"Over the years I got to know him, both from interviews and sometimes just hanging out, so many of his anecdotes ended with the words: Well I wasn't going to say no, was I? I wasn't fully joking when I told him it should be his catchphrase. But that was Jimmy Cliff, a charismatic combination of charm, bravery, humour and an ability to see beyond what was put in front of him."
"This was true at the start of his career when he saw an opportunity to establish himself as a singer outside the cutthroat world of the Kingston sound systems where artists made records to be played in dances rather than for sale. The 17-year-old talked Leslie Kong, a Chinese Jamaican who owned an ice-cream-parlour-cum-record-shop-cum-cosmetics-boutique called Beverley's into starting his own label: I wrote a song called Dearest Beverley and sang it to him in the shop the next day."
Jimmy Cliff pursued opportunities relentlessly, repeatedly taking chances that advanced both his career and reggae itself. He combined charm, bravery and humour with an ability to see beyond immediate circumstances and often departed from standard industry practice to widen the music's horizons. As a teenager he persuaded Leslie Kong to found Beverley's label, leveraging his knowledge of musicians, studios and the business to help the label succeed. He later moved to London, absorbed contemporary pop song structures and applied those ideas to ska, rocksteady and reggae, helping to internationalize Jamaican music while retaining its core identity.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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