The classic reggae song that became an Amy Winehouse standard
Down in the heart of Kingston, Jamaica, Toots & the Maytals were doing perhaps more than any other band to pull reggae into the world. Even though Bob Marley and the Wailers are most commonly cited as the main driving force behind the genre, Toots Hibbert was the one taking the sounds of ska and rocksteady into the future. In fact, Hibbert is even credited with giving the genre its name, pulled from his 1968 song ‘Do The Reggay’.
The following year, Toots & the Maytals released what would be their signature song, ‘Pressure Drop’. But it would be another song from 1969 that pushed the band past the borders of Jamaica. ‘Monkey Man’ was an infectious three-chord romp that moved more leisurely than most of the previous songs by the Maytals. It wound up being a key line of demarcation between the end of rocksteady and the beginning of reggae, especially once ‘Monkey Man’ went across the Atlantic Ocean.
In April of 1970, ‘Monkey Man’ cracked the top 50 of the UK Singles Chart. That made it one of the first reggae songs to sell significantly outside of Jamaica. While Toots & the Maytals would carve out their own legacy, ‘Monkey Man’ was quickly embraced by young British listeners and transformed into something faster and more party-centric.
As Hibbert was the one who slowed down the quick rhythms of ska and the high energy of rocksteady into the more laid-back flow of reggae, it only made sense that The Specials would push ‘Monkey Man’ back to its original roots. By jacking up the tempo, The Specials returned ‘Monkey Man’ to the world of ska, placing the track at the start of side two for their 1979 debut, The Specials.
It was through The Specials that ‘Monkey Man’ would eventually find its way to Amy Winehouse. A longtime admirer of the two-tone ska champions, Winehouse committed their version of ‘Monkey Man’ to memory and recorded the song during her Back to Black sessions. Winehouse’s version was a close copy of The Specials’ arrangement, including the half-time bridge breakdown and its clattering ending.
Winehouse’s version of ‘Monkey Man’ eventually found its way onto the expanded editions of Back to Black, but fans who were able to see Winehouse live in the immediate aftermath of the album’s release got to see her perform ‘Monkey Man’ as a part of her setlists. Winehouse played the song for the final time at the St. Lucia Jazz Festival on May 8th, 2009, bringing the grand total number of performances to 39.
Check out Winehouse’s rendition of ‘Monkey Man’ down below.
