Beres Hammond Essentials (listen)
Beres Hammond Essentials via Apple Music
Beres Hammond makes reggae that’s both impossibly smooth and impossibly soulful, delivering his lyrics with the soft, raspy croon of a wise elder. Of course, in reggae, Hammond is just that: Born in Jamaica’s Annotto Bay, he grew up idolizing R&B singers like Sam Cooke and rocksteady stars like Alton Ellis, and his breakthrough came in the mid-’80s, when he combined their old-school style with the new sounds of dancehall. The result was hits like “Groovy Little Thing,” and that fusion helped birth a new genre, lovers rock. Tracks like “Rock Away” exemplify its charm, reflecting on romance and friendship with warm melancholy.
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