RAT IN MI BAND
Ali Campbell says his brother ruined UB40 — but he will restore the band’s pride in SA next weekend, he tells Carlos Amato
ALI Campbell doesn’t want you to think about the other UB40. They aren’t coming to South Africa this weekend. They are banjo-strumming Judases, under the misguided captaincy of his brother, Robin Campbell. They have marched into the valley of the shadow of country, and they must be left to their own dismal fate.
For all Ali knows or cares, the other UB40 will be playing Shania Twain covers in a half-empty Albanian titty bar come Saturday night. He doesn’t speak to Robin, and has no plans to.
On a Skype call from London, Ali summarises the bitterly comic tale of the two UB40s. “I’ve sat back for five years and watched my brother destroy and crucify the songs that made UB40 famous. And playing to smaller and smaller venues.
“They’ve been destroying the legacy of the biggest-selling reggae band in the world, apart from Bob Marley and the Wailers,” he says. (Which is a bit like saying that chimps are the cleverest primates, apart from humans. But we get the idea.)
Ali’s Brummie tones are flatter than the Edgbaston pitch: he sounds a bit like a Scouser who has just suffered a heavy blow to the head. “There will never be a reunion of me and the old band. I can tell you that. I left in a pretty acrimonious split five years and four albums ago. I’ve been touring the world with my band, who are younger and more energetic, and we’ve been carrying the flag for reggae.
“But the straw that broke the camel’s back was when the old band released a country album last year. That was a slap in the face for me. At that point (trombonist and rapper) Astro left them, because it was a slap in the face to him as well. He’s back with me, and we’ve taken back the name UB40, and we’re going to tour the world.”
UB40 Reunited includes the original bassist, Mickey Virtue, and eight younger musos. They will play Emmarentia Botanical Gardens next Saturday, at the civilised hour of midday. I put it to him that the choice of venue is a gesture of solidarity with the band’s rapidly ageing fan base.
“Well, it’s a natural thing to smell flowers as you get older,” Campbell concedes with a chortle. “There’s something about the pollen in flowers that stops the onset of dementia. That’s why elderly people do start sniffing flowers.”
Campbell, 54, has sniffed more than flowers in his time. For decades, he was an avid cokehead who also knocked back two bottles of whiskey a day, interspersed with bottles of wine. He kicked hard drugs a few years back, and limits his booze intake to wine.
I was 18 when they toured in 1994 — and sold cups of orange juice to fans from a backpack at their gig at Green Point Stadium. UB40 were in their pomp, clogging global airwaves with Can’t Help Falling in Love.
Campbell treasures that tour. “We did an enormous concert for 80 000 back then (at Soccer City stadium) — and when we sang Sing Our Own Song, we had 80 000 clenched fists singing Amandla Awethu! back at us. It was a big lip-wobbly moment for us all. Yeah, man!”
For the past few decades, UB40 have been seen as the kings of lightweight, apolitical reggae — a perception that Campbell resents. Indeed, the band won fame with Signing Off and Present Arms, two smoky, brass-laden manifestos of anti-Thatcher rage.
“I think we’re back to one in 10 unemployment now, aren’t we?” says Campbell. “I don’t think anything has changed. We’re still led by a coalition of foul Tories and revolting new Labourites.
“I think people kind of got us wrong, thought of us as a cover band. Of the 24 albums I made with UB40, three are cover albums: the Labour Of Love series. We had brilliant success with them. Red, Red Wine, Kingston Town. But of course there were 21 other self-penned albums. And you could choose any one of those and see that our lyrics were just as angry and vitriolic as in Signing Off. We’re saying the same things, and that’s never changed.”
Ali’s dad was Ian Campbell, a Scottish folk singer. “I grew up in a folk family but I really didn’t like folk music, I was into reggae, because we lived in south Birmingham, which was mainly a West Indian and Asian area. I grew up listening to Indian music as well but reggae was the music of the streets.” Now it’s the music of the botanical gardens. And that’s fine.
UB40 Reunited play Val de Vie Estate in Cape Town on April 4 and Emmarentia Dam in Joburg on April 5.
‘There’s something about the pollen in flowers that stops the onset of dementia’