Quem não desistiu de acompanhar as notícias, ou pirou com algumas delas durante a pandemia que atire a primeira pedra. Ou, como fez um dos maiores nomes do reggae internacional, Clinton Fearon, atire música! O artista jamaicano preparou durante o período de isolamento seu 13º álbum, “Breaking News” com o objetivo de jogar para o mundo um pouco de bom senso e compaixão. O projeto já está disponível em todos os aplicativos de música e representa a cura para Clinton Fearon, cuja vida mudou completamente durante a pandemia, assim como a de toda a comunidade de músicos e artistas.
Durante o momento de reclusão povocado pela pandemia, o cantor permaneceu em casa em Seattle, vivendo a crise com sua esposa, e, juntos, realizaram diversas lives para se manterem conectados com o mundo exterior. Esses momentos foram luzes brilhantes durante o período para manter a inspiração de Clinton positiva. Por outro lado, as constantes más notícias vindas de todos os meios de comunicação também o impactaram, foi quando o compositor sentiu vontade de reagir, apresentando ao mundo suas letras que como disse seu iamigo de longa data, Manjul são “bálsamo para ouvidos, mente, alma e corpo”.
Por conta da pandemia, a produção do projeto também foi realizada de forma incomum. Acostumado a gravar uma faixa guia para cada música nos primeiros dias de estúdio, com apenas sua voz e seu violão capturados de uma só vez, e só então gravar faixa a faixa com os músicos de sua banda em Seattle, Clinton Fearon precisou gravar uma demo adequada com a maioria dos instrumentos em arquivo- exceto bateria e teclado-, todos executadas por ele mesmo, com o engenheiro de som Pete Remin, no Dubtrain Studio, em seu bairro. A demo foi enviada aos músicos na França para praticar e, alguns meses depois, o artista voou para Bordeaux para gravá-las em conjunto, com o apoio do engenheiro de som Damien ‘Bobby’ Coutrot no Baco Studio.
Os músicos da banda The Riddim Source, os grandes Xavier ‘Kubix’ Bègue (guitarra), Julien ‘Manjul’ Souletie (vocal e percussão), Simon ‘Saymon’ Coutant (bateria), Thomas ‘Mato’ Cirade (baixo) e Muctaru Wurie (teclados), foram os responsáveis pela interpretação impecável das canções. Pelas próprias palavras de Clinton: o melhor conjunto de músicos com quem ele já tocou.
“Breaking News” é o 13º álbum completo de Clinton Fearon em seu próprio nome, e o primeiro não totalmente produzido por ele mesmo. Após três anos de parceria de sucesso, Boogie Brown Productions (Clinton Fearon e sua esposa Catherine) e Baco Music decidiram co-produzir este magnífico álbum, a ser lançado pela Kool Yu Foot e Baco Records em junho.
No Brasil, Clinton Fearon é um artista muito reverenciado e já se apresentou em grandes festivais e eventos por cidades como Salvador, Belém, São Paulo, Porto Alegre, São Luís, Brasília e Fortaleza. Uma das curiosidades é sua semelhança física com o mestre do samba Martinho da Vila, fato sempre citado pelos fãs e que causa risos e satisfação ao jamaicano. Clinton é também conhecido por ter sido um dos fundadores do “The Gladiators”, icônico grupo do reggae jamaicano da década de 70 e que já excursionou por seis continentes. Além dos treze álbuns solo, Clinton possui mais de 25 sucessos ao lado do The Gladiators, faixas essas que são sempre muito pedidas nos seus shows. O jamaicano agora se prepara para uma mega turnê na Europa e espera lançar o seu novo álbum no Brasil em breve.
Vídeos do novo álbum: YouTube.com/watch?v=86kUIDJ2Tu4 (Trod On) | YouTube.com/watch?v=iTcZAaTPvVs (Breaking News)
Song by song:
Clinton Fearon talks about the songs of his new album “Breaking News”:
- Breaking News
The saying ‘breaking news’ has been around for a long time but for the past few years it has become very popular spreading news, and it’s always almost a hundred percent bad news! Sometimes I’m hungry for some good news and it’s hardly ever there or get talked about. So I decided to use ‘breaking news’ as a topic, I mentioned some of the bad things we always hear on the news and then halfway through I changed the narrative to a more positive outlook. - Don’t Dump It
The inspiration for this song in part came through breaking news. There are the many oil spills in the oceans, the many plastic, toxic waste and so on. Ever so often there are dead fishes on our shores and we’re not just talking about a few dead fishes! Another huge part came from traveling to and from many countries where I saw a lot of these bad situations with my very own eyes. Most simple way to avoid these environmental issues is not to dump our waste in nature. - Social Unrest
The past five or six years of political instability and the global COVID situation together they’ve caused a crisis of panic, which left us in a world of social unrest: I think that systemic injustice and fraudulent justice plays a very big role in this social unrest that we’re experiencing. But again, I also think we can do something about it, together as one. - New Chapter
I must say that to the level of the social unrest that we’ve been going through, I have no choice but to turn to the new chapter of survival. The first and second verses of this song are literally talking about me and for reason I feel a very special connection to this new chapter. - Have Some Fun
When COVID pandemic hit and people couldn’t get together anymore, concerts were not happening. Like many others I got hungry for it, so I decided to write about my feeling, how it’s a long time we no have some fun singing and dancing till sweat start run… Staying positive with an affirmation at the end that we are gonna have some fun. - Sweet Morning Sun
The first four lines of this song could catch you off guard based on how heavy and maybe even depressing the lyrics are, and at the same time the melody is so sweet. It all starts to make sense when the second verse comes along and goes to see and hear why the melody is so sweet. “Sweet Morning Sun” is definitely one of my favorites on the album. - Brace Yourself
The inspiration for “Brace Yourself” was triggered by my daughter Sherine. I’ve been telling her from long time that she has a nice voice and that she’s a sensitive person so I think she would write beautiful songs. About a year ago she wrote a song and sent it to me for approval. When I listened to the melody and the lyrics to me it was simply beautiful. I was feeling proud and happy for her. Few days later I picked my pen and started to write “Brace Yourself” because another poet is born! - I Wanna Dance
The inspiration for this song came in two parts. The first part came from some musicians that I’ve worked with in the past who let me know on several occasions when I want them to play their instruments with intend and to try to be in the pocket, they said that they’re not machines and that I’m asking for too much.
The second part came from not being able to do concerts because of the pandemic.
Same frustration came from both situations: I want to dance! - Trod On
“Trod On” is a song of encouragement and perseverance with an attitude that says, I will not give up. This song is one of them that helped me not to get depressed. I remember picking up my acoustic guitar and started playing chords and movements and the sound felt really good so I started to sing: “Once we’re alive we’ve got to keep on keep on moving trod on trod on trod on… “. I knew right there and then that I’ve got myself a hit song. - I Am Thankful
I am thankful is literally how I felt when I got to the 10th song of the album. I’ve been giving thanks for a long time, but living through the past few years, with the political situation, the pandemic and the social unrest give more volume to how much I am thankful. I love when it goes to the bridge and lyrics are saying: “Sometimes we sing, sometimes we talk, sometimes we run, sometimes we walk, sometimes we cry, sometimes we dry, and when all is said and done I am thankful for all”. - Unbeatable Dub
This track was not part of the album. Getting close to the end of laying down the raw tracks we were talking together and someone suggested that we should do a dub track and that I should play the bass. I thought it was a great idea. So at the end Simon Coutant the drummer and myself laid down the drum and bass. And then we laid the other tracks one by one except for the horns who played their part together. At first we named it “Unstructured Dub” but sound engineer Damien Coutrot and myself structured it a little when we mixed it. And my wife came with the final title “Unbeatable Dub”. “Unbeatable Dub” is badass!
