Jimmy Cliff, the Jamaican singer who helped transform the local genres of ska and rocksteady into the international sensation of reggae, died Nov. 24 at the age of 81. Jamaica's Prime Minister Andrew Holness called him "a true cultural giant whose music carried the heart of our nation to the world."
His 1972 film The Harder They Come, a semi-autobiographical tale of an aspiring musician caught in a web of crime and corruption in the Kingston underworld, made him a global star—along with the movie's eponymous hit single. He would win two Grammy awards and (along with fellow breakout reggae icon Bob Marley) Jamaica's Order of Merit.
While never as publcily associated with ganja as Marley (in some ways his inheritor), Cliff was definitely an indulger. In February 1981, he was arrested at Nassau International Airport in the Bahamas for possession of eight grams, although the charge was ultimately dropped on the grounds of insufficient police cause for the search. (NYT, The Guardian, Amsterdam News, UPI)
Image: Thesupermat via Wikipedia
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