Reply #9: He has Jamaican roots [View All]

http://jamaicaheron.com/

This from someone who knew him well


He was a brilliant evocative artiste-perhaps one of the most incisive and important of the 20th century-who somehow could not outpace his many demons. His connection to Jamaica & Reggae is not readily acknowleged but he was very proud of his Jamaican father, Gilbert Heron, who played professional football in Scotland for Celtics.

Gil Scott Heron shared a bill with Peter Tosh at the No-Nukes concert at Madison Square Garden in 1979; he replaced Bob Marley, when Bob got sick in 1980, as Stevie Wonder's opening act for the tour which was supposed to break Bob in Black America; iconic Studio One percussionist Larry macDonald was a staple in his band for years. Gil was also instrumental, along with Stevie Wonder, in lobbying for Martin Luther King Jr's birthday to be declared a National Holiday.

It is really a paradox though that such insightful"conscious" artistes could at once also be so personally reckless, indiscipline and self destructive.