Cornel Campbell

MacSorleys, Glasgow 4th August 2012

Cornel Campbell may not be a household name in Scotland but in a slightly different parallel world he would be as well-known as Smokey Robinson and hits like ‘Stars’ and ‘Queen of the Minstrels’ would be on rotation on Capital Gold. The upside of this is that instead of paying a fortune to see a tiny dot on stage at a massive arena, you get to see him up close in a pub in Glasgow and hear one of the sweetest falsetto voices in the world in an intimate live PA, backed by the Fenomeno Show on the Samson sound system, all for a very reasonable price and a Caribbean buffet thrown in. Once again, the reggae cognoscenti of Glasgow turned out in full force and with enthusiasm to salute a stalwart of Jamaican music.  Everyone who was crammed into the bar, festooned with black gold and green crosses for the occasion, knew we were lucky to have a true reggae veteran to join us here at a time when concerts are taking place all over the world to honour Jamaican Independence Day on 6th August.

Cornel Campbell made his first record with Clement Coxsone Dodd in 1956 at the age of eleven, in which case he must have discovered a fountain of eternal youth or the secret of time travel, because he looked and sounded like a man still at the top of his game. Spells as part of the appropriately named vocal harmony groups The Sensations, The Eternals and The Uniques brought us the Studio One and Treasure Isle classics that have been revisited and versioned by everyone from Frankie Paul to Major Lazer, rendered tonight in perfect style, sounding even better than on record. Cornel reminded us of his easy adaption from those rock steady love songs in the sixties to roots rockers anthems in the seventies like ‘The Gorgon’ and ‘No Mans Land’, and riding into the dancehall in the eighties with hits like ‘Boxing’.  A solid gold performance, where else but MacSorley’s Bar, Jamaica Street, in the shadow of the Kingston Bridge, home of Glasgow’s  celebrations  for the 50th anniversary of independence – more events tonight and tomorrow courtesy of JA Live, so get yourself down to the area now known as Little Jamaica.