Junior Murvin's 'Muggers' a good set (if you can take the falsetto)

Album: Muggers in the Street

Artiste: Junior Murvin

Label: Greensleeves

Genre:Reggae

Junior Murvin is known primarily for the classic Police and Thieves and Cool Out Son, a real rocker on the Real Rock rhythm which he starts with "son don't put your hat where you can't reach it" (many a sound boy has been on the receiving end of a dub plate of that one).

The bad news is neither of those songs is on Muggers in the Streets, the 1984 set recently reissued by Greensleeves as it dips into its back catalogue. The good news is that the finest consistent falsettos in reggae (Sizzla and Courtney John have taken a go at the high-flying singing style in recent months) are on the album.

In fact, it is there in loads, Murvin going lower on a part of Jahovah's Children and alternating lines in his different tones on Strikes and Demonstrations (there's the low on "worldwide crisis is at large" and the high coming in on "at home and abroad".

So whether you are going to take onto this 10-track set produced by the late Henry 'Junjo' Lawes depends in large part on how much high frequency singing you can take. It is, of course, very well controlled, but it is still a lot for me.

So although Muggers in the Street is a very good set musically (check the horns on Jahovah's Children and Strikes and Demonstrations), the lyrics are not blowing me away. Although the topics are diverse and competent enough, (he sticks mostly to social issues, but dips into a compliment to Jamaican Girls) and gets philosophical on I'll Follow You, it is a lot of falsetto to go through.

For the Police and Thieves fans the title track, Muggers in the Street should sound very familiar. It utilises the same melody and music as the classic musical tale of the clash of the legal and illegal gunmen, the lyrics being adjusted to "mug everybody in the street".

So, in the end, it comes down to a matter of just how much of the delivery you can take. Junior Mervin's vocals are not, of course, not a false falsetto but, for me, 10 songs of it is a lot to sit through.