Music > Interviews

UB40

14/10/14

Have you visited Norwich before, Jimmy?

My daughter’s actually at university in Norwich so I go there quite often; it’s a beautiful place! It’s a bit of a drive from Birmingham but we love the countryside. We also played UEA years ago, maybe 1980, and we supported Dave Edmund’s Rockpile there; it was one of our first gigs. At the time we had battered old instruments as we had no money, but the manager of Rockpile leant us the money to buy a new saxophone after meeting at UEA!

How did UB40 start, and how did you become involved as their drummer?

We were all at school together, and then after we’d finished at school we decided we’d be a band, and then we decided we’d better learn how to play some instruments! So we locked ourselves away for six months and learnt how to play. We didn’t really know what we were doing but learnt how to do what we wanted. None of us have any formal music training but you don’t really need it. It either sounds good or it doesn’t.

Why did you choose reggae as your style?

We played reggae because that was the music that was around us at the time. A lot of the fellows in the band had parents who came from a Caribbean background and at the time reggae wasn’t on the radio, so the local kids, first generation of Caribbean-British were influenced by their own culture. There were loads of local dances with reggae songs. So it chose us rather we chose it.

What influence did growing up in Birmingham have on you as a band?

It has a massive, massive effect on everything we do. That was the reason we were exposed to reggae in the first place was because of the cultural melting pot on the streets we grew up in. Where I lived, it was a mix of all kinds of backgrounds, Asians, Arabs, people from the Caribbean, Irish, working class English…today we’ve become more ghettoised these days, rather than everyone being together. There was a few hundred years of colonial history in Birmingham at that time, and that’s informed everything we’ve done since.

You’ve been playing together for over 30 years, but for the past six years you’ve had a new singer, Duncan, Ali Campbell’s brother. How have you adjusted to that?

You get a lot of brothers in bands and there’s a good reason for that. You get that unique sound and chemistry that they were brought up with that you don’t get with strangers. Robin Campbell, the third brother from that family has also been playing with us for years. For us it wasn’t a massive upheaval to change singers; we didn’t have to change anything because we still had the same unique Campbell sound. Like the Everly Brothers, or The Bee-Gees; if they were both singers in other bands there’s a chance it would sound the same. 

On this tour, will you be playing all the UB40 hits or more of your new material?

We try to avoid just playing our greatest hits as it gets a bit karoake. We had 50 top 50 hits in England alone and we do about 25 songs in a set, so there’s no way we can cover all our hits. There are really three elements to our set; we’ll be playing our really early stuff from before Red Red Wine came out, from 1980-1984, and we’ve picked out a lot of those old favourites. We’ll also be playing a lot of the hits that everyone will know, and then we’ll play a lot of the songs from our new album. We respect the fact that we’ve had a lot of hits but we feel we’re bigger than just playing those; we’d like to introduce more of a dub element to the set and we also don’t want to ignore our more political side either. Reggae is really broad, and we want to cover those as much as we can.

Is my favourite UB40 song, ‘Rat In Mi Kitchen’, a true story?

Yes, it’s a true story, but also it’s open to interpretation… it can mean anything; it has a bit of a political side to it as well. Everyone has their own meaning to put to it!

 You released you new album, which is a mixture of covers of country tracks and your own new tracks. Can you tell me about it

I’m not a fan of country music, but that said the songs we chose to cover are amazingly brilliant songs, which can be recorded in any style; the Willie Nelson song Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, for example, is a beautiful piece of folk poetry and it was brilliant to work with songs like that. It’s not a country album, it’s a UB40 reggae album but we’ve added some country touches, like a steel guitar player. I’ve always thought country music was a bit cheesy, but I’ve discovered it’s got some gravitas and seriousness to it; songs like Forever in Mind are deep, beautiful songs, and although this is a one off for us on this album, for me it’s opened up a whole genre.  Country music and reggae are well connected; for example my wife’s dad came from Jamaica, and every week he’d bring home country AND reggae songs. It seemed an obvious fit for me anyway, being the people’s poetry.

What is your reaction to the criticism aimed at the homophobic lyrics of some ragga and dancehall tracks coming over from the Caribbean?

I think the homophobic stuff ended up being a parody of itself in the end and I don’t think banning something is necessarily going to change that element of roughneck culture in Jamaica. Back in the day when we were into reggae it was more laid back and there was more of a peace and love vibe, with Marley etc. I think a lot of it is to do with drugs. In those days people smoked weed and got into transcendental stuff, there were more dub and calypso sounds. Cocaine took over the island in the 80’s and it made the music more aggressive, punchier and more like soca than calypso. I think lyrically, people are aiming to be being anarchists in some ways, but it doesn’t mean that there isn’t other music in those genres that aren’t more progressive.

Are you finding touring more challenging as you get older?

As a drummer, I’m fitter at the end of a tour than when I’m at home, as being on stage is like a workout. To be honest it’s a fantastic life. I don’t like to rub it in but I couldn’t think of a better way of life, playing shows and partying every night! It transfers back to us; as the audience becomes uplifted we do too. By the end of the night we’re buzzing. It’s better than drugs…and it’s healthier! You get to be with your friends and meet fans backstage (we’re not hermits); I’m absolutely amazed we’re still doing it after all these years and I’m enjoying every minute of it.

What can fans expect from your UEA gig?

You’re going to see 30 odd years of our career performed by a live band that have been doing it for so long that we’re comfortable and in control on stage. It’ll be a dynamic and loud show; at the end of the night your feet will hurt, your ears might ring a little bit and you’ll have a sore throat from singing! We made a woman’s ear bleed on the first leg of the tour apparently, but she had a grommet in so…it’s not going to be a sedate occasion, that’s for sure.