Music Box: Spice for the ears

By Aaron Davis (for Jackson Hole Weekly, JHWeekly.com)Jackson Hole, Wyo.-More than any other genre or lifestyle, Jamaican reggae artists tend to follow a template—spread positive vibrations for unity, be outspoken members of the Rastafari movement, and deliver a musical sermon inspired from the hardships of coming of age in a country with high crime and poverty. The trends are shifting. Not the message, but the aesthetics within the music.Unlike many of his contemporaries, Richie Spice is a 40-year-old farmer, devout Rasta, and singer-songwriter —born Richell Bonner—and didn’t come from Kingston. Instead, Spice came from the rural area of Rock Hall in St. Andrew, Jamaica where he grew up on a farm in a family of 11 siblings. His calm demeanor and slow-paced reggae fits his upbringing.“Life was more of a natural vibration, living on a farm,” Spice told United Reggae earlier this year. “It came with a rhythm less hectic than a city.”One aspect of Spice’s music that deserves attention is its quality production—particularly on the 2011 release, Book of Job. Balancing a dancehall sensibility with a likeable pop-R&B edge, Spice intends with the album’s title to compare Job’s faith in the face of misfortune with his own persistent approach in a volatile industry.Spice grew up in the golden age of reggae music, but as his career begin to take off in the 90s, Jamaican youth began to favor a more modernized dancehall scene filled with DJs and computerized beats that kept the bass and rhythm, but dropped the harmonies. Despite the trends, Spice kept live instrumentation as well as the one-love message. In the process he has always sought out veteran producers to cultivate healthy development.The New York Times listed his 2004 album, Spice in Your Life, among the year’s best reggae releases, and 2007’s In the Streets To Africa reached No. 6 on the Billboard Reggae chart.“At one time ... no one would record me so I had to fight, fight and fight the fight until people started to record me,” Spice said. “And when people started to record me, being out there in the music business there was no one to represent me so I was like one man against the world. No presentation, no promotion, no management, nothing at all. A lot of things, a long story, but I don’t spend much time lamenting on it.”Spice is known to close each live song with the phrase, “Selassie I the First”—paying respect to Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia who Rastas dating back to Bob Marley believe to be the reincarnation of Jesus Christ. And of course, the most famous common thread to Rasta living:“Burnin marijuana pon di corna / It keep mi calma / It mek mi smarta / Burnin on di highway / It’s di highest grade gettin’ to ma head,” Spice sings on one of his more popular songs, “Marijuana.”Spice’s advocacy of legalized marijuana use for Rastas in the U.S. has been an ongoing issue. While a few significant court rulings in the last 10 years acted to protect Rastafarians under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act for possessing and smoking the drug under “certain religious circumstances,” the drug largely remains illegal for Rastas as much as it is for the rest of us.Richie Spice and his band perform at 10 p.m., Sunday at the Knotty Pine in Victor. $18/advance or $22/day-of-show. Tickets at KnottyPineSupperClub.com or call 208-787-2866. tags: jackson hole music band songwriter nightlife wyoming center arts photographer musician planet teton venues