Tad's International Record Re-Releases Mento Album 'Jamaica Farewell'

With renewed interest in mento among dancehall fans, Tad’s International Record will re-release Jamaica Farewell, an album the company first released in 2013.

It contains 18 songs, most of them interpretations of Jamaican folk and reggae standards by the trio who are from St. Ann parish in Jamaica. They include Island in The Sun, Big Bamboo, Shame And Scandal, Bob Marley’s No Woman No Cry and Three Little Birds; and Jamaica Farewell.

Tad Dawkins, principal of Tad’s International Record, said Jamaica Farewell did not receive adequate mainstream promotion 13 years ago. He plans to change that for the album’s second run, scheduled for this summer.

“There is a market out there for mento, people still love that traditional kind of music,” he stated.

The current mento revival is spiked by Grammy-winning producer Stephen “Di Genius” McGregor’s dancehall spin on Hill And Gully Ride, a mento staple. Slip And Slide, a song on that beat by leading deejay Masicka, is the rage in Jamaica. 

Mento, which is similar in sound to Trinidadian calypso, is considered by many musicologists to be Jamaica’s first popular music. Its earliest star was Lord Flea, who performed throughout the United States during the 1950s on The Perry Como Show, as well as in two movies.

It had revivals during the 1970s when roots-reggae acts like Marley dominated. Stanley Beckford and his group, The Starlights, had a string of hit songs including Soldering, which was covered by Hall and Oates.

The Jolly Boys, a group formed in 1945, have been the most successful mento exponents in recent years. Great Expectation, their 2010 album, was hailed in major publications like The New York Times and earned them tours of the United States and United Kingdom.