Prince Far I – Silver and Gold (Blood and Fire)
Reviewed by Sadie O., 11/2/05
Toasting (rapping over hit songs) by great gravel-voiced DJ Prince Far I during the heyday of the form, 1973-1979. Far I was shot to death in his home in 1983. If you know Big Youth and I-Roy, you know the basic sound. This is just as good, and mostly less known, so it’s a lot of fun to play. If you want to find the roots of hip hop, look here – this is where the Jamaicans who started rapping on street corners in NYC got the idea. It was also hugely influential on British punks. There are many examples here of toasts over songs and “versions” (sort of beginner’s dub). It’s frankly often hard to tell the difference in the earlier cuts. Later cuts are often Far I produced, rather than toasts. Tracks 11-14 are a song, the dub of the song, the toast of the song, and the version of that. Whew!
No FCC. Track 1 is fun because we know the song, 19 is similar, and interesting as an extended cut covering all the bases. 10, 13, 15 and 18 also good.
1. 3:01 ***Toast of Johnny Too Bad. Original song comes through often; classic toasting format
2. 3:20 Rasta toast; sounds like it was recorded in a bathroom. Choir sings on original.
3. 3:09 *More Rasta testimony, this time downtempo with melodica.
4. 3:13 More of the same, in dub (not very heavy dub, though)
5. 3:03 *Dueling toasters. Stoner’s paradise!
6. 3:06 Same as above, without Far I
7. 4:00 starts with spoken testimony, into a lot of the original song (vocalist way out of tune!)
8. 3:59 Version of the above
9. 3:11 Monotonal preaching on Rastafari. Uptempo original.
10. 3:10 **Version, less preaching, rather nice dub.
11. 3:21 Midtempo skank w/ Errol Holt vocals.
12. 3:21 *Dub version of the above – cool.
13. 2:31 **Toast of track 11.
14. 2:30 Dub of 13, without most of the toast.
15. 3:36 **Downtempo toast, great message.
16. 3:39 Version of 15, just music/dub, pretty minimalist.
17. 2:43 Another nice Errol Holt midtempo midtempo swing.
18. 2:52 **Version of 16, pretty serious dub, vocals only blurps.
19. 7:40 ***The switch from singles to 12” 45’s illustrated. Rasta version of classic hit “No No No’, mixing song, toast, version.