Contents - Beth Lesser

Tosh, Big Youth, Dennis Brown, Ras Michael and others. The high point of
the evening was when Bob Marley was joined on stage by the two leaders of
the rival political parties and, in a dramatic moment, Bob joined their hands
together in a forced display of unity.
But the dances had come first. Even before the big concert, sound systems
had been holding peace dances all around Kingston as part of the burgeoning
movement to end the bloodshed. Jah Wise began to travel with Tippertone
into areas he had never been before. The community leaders had sat down
together and decided to try and live in harmony. “I think it was [in] jail or
gun court, but a man reason and reason and it just happen. Claudie Massop
said, ‘peace dance’, and we came to Tivoli – the first peace dance. The second
peace dance [was] in Rema. That was before the concert. The concert come
long after. The dance them keep before.”
The peace dances became a big trend. Dexter Campbell, owner of Echo
Vibration, remembers, “You have this place in front of Duke Reid’s Studio.
Used to have a bar there. We play a peace dance there. And I play at Lizard
Town, a part of Tivoli Gardens. They used to call Lizard Town the ‘social’
part, the PNP part. They used to have Tivoli Garden at the top and, at the
bottom, you have a little areas where you have the high rise houses and things,
and we played there. Everybody come together, PNP and Laborite. That was
one of the first peace dances I play. At that time Gemini also play in Tivoli
Gardens- a peace dance.”
It was a very exciting time for dancehall. While the truce was in place, it
allowed people to cross borders for the first time and learn about new deejays
with lyrics and patterns that still hadn’t reached very far ‘out a road’. Ranking
Trevor, then a deejay with Socialist Roots recalls, “The way how it get so
united, we have some politicians from the other side following the sound now!
Them time there, we just learned about General Echo. That’s the first time I
hear Tappa Zuckie and General Echo.”
The peace idea struck a chord all over Jamaica. For the week ending week
ending April 11, 1978, The Daily Gleaner’s top ten hit parade included three
songs about peace, two of which were specifically about the peace treaty. At
number four, ‘Peace Treaty Special’, by Jacob Miller, on Top Ranking. At
number five, ‘Tribal War’ by George Nooks on Crazy Joe. And, just entering
the chart at number 10, ‘War is Over’, by Dillinger, on Joe Gibbs.
Deejay Trinity, who recorded the song ‘Western Kingston Peace Conference’,
remembers peace time mainly for its brevity. “It help things. But only
for a time. It never last. You know, politics come. The whole thing just stir up
back. It was just for a time. It was a nice little time, but it just come and just
gwaaaann, and you have [community leaders] Claudie Massop dead and then
Bucky Marshal go ‘way a foreign. Because they was the instrument of peace.
Yea, instruments of peace. Cause most of the big politicians dem didn’t like
peace cause them know that when peace [come] and people come together,
then people get smarter. They use it to divide the people. It never last, as I say,
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