[size=14pt]Gregory Isaacs dies at 59; Jamaican singer pioneered reggae style known as lovers rock[/size]
By Richard Cromelin, Special to The Los Angeles Times
October 26, 2010

One of the genre's major stars in the 1970s, the 'Cool Ruler' had a polished sound and lyrics that focused on tales of love. He was also known for his designer suits and an outlaw persona that included cocaine addiction.



Gregory Isaacs in 1992 during a performance at the Veterans Auditorium in Culver City. (Axel Koester / For The Times)



Gregory Isaacs, the Jamaican singer who pioneered the style of reggae music known as lovers rock and became one of the genre's major stars in the 1970s, has died. He was 59.

Isaacs died Monday at his home in London, according to his manager, Copeland Forbes. He had been diagnosed with lung cancer last year.

Known as the "Cool Ruler," as he styled himself in the title of a 1978 album, Isaacs cut a dapper figure in his designer suits and silk shirts — an image suited to a style of music that emphasized romantic yearning over reggae's more traditional themes of spiritual and political transformation.

"I'd say he's one of the three geniuses I've known in the reggae music business, and I've known everyone," said Gary Himelfarb, who recorded several Isaacs albums for his Washington, D.C.-based RAS Records label in the 1990s.

"Gregory was the kind of person who could walk through a room of 20 people and come out the other side and tell you what everybody was wearing," added Himelfarb, whose professional name is Doctor Dread. "He could sit at a piano and compose incredible tunes. He was really brilliant. He was on a whole other level than your typical Jamaican artist."

Isaacs also cultivated an outlaw persona — a "rude boy" in Jamaican slang. He had frequent run-ins with the authorities (he once estimated his number of arrests, mostly on drug- and gun-related charges, at around 50) and suffered from a serious cocaine addiction.

Those tendencies might have held him back from even greater achievements, especially in the U.S. In 1982, shortly after the death of reggae's iconic leader, Bob Marley, New York Times critic Robert Palmer wrote that Isaacs "could be reggae's most likely candidate for stardom in the United States."

That was the year of his biggest hit, the playfully suggestive "Night Nurse," but instead of capitalizing on its success, Isaacs spent six months in jail in Kingston, Jamaica. His drug habit contributed to his notorious unreliability and the eventual deterioration of his supple voice, but in recent years he said that he had brought it under control, and reports on some 2009 performances were highly positive.

"Drugs are a debasing weapon," he said in a 2007 interview with London's Daily Telegraph. "It was the greatest college ever, but the most expensive school fee ever paid — the Cocaine High School. I learnt everything, and now I've put it on the side."

Isaacs was born in Kingston on July 15, 1951, and grew up in Denham Town, a poor section of the Jamaican capital. In school, he enjoyed reading, composition and painting, and at home he listened to American R&B on his family's rented radio.

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-gregory-isaacs-20101026,0,2253575.story

since yesterday.

Oh what a loss!