Search - Tommy McCook :: Top Secret

Give thanks that so many discs from the Skatalites--as a unit and as solo recording artists--are being released these days, so there's less time to bemoan the tragic losses of Roland Alphonso and Tommy McCook, and those who left before. Still, one's heart breaks a little at these sounds from a musical era that is past and gone in life, if not on record. McCook is one of many musical youth whose gifts flourished at Jamaica's famous Alpha Boys School, still run by Sister Ignacius. A virtual who's who of seminal Jamaican jazz, ska, and reggae music passed through those school gates, and many of them contribute to this classic and near-impossible-to-find vinyl gem. It was originally recorded at one of Kingston's first studios, Treasure Isle--owned by the notorious gunslinging sound-system don Duke Reid--and faithfully preserved on this CD. Four bonus tracks up this collection's already considerable value. And how sweet it is to hear McCook leading early Super Sonic band members--ska and reggae masters like Lloyd Knibb and Lloyd Brevett, who were also Skatalite members, and the legendary late Jackie Mittoo and trumpeter Bobby Ellis--through an elegant sequence of easy-rocking early reggae, captured at the music's freshest moments. If "Green Mango," "Jungle Skank," "Beirut," and the other evocative tracks sound familiar, it's not just that they're evergreen classics that will never grow old. Virtually all of today's riddim track makers still draw inspiration--and samples!--from the plentiful vaults of seminal music machines like Treasure Isle. Elena Oumano