerning record buyers and enjoy a measure of international recognition too.
In the capital city the sophisticated 'townies' dismissively refer to everywhere else in Jamaica as 'country' but, despite their condescending attitude towards the rural population, Kingston's record producers and record shop proprietors were not slow to realize the importance of this particular market. A number of record shops, including Herman Chin-Loy's Aquarius Records at Half Way Tree and Randy's Records and Joe Gibbs Record Globe, both on North Parade, were situated adjacent to the central bus stops where "people from country would pile straight off the bus and into the shop". Naturally enough country folk resented being denigrated in this way and The Maytones, formed by two school friends, Vernon Buckley on lead and Gladstone Grant on harmonies, were at pains to point out that May Pen in the parish of Clarendon was a large, important town and not a country backwater. They were fiercely proud of their heritage and like their local compatriots, The Maytals, used their birthplace as part of their name when the duo began to sing together in the late sixties.

Track listing

1. Jugement Day
2. Boat To Zion
3. Do Good
4. Music Is A Part Of Life
5. Zion Land
6. Ital Queen
7. Good Bless The Day
8. Who Feel It
9. Don't Show Off
10. When Will Peace Be
11. Madness
12. Contiquros

Bonus Tracks

13. Hard Time

14. Hard Time DJ version

15. Only Your Picture

16. Picture Rub-A-Dub

17. Throw Down Your Arms

18. Throw Down Your Arms Version