1969 Desmond Dekker & The Aces: Israelites

There had been flashes and sparks of its influence previously in the charts, but Desmond Dekker's 'Israelites' is the first bona fide reggae track to top the UK charts. When presented with that kind of statistic, it leads me to question why? Why this and not, say Millie's 'My Boy Lollipop', The Skatalites 'Guns Of Navarone' or Dekker's own '007 Shantytown'? And why is it that 'Israelites' - a basic B flat tune with a vocal that's often difficult to understand - has passed into genre legend, a song that All Music claim as a "timeless masterpiece that knew no boundaries"?

To my mind, the 'no boundaries' comment nails the song dead - 'Israelites' walks a high wire with aplomb. It's very title is pure Rastafarian, and it would take more than a passing knowledge of the religion to appreciate the "poor me, the Israelite' refrain, a move that at a stroke short circuits any accusation that Dekker's pop tune and presentation is offering an eye on the prize dumbing down of the genre. By basing his suffering and woes in a Biblical context, 'The Israelites' neatly joins the dots between classic Rasta culture, contemporary rude boy experience and a more general everyman concern - as understated as they are, the lyrics to 'The Israelites' have the blues based resonance of a 'Sixteen Tons'.

"Get up in the morning, slaving for bread, sir, so that every mouth can be fed/You load sixteen tons, and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt". You don't need dreadlocks to appreciate the world weary stance of slogging your guts to stand still. And if Tennessee Ernie was quick with his fists, Dekker too warns "don't wanna end up like Bonnie and Clyde", a threat of violence in its invocation of a down at heel couple who tried to build a better life via the barrel of a gun. Danger then, but it's a blink and you'll miss it taunt that's buried in a song with bounce and smile enough to let anyone join in the party and then buried further again by Dekker's sweet vocal.

Ah yes, the vocal - there's that famous Maxell tape television advert from 1990 that gets great mileage from the vocal's lack of clarity - "My ears are alight" and so on. All good fun I'm sure, but the no concessions of Dekker's thick patois slang adds further to the authenticity of the song and could also be hiding a multitude of sins - is he really singing "My wife and kids they fuck off and leave me" I wonder? The voice of the gutter crossed with the voice of the ghetto and the voice of the people - back to back with 'I Heard It Through The Grapevine', 'Israelites' seals a double whammy of the very best that black popular music had to offer. Put simply, it doesn't get much better than this.