DR. JAH ON THREE DECADES OF BRINGING 'POSITIVE VIBE' TO REGION
Reggae band became respected by practice, will
This weekend is the inaugural Diggin’ Roots Festival. Located at Magic Forest Farm in Coeymans Hollow, the two-day, family-friendly affair features camping, hiking trails, local vendors and more than a dozen bands.
Near the top of the bill is Dr. Jah and the Love Prophets. The reggae band has become a mainstay in the jam band scene for over 30 years, and there are two things you should know about them.
First off, Dr. Jah isn’t real. As guitarist Dave Geoghegan explains, “we are the Love Prophets, but there is no Dr. Jah; this is our joke on the universe.”
The other is the journey Dr. Jah and the Love Prophets have taken on its path to finding success and creative inspiration as the Capital Region’s go-to (and possibly only) original reggae band. That story starts back in 1988, when Geoghegan and his friends were students at RPI.
“We had been listening to a lot of jam music and rock ‘n’ roll and really wanted to start a band and promote a positive message,” he said. “We settled on reggae.”
Deciding on the form was easy enough but becoming proficient and finding an audience took some time.
“People say, ‘It’s so simple,’ but it literally took me a decade to learn how to fit into that rhythm,” Geoghegan said. “There’s a different sensibility about it and the hardest part is to get the feeling right.
“There’s not a lot of bands playing roots reggae in our world; it took us a decade to really find an audience,” he continued. “At first, it seemed like everybody thought we sucked and hated us. Really, the turning point for the band was playing at the Rye Bread Festival (in Saratoga Springs).”
That gig at the annual local music festival introduced Dr. Jah and the Love Prophets to a supporting community of
established regional bands and marked the first of what is now 33 straight appearances at Rye Bread. Combined with befriending and making a fan out of area promoter Greg Bell, it allowed the group to find a home in the jam community.
These relationships and a consistent effort to constantly improve its sound helped Dr. Jah and the Love Prophetsbuild a local following and land slots opening for reggae icons Burning Spear
and the Wailers, as well as more offbeat artists like Robert Fripp of King Crimson and local ska legends Conehead Buddha.
“We would play with everybody that came through the area, even if they were tangentially related,” Geoghegan said. “It was pretty obvious we were trying as hard as we could. We were making original music and playing entire sets of our own songs.”
Geoghegan notes that the lineup “evolved over time,” until the current roster came together about 12 years ago. Geoghegan stresses that this consistency and chemistry has helped him grow as a writer and musician.
He’s enthusiastic in his recollection of the support he received from his bandmates the first time he wrote his own songs.
“It was a really gratifying moment when the band said, ‘These aren’t perfect Dave, but these are actual songs,’” he
said. "I learned that I can write songs. It’s hard, but not impossible."
This camaraderie was crucial in helping Dr. Jah sustain itself over the past year-and-half after the pandemic derailed what looked to be a busy 2020 concert season.
"Last year, I had literally booked the greatest slate of gigs in years,” Geoghegan recalled. “Then the cancellations started coming in. So we did the remote Protools thing for a three-to-four month period.”
Dr. Jah and the Love Prophets worked up over a dozen songs during the pandemic in preparation for a new albumthat they’re hoping to record in the coming months. In the meantime, the band has been playing these songs live and receiving a positive response.
Playing shows again and interacting with fellow artists and audiences has been a real treat for Geoghegan and the group. With the rust from the lengthy time off shaken off, he’s eager to play Diggin’ Roots.
“Song we played for 30 years, we couldn’t remember how to (flippin’) play,” he laughed. But there’s nothing like the emotional impact of seeing people you’ve known for a long time grinning back at you while you’re on stage. Seeing people perform is in our DNA and it’s just something you couldn’t imagine getting shut down.
“With this new festival, it’s really affordable and pretty rare to get this level of local talent together,” Geoghegan continued. “I hope that we can help some new band, trying to figure it out, have the same experience we did at Rye Bread 33 years ago.”
Last year, I had literally booked the greatest slate of gigs in years. Then the cancellations started coming in. So we did the remote Pro-tools thing for a three-to-four month period.”
— Dave Geoghegan