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52 albums · 1963–2022

Reggae, from ska and rocksteady to roots reggae, dub, lovers rock, dancehall and today

· 1 min read · by 1001 Albums

Bob Marley singing at the microphone with his eyes closed, pointing out over the crowd, a guitar hanging at his side, in a black and white photograph
Lee "Scratch" Perry in a red cap covered in silver spikes, singing into a microphone decorated with shells and stonesAba Shanti-I in a knitted cap leaning over a turntable in the dark, his hand on the record, a mixer beside him
Bob Marley at Dalymount Park in Dublin on 6 July 1980. Photo: Eddie Mallin, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. · Lee "Scratch" Perry at Band on the Wall in Manchester in 2013. Photo: Jake from Manchester, UK, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. · Aba Shanti-I, who runs one of London's sound systems, at the Music Cafe in Leicester in 2013. Photo: Ashanti Selah, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Reggae comes from Jamaica. In Kingston in the early sixties, ska grew out of mento, American rhythm and blues and the sound systems that played records at dances. Around 1966 it slowed into rocksteady, and by 1968 into reggae.

In the seventies Bob Marley and the Wailers, Burning Spear and Culture sang the roots reggae of Rastafari, DJs such as U-Roy and Big Youth talked over the records, and King Tubby and Lee "Scratch" Perry took the songs apart into dub. In London came lovers rock and the dub poetry of Linton Kwesi Johnson, in Coventry the 2 Tone ska of the Specials. Dancehall took over in the eighties with Yellowman, then Buju Banton and Sean Paul, and today Protoje, Chronixx and Koffee carry it on.

The list has 52 records from 1963 to 2022. It leaves out the singles, where much of ska and rocksteady was made, the producers' compilations, and most of the reggae made beyond Jamaica and Britain, with Alpha Blondy and Lucky Dube as the only nods. About 41 hours of music, 5 days of a few records each.

By genre

Reggae 98%Folk & Country 1%Other 1%
  • Reggae 98%
  • Folk & Country 1%
  • Other 1%

The genres named most: reggae, roots reggae, dancehall, dub, rocksteady, ska.

The colours of the covers

A stripe for each cover, in the colour Tidal picks from it, sorted by hue; the greys at the end.

Where the music comes from

Music from 4 countries: Jamaica 39, United Kingdom 7, Ivory Coast 1, South Africa 1. The deeper the colour, the more albums: one, two to four, five to nine, ten and more.

The 1960s

The 1970s

The 1980s

The 1990s

The 2000s

The 2010s

The 2020s

More lists

Lists of Genres first, then others; all of them on the blog. The blog.