Peter Broggs

I was born a humble man in 1954 in Hanover, Westmoreland -- a small, peaceful area of the Jamaican countryside. It was here that I started to sing for myself -- outside, surrounded by nature. Otis Redding was my favorite singer and I loved "I've Got Dreams to Remember You By". I Stayed in the countryside until I was 17, then moved to Kingston where I shared a tiny rotting shack with my brother, and got a job in a factory. When you're a young Jamaican and you're smack bang in the middle of the countryside, nothing happens and you have only one desire -- to leave and do something with your life. So, after a while, you head for the towns, where you can try and make things happen. And that's what I did.
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When I first arrived in Kingston, I stopped singing. Too many people, too much noise everywhere -- I felt intimidated. Gradually, over time, I started singing again -- in the morning, on the way to work and in the evening, on the way home. Then, after a while, I started singing at work and it was there I wrote my first two songs, 'Vank Out' and 'African Sister'. I started to grow my dreads -- it was the beginning of the 1970s, and I had begun to mix with the Rasta community. We'd sit together around the fire in the ghetto, smoking herb in the challis and talking about God, about Jah Rastafari, the Almighty. We reasoned, read passages from the Bible and evoked our African roots. We were reviving our culture. It was there that I realised that I'd always been a Rasta. I just needed the spark that would reveal this to me. All those evenings spent with the old Rastas gave me the key. I began to understand who I was and what spiritual voice I should follow. At this time, I wasn't in contact with any musicians, I just sang for myself. Then one day I was sacked from my job because of my dreads -- and that was how everything started. I said to myself that, with my redundancy money, I must throw myself seriously into music. It was now or never.

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One day I met Bim Sherman at the record-pressing factory. That was in 1975 or 1976. He said, "Man, I heard your song 'Vank Out' and I like the way you sing. I really like your style and sound. Believe me, you should keep it up." So I started singing again with renewed confidence. Along with Bim Sherman and sacks of our singles, we left to do a tour of all the studios: King Tubby's, Treasure Isle, Channel One, Tuff Gong -- the cream. We sold our songs in the studios' courtyards. Miss Patsy Chin from Randy's let me sell them near her shop, too. She helped me a lot by getting me to do odd jobs for her in exchange for a little money.
People started to hear my songs and know more about me. I started chilling with Gregory Isaacs. Then one day, Bingy Bunny came to me and said, "Peter, I'm going on tour in London with Gregory and I want you to record a few songs for me to take over there for people to hear." I said OK then, let's go! The Roots Radics laid down the music to 'Forward Natty Dread', 'I Don't Know', and 'Never Forget Jah' in two hours at Channel One. Then a few weeks passed before we could put the vocals down and mix everything, which we did at King Tubby's studio in Waterhouse. When Bunny finally managed to book Tubby's, it was only for two hours -- two hours for three songs! When we arrived, there was a singer in the studio I didn't know, who was having a nightmare and eating into my time. He was using the same beat as 'Forward Natty Dread' so I went outside to practice my singing. Just then, Bingy bounced out of the studio and told me too go in and sing what I'd just sung immediately, exactly the same. The other guy had to move over for me, and I went in and did it in one take. I sang my other two songs at the end, and my work was done. Man -- in quarter of an hour it was done!