UB40

While UB40 are often dismissed -- and perhaps rightly so -- as a toothless Pop Reggae outfit, they introduced a generation of teens to reggae with this collection of covers. Unfortunately, the shrill version of Neil Diamond's "Red Red Wine" is what most listeners remember. The album truly was a labor of love, however, and what it lacks in depth it makes up for in spirit.

Unlike Steel Pulse or other more pro forma U.K. reggae outfits, UB40 has a sound wholly its
own. The group draws as much from R&B and contemporary British pop as from standard
Jamaican fare, and it's this catholic approach that makes Labour of Love worthwhile.
Although all the selections on the album are remakes of well-known or influential Jamaican
songs from between 1969 and 1972, UB40 has reworked them so that each retain... More >

Slightly annoyed at Ali Campbell's low pain threshold, I was about to dismiss these classic covers as a reggae Pin Ups when I noticed Astro's toasts and the U-Threes' backups saving the two Harder They Come remakes. A week or two thereafter it hit me once again that reggae tunes can take a long, long time to hook in. And by then, guess who I was suffering along with. (Grade - A-)