“It’s de glamour boys here again we are going to rule Port-of-Spain …”
What was the Mighty Sparrow attempting: a rescue of our women who fell on hard times in the “war days” and had to “make out how dey could?” Or was he “seeking revenge with meh heart and soul” for Yankee Sex Imperialism and Plunder?
He may also have been striving for psychological and sexual healing of the male ego badly bruised during the period of Yankee occupation: “no more Yankees to spoil we fete Dorothy have to take what she get … she taking two shilling with ah smile.”
When “de Doctor” retook Chaguaramas and sent the Yankees on their way and with the inevitable return to packotay, hand fares in the gateways and barrack yards of the city, Sparrow was not finished with his verbal sexual retaliation: “no more hotel to rest they head” ... for “Jean and Dinah ...”
“Ah hear dey have ah new campaign cleaning Port-of-Spain,” but to do so effectively, Slinger advised the PoS City Council: “They should hold Marabunta Jean and then hold Pickey Head Eileen and then hold Stinking Mouth Doreen if they want to keep the city clean.”
What were the objectives of Sparrow? Was he merely articulating the currency of the man-woman relationships of the period? Should he have had more of an understanding and sympathetic feel for the women who I was told by one such lady: “We had to mine we pickney who them wutless father had leave and gone? Plenty of them come out doctors and lawyers yuh know.”
In a different role, Sparrow, as one of the victims of the post-colonial society with its moralistic position on cultural creations and practices which came from the said barrack yards of the period, articulated total identification with another group of social outcasts: “Calypsonians really ketch hell for an long time, to associate yuhself with them was ah big crime, if yuh sister talk to ah steelband man yuh family want to break she hand, put she out, lick out every teeth in she mouth, pass yuh OUTCAST.”
It’s difficult at times to reconcile the attitude towards the steelband man of the early period with that of the present, who are idolised on Panorama evening into the night and early morning. But is real appreciation being extended beyond the enthusiastic applause, the identification with the band of choice by the wearing of its T-shirt, even pushing pan on Carnival day?
Not too incidentally, an effort to insert the steelpan on a reported new $100 note has been stymied, we shall await the outcome of that interesting development.
The badjohnism of the 1940s into the 1960s was a signal feature of the times at the level of the steelbands and the life Behind and in Front the Bridge of the Port-of-Spain Dry River.
Sparrow inserted himself in retaliation, fighting on the side of the victims of the Bad Johns but with a high degree of ambivalence towards the “Gunslingers”. “Sparrow selling guns nowadays, that’s what really pays ... When yuh ketch gun fever your whole body does start to shiver, this time yuh ready to attack like Audie Murphy into Hell and Back ... if yuh see ah man who ent fraid to get kill just give him a one-way ticket to Boot Hill.
“Ah young and strong ah ent fraid ah soul in town … if yuh smart clear de way ... if yuh think yuh bad make yuh play.”
Here was Sparrow making a link between the Hollywood movies and the influence they had on the Bad Johns who would crowd into Pyramid and Royal theatres for 12:30 to witness “gun play” on the screens; even adopt names: “Jack Slade”.
Ironically, or perhaps in keeping with the badjohnism which he sang on, his real-life experience came: “Me alone against ten, ten vicious men, Ten to One is Murder ... ah remember ah had ah chicken at Miramar, ah say to mehself that was meh last supper but ah getaway … they take off in meh tail with big stick and boulder, the fella in front was a very good pelter … ah hear putow pow and de crowd start to scatter.” In reflecting on the lyrics, they sound like a defence prepared for the courthouse: ‘Self-defence, your honour:’ “Not ah police in de area.”
Sparrow’s Bad John tales and badjohnism travelled the distance from “when I was young and growing up in town, all of them bad johns used to slap me down … now I am ah rebel ah seeking meh revenge in any kinda way, I am a devil … any time we meet man to man is blood and sand.”
The pinnacle of his boasts had to do with his claimed successful encounters with real bad men with big reps: “Ah beat men like Gold Teeth, Copper Head and Syms, Pringay, Jap and Boysie Singh … the great Fire Kong he and all did fraid me in town … ah destroy ah whole town just to get one man.”
Was he a warrior on behalf the society, made so by the violent men?
To be continued.
Tony Rakhal-Fraser–freelance journalist, former reporter/current affairs programme host and news director at TTT, programme producer/current affairs director at Radio Trinidad, correspondent for the BBC Caribbean Service and the Associated Press, and graduate of UWI, CARIMAC, Mona, and St Augustine – Institute of International Relations.
