For Posterity

For this episode, I talk with David Katz -- music writer, film producer, dj, vinylist and Lee "Scratch" Perry biographer -- about his multi-decades long relationship with dub music. Tune in to this very special (very trippy) episode of For Posterity.

Singer, songwriter Naomi Cowan is back for a solo conversation about her current project and so much more. She joined me back in 2020 with her fellow Rock & Groove Riddim singers — Sevana, Lila Iké, and Jaz Elise — and today she talks with me about the bright star energy she has brought to Star Girl, the first installment of what will be a succession of mixtapes. 

On this episode you will hear “Gun Shot”, “The Voice”, and “Naked” by Naomi Cowan, as well as “Ism Schism” by Naomi’s mother Carlene Davis. Stream Naomi Cowan's entire catalog on Apple or Spotify and follow her on socials @naomicowan.

Part 2 of my conversation with Susan Cadogan highlights how every life touches another. It shows that every individual's story is made up of all of the many places, experiences, and people who mattered, influenced, shaped, hurt, and loved them. Part 2 begins at the intersection of Susan Cadogan and Glen Adams. Theirs is a love story that is so special that it just begged to be spotlighted, as bittersweet as it is.  Listen and learn about the acts of loving someone. Learn too that many of our artistes need our support just as much as we need their artistry. Go on now; press play on For Posterity. There's so much inside.

As always, big up the music and makers of music featured in this episode: "I Just Love you" inspired by Glen Adams, written and sung by Susan Cadogan, and "Do It Baby AKA Nice and Easy" sung by Susan Cadogan and produced by Lee 'Scratch' Perry.

This is a conversation* with the Jamaican lover's rock singer Susan Cadogan. For many, her voice was made famous during the early 1970s by producer Lee Scratch Perry; but as you tune into the richness of this conversation she shares with me, you'll be able to hear another side of the record.  In this episode and the next, I explore the depths of Susan Cadogan's memory so that listeners can really start to understand how this woman’s music career really has "Hurt So Good". I give thanks for the music heard in this episode: "On Ma Journey Now" by Lola Veronica Cadogan and "Do It Baby, AKA Nice and Easy" by Susan Cadogan/ Lee Scratch Perry. 

*Note: This conversation with Susan Cadogan was recorded before the passing of my guest's father Rev. Dr. Claude Langton Cadogan on August 20, 2021 and before the passing of Lee 'Scratch' Perry on August 29, 2021.

I took a little hiatus to process and recharge. But now I'm baaaaaack!  For Posterity is back with a new season that will, as always, tease your memory and pique your curiosity. Press play because it's time to begin again.

My guest is Mr. Christopher Creary and our conversation is about plants that are mistakenly believed to be native to or indigenous to the Caribbean. This conversation was recorded at the former Hope Experimental Garden (now the Royal Hope Botanic Gardens).  If you’re ever at the Gardens, pay Mr. Creary a visit. You will be glad you did. For now, enjoy this episode about how plants, communities, and street names reveal Jamaica's colonial history. Reader’s reference: William Fawcett’s “The Public Gardens and Plantations of Jamaica” published in The Botanical Gazette (1897), the novels and poetry collections of Jamaica Kincaid, Olive Senior, and Lorna Goodison. Musical references: “Over the Hills and Far Away” performed by Hilary James and Simon Mayer (via YouTube) and “Where Is My Home” by Aisha (via Bandcamp).

My guest for this episode is the one and only poet-professor-Portlander, Ishion Hutchinson.  We recorded this conversation via video conferencing as we each lazed in our yards, feeling tethered by the hammock of history and comforted by thoughts of home. Hear macaws and other birds endemic to Jamaica, sing meaningfully as a kind of soundtrack to our chat. Hear how our audio sometimes sizzles and our voices sometimes glitch, and think of how the digital creates a kind of dub-like recording.  Think of sound and imagination as you listen to this one. Think of home, homecoming, and returns. Think of maroons and coves. Think of yourself and your nation and know that we're always home. ***Recommended reading: Ishion Hutchinson's House of Lords and Commons (2016) and Far District (2010), and any and all poems by Derek Walcott. 

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is it that we see?  With public debate booming about a young girl's right to wear her hair in dreadlocks at school, one wonders if any of us are ready to take a long look at ourselves in the mirror of history. Are we yet ready to be independent? My guest for episode two is my friend LA Wanliss. She is a poet, writer, editor, teacher, and dramaturg here in Kingston, Jamaica.  She joins me to discuss the performance of the national via representations of the personal and vice versa, as the two are always linked. As you listen, you may find fragments of yourself in this conversation; but more than that, I hope that you find a desire to look more critically at the idea of independence and identity. Suggested Reading: Una Marson's "Kinky Hair Blues" (1937), Roger Mais' "Now we Know" (1944) and "Where the Roots Lie" (1940), and Jamaica Kincaid's Annie John (1983). <>

This episode is about the collision of past and future and the making of an uncomfortable present.  In this conversation with my friends John and Valerie, they talked to me about 1970s Jamaica. During the Manley years, the country was sent into a kind of lockdown, but this was also a time of innovative opportunity and identity building. Together we discussed how race and access impact everything from fashion to employment to the uneven hand of the law. This episode is the Season 1 closer and it clarifies just what is meant by posterity. Big up to Future, Kendrick Lamar, Jah9, and Lila Ike for their musical expression.

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Stitched together under self-isolation, this episode of For Posterity sits curiously between science and science fiction, somewhere between literary escape and writing reality.  As I consider the possibility that we are living in a kind of "end of days", I realize that it's all about the word and how words will, ultimately, save us all.  Well, words and washing our hands.  In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, these are the remotely gathered voices of a few dear writer friends, sharing their own words in their own voices.  You'll hear from Jamaican writer and Renaissance man Roland Watson-Grant, Dominican American scholar-poet-painter Ines P. Rivera Prosdocimi, and Trinidadian artist-activist-attorney Caroline Mair-Toby.  Press play and escape into words with me.