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Obituary
of Blondel Keith Calnek
by Mark Williams
Rocksteady producer Blondel Keith Calnek, also known as Ken
Lack, died on June 6, 2001 after a long illness stemming from
heart problems. He was 67. He was living in Port St. Lucie,
Florida in recent times, but was relocated to Miami near one
of his sisters for his hospitalization. He was the youngest
of 8 children, only one of which remains in Jamaica. He left
Jamaica in the early 70s and only returned a handful of times
to visit family and friends.
Mr. Calnek
is best-known for his Caltone and JonTom (in honor of Johnny
Dizzy Moore and Tommy McCook) record labels that featured some
of the best rocksteady songs ever recorded. He had briefly been
the touring/road manager for the Skatalites up until Drummond's
demise, and used this connection to McCook and Taitt to then
go into producing records. The last Skatalites tune proper (sans
Drummond) was produced under his tutelage (title escapes me
now, but it came out on Caltone).
He was the
first person to produce Max Romeo, then singing with the Emotions,
and the Heptones. He was not a big-time producer, and recounted
to me several years ago how he'd lost the Heptones and their
"Fattie Fattie" tune to Coxson because he didn't want
to rush into the studio again so quickly with them, and they
promptly went to Coxson.
The Caltone/JonTom
catalogue combined is a relatively small one (a handful of songs
were recorded in the reggae era as well), but qualitatively
has long held rightful cult-status for the singular excellence
of the recordings. Most of this can probably be put down to
the musicians/arrangers that Calnek hired, which was either
Taitt or McCook's band. He would record either at WIRL (mostly)
or Treasure Isle, and Bunny Lee was a frequent "participant"
in those sessions. There are also still some unresolved questions
relating to tunes involving Phil Pratt, which may be incorrectly
accredited as Caltone productions.
reproduced
by permission of Mark Williams
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