Johnny Osbourne: "I've never regretted that I stopped smoking, as it made me a lot more serious and focused on my career!"

Johnny, instead of taking a trip down memory lane, I’d like to focus on ‘Right Right Time’, your recently released new album. But, it so happens that it also offers some glimpses into your past. You recorded the album with French veteran musician and producer Guillaume ‘Stepper’ Briard. What brought you guys together? 
Johnny Osbourne: “Back in 2012, the first time I came to France to play at the Garance Festival, I asked Fatta (founder and selector of Soul Stereo, red.) if he knew any good local bands who could back me on stage, and he pointed me towards Homegrown Band, the original French Connection. I went to a first rehearsal, and whatever riddim I asked them to play, they jumped right in. They feel the music, like I feel the music, so we haven’t parted ways since. We’ve become like one big family of sorts! (laughs)“

Was it also Stepper who coxed you into participating in the Inna De Yard-project?
Johnny Osbourne: “Stepper had told me about Inna De Yard, yes, but one time when I found myself in Paris, I was invited to go to a Tiken Jah Fakoly concert. At the venue I ran into Winston McAnuff. We go way back, so we started talking and he even introduced me to Nicolas and Romain, the guys behind the project, who were also there. Winston told me they were heading back to Jamaica to do some recordings for a new upcoming album and it just so happened I was going to be in Jamaica around that time as well. We exchanged phone numbers and they invited me to come up and check out their recording session in the hills. I liked what I saw and heard, because it was different and acoustic. I like to experiment and try different things, so it kind of peaked my curiosity, I decided to get involved and it turned out to be a very nice project.”

You did two tunes one the ‘Family Affair’ album, your own classic ‘Truths And Rights’, and a cover version of ‘Baltimore’, which you voiced together with Winston.
Johnny Osbourne: “Yeah, Winston wanted to do that tune and the producers of Inna De Yard thought it would be a good idea to have a second voice in there to create some nice harmonies. The original version was done by The Tamlins, who were a vocal harmony trio, so it made sense to me.”

If we don’t take into account the ‘World In A Crisis’ album, which was only released digitally back in 2018, then ‘Right Right Time’ is your very first studio album since ‘First Choice’, which was released way back in 2000.
Johnny Osbourne: “That’s exactly why we chose to name the album ‘Right Right Time’, because to me it felt like the right time to head back into the studio. Stepper had introduced me to the guys of Baco Records and they invited me to come and check out their studio in Bordeaux. It immediately reminded me of what Channel One used to be like back in the days. I don’t know how they managed to do it, but somehow that studio has a Jamaican sound, which immediately gave it a homely feel for me. Just listen to the album, it sounds like it was done in Jamaica! So, I have to give thanks to the engineer (Damien Coutrot, red.), who did a great job and big up to Baco Records!”

As I already mentioned at the beginning of the interview, the track list of ‘Right Right Time’ also delves into your musical past, as it contains several new versions of songs people will undoubtedly recognize. You have a vast catalogue to choose from, so how and why did you end up going for said songs in particular? I’m asking, because on closer inspection, they kind of offer a cross section of your entire career, including productions by King Jammy, Junjo Lawes and even from the period you spent in Canada…
Johnny Osbourne: “It’s like a whole lot of different Johnny’s in one! (laughs) That being said, it wasn’t me who picked out these particular songs. I think it were some of Stepper and the Baco crew’s personal favorites. I also want to add that personally I wasn’t always happy with the original versions of some of these songs. A lot of producers you work with are quite set in their ways or have a sound in mind they want to create, so they’re not necessarily open to listen to the personal input of the artists they are recording. Haven been given the chance to re-record these songs for this project was like a great opportunity to me, as I could finally record them as I originally intended them to be. A lot of my older albums sound alright, but they could have done with a little more finessing or finetuning if you want. It’s like when you’re cooking and you think a dish is done, but then you have a little taste and you notice it’s missing some seasoning to really make it pop! It’s been one of the main reasons why I’ve done so little recording before doing ‘Right Right Time’. I was just done compromising and felt that if I couldn’t do my music properly and give it the time and attention it deserved, I’d rather not record at all. I always perform my part to the best of my abilities and I expect the same from producers, engineers or musicians I work with. Sometimes it’s better to stay good friends and not do business together, then to do good business together and ending up not being friends anymore! (laughs)“

Let’s get a bit deeper into some of the tracks on ‘Right Right Time’. Starting with ‘Get Up’, which has a bit of a funky disco vibe nut unlike Bob Marley’s ‘Could You Be Loved’ going. Was that intentionally?
Johnny Osbourne: “Well, it was really Stepper who saw fit to rearrange the 1983 Prince Jammy (a track from Johnny’s ‘Water Pumping’ album, red.) original in this way, and seeing as I don’t dislike a bit of funky reggae, I just went with the flow and I think the new version really works!”

Then there’s ‘Oh My Jah Jah’, which has a melody that sounded strangely familiar to my ears, but which I couldn’t immediately place…
Johnny Osbourne: “(starts singing) Oh my papa…”

Exactly, it’s based on an old Swiss song from the 1939 musical ‘Der schwarze Hecht’. Were you already familiar with that tune?
Johnny Osbourne: “I knew an English version of that song from when I was still a child, and always wanted to create a Rasta version… (continues singing) …to me you are so wonderful! Oh my pa-pa, to me you are… But, to me, Jah is my papa, so it fit! (laughs)“

Everybody knows you as Johnny Osbourne, but you were born Errol Osbourne, which sounds just as cool to me. Why exactly did you feel the need to change your name to Johnny?
Johnny Osbourne: “I had three reasons to do that… Firstly I used to listen to a singer called Johnny Ace (an American rhythm-and-blues singer who had a string of hit singles in the mid-1950s, red.), who had a song that went (starts singing again) Just let me love you tonight, forget about tomorrow, cling to me with all your might and never let me go… (from 1953’s ‘Never Let Me Go’, red.). I used to practice, trying to sing that song just the way Johnny Ace did. Another song which had a great impact on me was ‘Venus’… (starts singing) Hey, Venus! Oh, Venus! Venus, if you will, please, send a little girl for me to thrill, a girl who wants my kisses… Originally recorded by Frankie Avalon in 1959, but I knew it in the 1968 cover version by Johnny Matis; the second Johnny my stage name pays homage to. In my early days I had formed a little group called The Soul Leaders with two of my friends, and we managed to convince a producer called J.J. Johnson to record one of our songs (‘Pour On The Sauce’, red.). Now, in those days you also had a radio show in Jamaica called ‘Pump It Or Dump It’, and every Wednesday night they used to play the newest releases, deciding wither to pump it or dump it, so basically if it would become a hit or not. Having recorded this tune for J.J., I was hesitant to release it under my own name, cause if the show decided to dump it, my name would already have been burned even before my career had taken off.  So I decided to record under the alias of Johnny Osbourne. J.J. never really promoted our recordings, so nothing ever came of it, but then I recorded tunes like ‘Come Back Darling’ and ‘Warrior’ for Winston Riley’s Techniques label, and all of a sudden people were screaming for Johnny Osbourne, but no one realized it was me! I continued recording for Winston Riley and eventually he released the ‘Come Back Darling’ album in 1970. By then I’d left Jamaica for Canada and wouldn’t return for the next decade, so people still didn’t know who Johnny Osbourne was! In Canada I joined a local outfit called Ishan People, made up of Jamaican immigrants (Johnny can be heard on their 1977 release ‘Ishan People’, red.). When I returned To Jamaica in 1979, I basically had to start my career from scratch and decided to continue where I left off, once again recording under the name of Johnny Osbourne. There’s a lot of people who also don’t know Osbourne is my real name, you know! And others knew me by my nick name, which is Bumpy. I’d always dreamt of recording at Studio One, but in my early days never got the chance to do so, so when I returned to Jamaica, one of the first things I did was go and speak to Mr. Dodd. I managed to get a foot in the door, I recorded what I still regard as one of my greatest albums to date, ‘Truths And Rights’ (Studio One, 1979, red.), and the rest is history!” 

That being said, if the stars had been slightly differently aligned, I’d be sitting across from a trumpeter right now.
Johnny Osbourne: “I know what you’re referring to and I did study the trumpet for a while when I was at Alpha Boys School, but in all honesty even back then I knew it would never be my thing… Lennie Hibbert was one of the greatest teachers or mentors you could have hoped for, but his teaching methods weren’t really my cup of tea. I’m a fast learner and am quick in picking up new things, but if you’re going to use a whip to teach me, my mind will be more on the whip then on what you’re trying to teach me. With Lennie it used to be a drumstick, but it’s still the same. They used to call that drumstick “the swellhead”, because it used to make our heads swell when he hit us with it! (laughs) He was a great musician and mentor none the less. Lennie used to tell us we also had to make ourselves look presentable when we came in into band practice. Even when our shirts were hanging out of our pants, he would tell us off! It was while I was learning how to play the trumpet, hearing its bell tone sound, that I started to realize that if I could make my voice resonate like that, it would sound even sweeter! So in the end my voice became my trumpet.”

Johnny, you don’t smoke or drink. Is that something you decided to do to protect and preserve your voice?
Johnny Osbourne: “No, no, no… Listen, I smoked so much weed in my time; plenty of good herbs! I’ve been smoking from a young age, because I grew up around a whole heap of Rasta who used to sell it in the area where I lived and most of the friends I hung around with also smoked herb, so it was like a natural thing. But I used to smoke so much weed, that sometimes, even when I had nuff things to do, I would feel so irie that I just would forget or tell myself I would do it later, but of course I never did! I used to smoke the chalice with the friends I hung around with, but this was at a place that was a taxi ride from where I lived. So every time I went there I would have to pay a taxi fare of about 15 Jamaican dollars. I used to drop of my dirty clothes at a dry cleaner near where I lived, but I spent so much time at the place where I smoked that often the dry cleaner would already be closed before I got there. Then I decided to switch to a dry cleaner that was closer to the place where I smoked, only to realize that now I would stay even longer at the smoking place and still would forget or postpone picking up my clothes! In short, my smoking habit was preventing me more and more from doing the things I needed to do. Apart from that, the part of my earnings that I was putting into buying herb was getting bigger and bigger! So, at one point I took the decision to take a six month break to see if I really need all that herb or if it had just become a load I was bearing. Those six months quickly turned into a year and I noticed things started to change. For example, when I used to eat, everything used to taste like weed, and after that year I suddenly started to taste things again like I was experiencing them for the very first time in my life! I haven’t smoked for over twenty years now… Before, I also believed I needed to smoke to sing, but I’ve since realized that I was just fooling myself and my voice has never sounded better! I still have the odd cup of herb tea or a herb cookie, but I’ve never regretted that I stopped smoking, as it made me a lot more serious and focused on my career.”