Dreadlock holiday for Third World

Third World remain one of the longest surviving reggae bands.

Roots reggae - the most pure form of the genre - runs through Steven "Cat" Coore's blood.

But over the years many purists have doubted it because his band, Third World, played a style of preened reggae that mixed in pop, rock, and R&B. They were seemingly dead-set on crossover success.

Take the 1978 hit, Now That We've Found Love - a funked up cover of the song by Philadelphia soul outfit the O'Jays - that went to the top of the charts in New Zealand and overseas.

"That was a great record, man," says Coore, who brings Third World to the Sound Splash Reggaefest in Raglan on Waitangi weekend. "Even to this day, it is still a contemporary record. It still gets a lot of respect in discos and anywhere it plays right now."

And he defends the band's sound. "Some people in Jamaica tended to think it was intentional ... but it was a natural thing. That was just where we were coming from because we had always done a lot of pop music in our dance bands," he says, in his chilled, Jamaican drawl.

Coore, and Third World's keyboardist, Michael "Ibo" Cooper, were originally members of Inner Circle, another Jamaican band who found success with "mainstream reggae".

He was still in his teens at this stage and, as well as reggae, he was influenced by Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder.

"We [Inner Circle] were basically a dance band," he explains. "We played dances, clubs, and in that sense, for our work, you really had to know all the popular stuff that was out there. We had a good pop, funk, and R&B background, but we also had the added element of that whole reggae in the blood thing," he says.

In 1973 Coore and Cooper left Inner Circle to form their own band because he "wanted to do something a little more conceptual". In its early years Third World were also a dance band and played everything from high school dances and Christmas parties to pay the bills. "But we could go to the north coast of Jamaica and work in the tourist areas, too. That was a great source of income," laughs Coore.

With the mainstreaming of reggae and its international potential - mainly as a result of Bob Marley's success - Third World decided to cash in and started writing their own songs.

"Reggae musicians were becoming almost like a commodity, so writing your own music was clearly the way to go," says Coore.

"And then of course the whole Rastafarian thing of becoming conscious, and speaking out about what we didn't like about the world, also inspired us to be a group who wrote our own music."

In the early 70s, Third World toured Britain and signed to Island Records (also home to Bob Marley and the Wailers). Around this time they also toured with Marley and the group's popularity boomed.

"Opening for Bob in '75 and '76 was very important," he deadpans.

But it wasn't until Journey To Addis was released in 1978 - featuring, Now That We've Found Love - that they broke through commercially.

Despite mainstream leanings, Third World are a political group, partly because they started out during a decade of prolonged social violence in Jamaica.

"It was exciting times because we had a political theatre happening around us and it was one of the special times of my life that era of [Jamaican prime minister] Michael Manley. That period defined Jamaica as a third world country and defined what the third world was, hence the [band] name, Third World.

"Jamaica had it's dangerous moments back then, because of political tribalism. But now," he says seriously, "there is gang tribalism and it is far more dangerous. As far as I'm concerned political tribalism is one thing, but now what we have is a real Caribbean mafia thing occurring where people are trying to extort money from people, there's drugs, gun running, all kinds of things. As far as I'm concerned the 70s were a piece of cake compared to now.

"But when you go to Jamaica, and you're in up-town Kingston, you won't see any of those goings-on because it's under cover," says Coore, who divides his time between Miami and Kingston.

Third World remain one of the longest surviving reggae bands and they continue to tour and release albums.

Coore, who was formally trained in music and learned the cello at a young age, also helps sustain the live music scene by encouraging young people to play. He says in the early 70s, with the boom of sound system DJs and "computer music", many musicians left Jamaica, or stopped playing.

"But many children are now growing up and wanting to learn instruments again."

He proudly tells me his son is the bass player for Damian "Jr. Gong" Marley, the youngest child of Bob, who did a string of tour dates in the US last year with U2.

"So the live music tradition is coming back big time," he says.

LOWDOWN

WHO: Third World

FORMED: 1973, Kingston, Jamaica.

PLAYING: Sound Splash 2006, February 4-5, Wainui Reserve, Raglan with Big Youth, Salmonella Dub, Katchafire, Cornerstone Roots, Kora, Anika Moa and the Plastic Tiki Band, Rhombus, Open Souls, Ladi 6, and more.

KEY ALBUMS: Third World (1976); Journey To Addis (1978); Sense Of Purpose (1985); Committed (1992).