Steel Pulse

Steel Pulse have been firmly established at the very top of my list of diverse musical tastes since I witnessed their incredibly powerful live act at Cheltenham Town Hall in late 1978, at the height of the punk rock and reggae movement 'Rock Against Racism'. At the time, they had a dynamic single out and Ku Klux Klan became something of an anthem of the period. In a roller coaster career spanning the next two decades, Steel Pulse have consistently surprised and delighted me with their innovative and infectious style of conscious roots reggae music, led from the front by the melodious tones of David Hinds. My only regret is their decision to leave these shores and base themselves in the USA, making it almost impossible to see them perform live in the United Kingdom.
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It all began for Steel Pulse in the mid-'70s at Handsworth Wood Secondary School in Birmingham. It was there that schoolmates David Hinds (lead vocals and rhythm guitar), Basil Gabbidon (lead guitar) and Ronnie 'Stepper' McQueen (bass) formed the nucleus of the group, quickly adding Selwyn Brown (keyboards) and Basil's brother Colin (drums), to the line-up. Handsworth was home to the UK's largest Caribbean community and a hotbed of reggae at that time. The naming of the band has been credited to McQueen, after a popular racehorse of the day. In January of 1975, Steel Pulse appeared in public for the first time at the Crompton pub in Handsworth and continued to advance their craft in local clubs and pubs in the Birmingham area until they could finance their first single a year later. Kibudu, Mansetta and Abuku, a song linking black youths of Western urban ghettos to their spiritual African homeland, was issued by a small independent label, Dip and helped to attract two new band members in vocalists Phonso Martin and Mykaell Riley. As Selwyn Brown recalls, "we used to rehearse in Ronnie's bedroom for a while. Then David's dad let us use his basement, as we got more serious about it and just started practicing and practicing. We basically taught each other how to play, so there was no ego thing. We just wanted to play and enjoy music and inspire people and write something conscious." Recalling their early struggles, David Hinds explained, "in our community at the time, our peers were questioning what we were trying to achieve becoming a reggae band. They were saying that we should stick to playing in basements until we got our act together because there was no reggae in Birmingham and no acts to identify with. The only reggae was coming out of Jamaica and London. We got involved with the punk scene and the Anti-Nazi League rallies because the punks were adopting anything the system was rejecting, which included reggae. There was never any airplay and always a limit to where we could perform."
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The band remain a major force in world reggae music today, based primarily in the United States. Surprisingly, their popularity remains mysteriously low-key in their United Kingdom homeland. Its a quirk that I've never been able to fully comprehend. As David Hinds explains; "As a matter of fact, from right since Steel Pulse has ever been together as a band, I think the States was the best reception we've ever had. We were playing to people who like the music, were curious to see the band and genuinely believe in what the band has got to say." Their distinctive sound and success owes a major debt to Hinds, the band's singer/songwriter and famed for his 'stovepipe dread' - a two-foot high vertical tower of dreadlocks. Born in Birmingham into a working class immigrant family in 1958, Hinds developed his musical interest through his roadie brother and friendship with his guitar-playing schoolmate Basil Gabbidon. Both were acutely aware of the black militant movement in the US, while in Britain, the National Front were making headlines of all the wrong sort. These formative years were to shape the future for Hinds and his fledgling band and to help them become one of the leading exponents of reggae music over the last quarter of a century.
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Andy Brouwer 2002