Jimmy Cliff, original rude boy and soulful reggae legend who helped spread the reach of the genre from Jamaica to the world with “The Harder They Come,” died at the age of 81.
The singer’s family announced his death on Instagram, writing that he “passed due to a seizure followed by pneumonia.” “To all his fans around the world: Please know that your support was his strength throughout his career. He appreciated each and every fan for their love,” wrote his wife Latifa and children Lilty and Aken.
“Jimmy, my darling, may you rest in peace. I will follow your wishes. I hope you all can respect our privacy during these difficult times. More information will follow at a later date. We see you, and we see you, Legend.”
Early career and advancement
Along with Toots & The Maytals – credited with coining the term “reggae” with their 1968 single “Do the Reggay” – Cliff was among the first Jamaican artists to have their music released through a partnership between Kingston label Beverley’s and Island Records, a joint British-Jamaican label co-founded by Chris Blackwell to bring Jamaican music across the Atlantic.
Through this deal, Cliff released half a dozen singles in the first half of the ’60s, starting with his 1962 debut single, “Hurricane Hattie,” as well as ska classics like “Miss Jamaica” and “Gold Digger.” In the mid-sixties, Cliff moved to the United Kingdom, where he met future rock legends such as Pete Townshend and Robert Plant.
The international breakthrough
In 1967 Cliff’s debut Iceland album “Hard Road to Travel” was released. Two years later, the self-titled 1969 album (later called Wonderful World, Beautiful People) followed, which contained two songs that would ultimately lead to Cliff’s international breakthrough and make him the first global reggae superstar: the anti-war anthem “Vietnam” and one of his most enduring and covered works, “Many Rivers to Cross.”
The following year, 1970, brought two more hits: Cliff’s interpretation of Cat Stevens’ then just-released “Wild World” and “You Can Get It If You Really Want.” The success abroad brought Cliff back into the spotlight in his native Jamaica, where filmmaker Perry Henzell was working on a crime film about the Rude Boys of Kingston.
“The Harder They Come” and cultural change
“The way Perry [Henzell] What made me do the film – I was doing so well in Europe at the time that I didn’t really want to go back to Jamaica, I could make a lot of money in Europe, I had hits with ‘Wild World’ and ‘Vietnam’ and those songs – was, ‘You know, I think you’re a better actor than a singer.’ And I said wow inside, because I thought the same thing about myself,” Cliff told Rolling Stone in 2019, adding that he trained as an actor before becoming a singer.
The film, as well as its legendary soundtrack – featuring Cliff’s biggest singles to date, as well as the soon-to-be-iconic theme song he composed for the film, and classics from the Maytals, Desmond Dekker and others – was a huge success and is considered a work that brought both reggae music and Jamaican cinema to a mainstream audience. “The Harder They Come” was later included in Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time and preserved in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress.
Cliff leaves Iceland – Marley enters
While Cliff was on the verge of superstardom with The Harder They Come, frustrated by a contractual stalemate with Island, he left the label after a decade and signed with competitor EMI. Although Blackwell and Island lost their superstar, the pain was short-lived: Shortly after Cliff’s departure, the label signed another up-and-coming artist from Jamaica – a friend of Cliff’s from his teenage days – Bob Marley.
“[Marley] was an artist I brought into the shop and perhaps the most amazing figure [im Reggae] he said. Cliff is often credited with giving Marley his first break, auditioning the young singer for producer Leslie Kong’s Beverley’s label in 1962.
Origin and youth
Born James Chambers on July 30, 1944 in St. James Parish near Montego Bay, Cliff was drawn to music from an early age; The son of a deeply religious father, he was inspired by the gospel services at which he sang in church as well as by American music and early Jamaican acts—from Little Richard to Derrick Morgan, from Sam Cooke to Ray Charles—that played on AM radio and informed Cliff’s soulful singing.
Cliff – who chose his stage name at the age of twelve in reference to the heights he wanted to climb – began writing songs while at St. James; his early plays were convincing enough to earn him a scholarship to a technical high school in Kingston. The family soon moved to the West Kingston area of Denham Town – near Trench Town, where young Marley lived – an area known for high crime among hopeless, impoverished youth and playing a central role in the emergence of the rude boy subculture.
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“Kingston was shocking,” Cliff said of his teenage years. “I grew up in a village where we had no running water, no shops. If you want to cook and you don’t have salt, you go to the neighbor: ‘Give me some salt.’ I wasn’t used to people cheating on each other.”
As Cliff told it, his time in Kingston marked not only the beginning of his career, but also the emergence of one of Jamaica’s most important labels: One day, on his way home from school, Cliff walked into a record store called Beverley’s, run by three Chinese-Jamaican brothers, the Kongs. Cliff offered to play them some of his songs – including one called “Dearest Beverley” – but they said they were a record store, not a label.
“But you sell records. Maybe you want to go into the business,” said the teenage Cliff. The eldest brother, Leslie Kong, asked him to sing. “Two of the brothers laughed,” Cliff said. “But the other guy said, ‘You have the best voice I’ve ever heard in Jamaica.’ And I thought: yes! When someone sees in you what you see in yourself, it is a great encouragement.”
Worldwide success and later years
The Kongs formed their Beverley’s label shortly afterwards, with Cliff’s “Hurricane Hattie” (and “Dearest Beverley” as the B-side) as their first single. The label soon became home to reggae greats such as Dekker, the Maytals and the Wailers, including Peter Tosh and Marley’s first two singles.
While Cliff never achieved the enduring global fame and cultural legacy of his compatriot Marley, he remained a prolific and revered reggae artist after The Harder They Come. He released albums almost every year in the 1970s and 1980s; A seven-time Grammy nominee, Cliff won his first award when his 1985 album Cliff Hanger was named Best Reggae Recording.
Cliff’s rarely heard 1972 single “Trapped,” produced by Cat Stevens, resurfaced a decade later when it became a staple at Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band concerts. Springsteen had bought a cassette of Cliff’s music while on tour in Europe and added “Trapped” to the program (where it remains to this day). Springsteen’s live version also appeared on the 1985 benefit album “We Are the World,” while Cliff himself re-recorded the song on his 1989 album Images. (Springsteen and Cliff later performed together at SXSW in 2012. “He’s still great,” Steven Van Zandt said of Cliff at the time.)
Final achievements and legacy
Cliff scored another unexpected global hit in the ’90s when he reinterpreted Johnny Nash’s “I Can See Clearly Now” for the soundtrack of the 1993 Jamaican Bob comedy film Cool Runnings; the version reached the top 20 of the US Hot 100 charts, his highest chart position in the United States. The following year, Cliff contributed a version of the Lion King classic “Hakuna Matata” for a companion album to the 1994 animated film.
Despite his love of acting and his acclaimed The Harder They Come performance, Cliff made only sporadic film appearances in the following decades: he had cameos in the Robin Williams comedy Club Paradise and the Steven Seagal action film Marked for Death. “There were other offers of roles, but I didn’t see myself in those roles, so I said no,” Cliff explained of his film career.
Late works and awards
In 2012, two years after Cliff’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he released his late masterpiece: Rebirth, an album that captured the sound of his ’70s thanks to production and songwriting contributions from Tim Armstrong (Rancid). The album earned Cliff his second Grammy, for Best Reggae Album. In 2022 he released his last album “Refugees”.
“When we saw Jimmy Cliff, we saw ourselves,” Wyclef Jean said in his Rock Hall induction speech. “When I saw Jimmy Cliff, I saw my face, and that is what Jimmy Cliff represents – not just to me from the ghetto, but to all the children who come from rural areas. Thank you, Jimmy Cliff, for being a role model for our lives.”
Final words about Toots – and himself
In September 2020, Cliff wrote an obituary for his late friend “Toots” Hibbert for ROLLING STONE – words that now also retroactively apply to his own legacy. “From our religious background comes our concept that when someone transgresses – we don’t say they ‘die’, we say they ‘transition’ – they simply go to the other side of existence, there is no death – and then vibrate out there before going to a higher level,” Cliff said. “But Toots, the way he lived, I’m sure his soul was able to move on. The soul can be reborn 24 to 24,000 times, it depends on how you lived your life. But with Toots, I can’t imagine him coming back to this planet. He has evolved. He has fulfilled his purpose on this planet.”
“His spirit will always resonate with us,” Cliff added. “His soul will always resonate with us and the people who loved his music.”