Blurb:

Chris Blackwell is a white Jamaican of upper-class background. As a young man
working at the island’s resorts, he became interested in recording local music. A
jazz LP in 1960 was the first release on his new Island Records label. It starred Bermudan
pianist Lance Haywood, who had been performing at a Jamaican resort, on
one side, and Jamaican guitarist Ernest Ranglin on the other. Island’s first big success
came in 1964 with Millie Small’s pop-ska cover of ‘My Boy Lollypop’, arranged
by Ranglin. It reached no.2 in both the US and UK charts, giving Blackwell an entrée
to overseas markets. By the early 1970s, when The Wailers began their association
with Island, it was a thriving reggae label internationally as well as at home and
had branched out as a force in UK rock and folk, with numerous successful album
releases. The association between The Wailers and Blackwell was not planned. The
group appeared in his London office in 1972 after an ill-fated UK tour organized
by JAD left them essentially abandoned in England. At this, their first meeting, The
Wailers so impressed Blackwell that he sent them away with a large cash advance to
record an LP of new material for his label. Blackwell no doubt recognized a potential
replacement for his most internationally successful reggae star, Jimmy Cliff, who
had recently left him. He could not have dreamt the full impact – artistic, financial
or cultural – of what ultimately would come of this deal.