Masterpiece: Equal Rights

[Today: Peter Tosh would like to kick your ass...]

Peter Tosh was no cuddly, teddy bear Rasta. A former member of The Wailers, he was born Winston Hubert McIntosh and later dubbed ‘The Toughest’ – a well and hard-earned nickname. Tosh’s former band-mate Bob Marley rose to international stardom through a combination of hard-line politics, rastafarian awareness, and sunny positivity. By contrast, Peter Tosh was always deadly serious – even when he sings about ganja it comes with an edge that doesn’t sound mellow at all. It’s nearly impossible to picture Tosh singing a song like Marley’s ‘Three Little Birds’ – the romantic element of that tune was as foreign to his music and his love of buckshot and menace was to Marley’s.

And Tosh never sounded tougher than on his 1977 album Equal Rights. Album opener ‘Get Up, Stand Up’ sets the tone, with a somber reading of a Tosh-written Wailers classic. From there the chip never leaves his shoulder, and he cajoles the rich (‘Downpressor Man’), threatens physical harm (‘Stepping Razor’), offers defiance (‘African’ and ‘I Am That I Am’) and demands justice (‘Apartheid’ and the title track). Over the course of these eight songs, he sings like he’d just as soon kick your ass as go on with the music. In many ways he was the gangsta rasta – like Dr. Dre and Eazy E, Tosh doesn’t want to win you over or be your friend, he just wants to tell you what’s going on.

But it’s doubtful that either of those rappers would have the scallions to threaten to shoot Keith Richards, as Tosh did in the summer of 1981. According to Richards’ 1992 biography by Victor Bockris, when Keef came to Jamaica and wished to re-take the villa that he’d lent Tosh, the latter said “If yuh come anywhere near here, I’ll shoot yuh.” Equal Rights has that same kind of attitude, and that’s why I love it.

Listen: Stepping Razor

Listen: Downpressor Man

Tags: Bob Marley, Dr. Dre, Eazy E, Equal Rights, Keith Richards, Masterpiece, Peter Tosh, reggae, The Wailers, Victor Bockris