Archive for rocksteady

Rivers of Babylon – The Melodians

Posted in Music with tags , , , , on August 11, 2019 by telescoper

Those of your of a certain age will remember that Boney M had a hit in 1978 with a number called Rivers of Babylon. I knew that that song was based on words from Psalm 19 and Psalm 137 but I didn’t know until recently that the original song was a Rastafari hymn and that the Boney M version was a cover of this beautiful rocksteady version recorded by a Jamaican band called The Melodians in 1970. Note the differences in lyric, e.g. “How can we sing King Alpha’s song…”. Anyway, I really like this version with its excellent vocal harmony and gorgeously relaxed groove.

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