Johnny Osbourne – Reggae Legend

Born Errol Osbourne in 1948 and raised in Jones Town, the Mecca of dancehalls in Kingston, he would become better known as Johnny Osbourne when he rose to success in the late ‘70s and mid ‘80s and became the king of those same dancehalls.
It was during 1967 that Osbourne first strode out as a singer when he became lead vocalist of The Wildcats. They recorded for producer Winston Riley but unfortunately nothing became of these works. The Wildcats' manager then financed a session at Coxsone Dodd's Studio One, from which his debut single, ‘All I Have Is Love’, was released. In 1969 he recorded an album, ‘Come Back Darling’ with the Sensations and with Riley once again at the controls. On the day of the albums completion, Osbourne emigrated to Toronto, Canada, to join his family. Here he sang with various soul and reggae groups, finally becoming lead vocalist for Ishan People. He recorded two albums with them, before the group broke up in 1979 and Osbourne decided to return to Jamaica.

On his return he joined back up with Coxsonne at Studio One recording ‘Forgive Them’ and ‘Jealousy, Heartache And Pain’ for the label. He continued recording extensively for Dodd into 1980 with these sessions culminating in the iconic ‘Truths And Rights’. Shortly after the release of this album he had a hit for the then Prince Jammy with ‘Folly Ranking’ and album of the same name soon followed. The success of these recordings made him one of the most in-demand vocalists in Jamaica and a glut of material was released. Along with many successful singles released over the next couple of years there were the Albums ‘Fally Lover’, ‘Warrior’, ‘Innah Disco Style’ and ‘Never Stop Fighting’ .
In 1983 Osbourne began the year with two big hits, 'Yo Yo' and 'Lend Me A
Chopper', before enjoying further success with the popular ‘Water Pumping’, an adaptation of Hopeton Lewis' smash hit 'Take It Easy', which had also served as the basis for Johnny Clarke's 1976 hit "Rockers Time Now".
The hits didn’t stop there with "Get Cracking", "Check For You", "Rewind" from 1984 and "Buddy Bye", "No Sound Like We" and "In The Area" in 1985 all scoring large.

A couple of lean years followed but he was back in the big time again in 1988 with the release of ‘Good Time Rock’ and ‘Rude Boy Skank’ recorded for Bobby Digital. These two songs were included on 1989’s ‘Rougher Than Them’. A few singles were recorded during this time as he continued to record for the likes of Coxsone Dodd, Ed Robinson and the now coronated King Jammy. Singles including 'Keep That Light', 'Unity' and 'A We Run Things' all saw the light of day, but regrettably a long-promised second album from Dodd never materialized
Johnny has remained a popular artist to this day although his recording days have been somewhat greatly diminished since those days of both Johnny’s and Reggae’s glory days.
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