OF ALL THE great harmonising groups of reggae, there is something particularly transcendent about The Congos, whose 1977 spiritual opus Heart Of The Congos has been hailed as the Pet Sounds of roots. Surprisingly, their first, foundational session with producer Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry at his legendary Black Ark studio was as much serendipity as design.
Speaking from his Long Island, NY apartment, bass singer Derrick ‘Watty’ Burnett recalls the scene. “Cedric [Myton] and [Ashanti] Roy [Johnson] were singing and Scratch said, ‘Cedric, you sing high, Roy, you sing middle.’ Then he said, ‘You need an anchor.’ Then he looked at me and said, ‘Watty, you be the anchor.’ That’s how I joined The Congos.”
“We did the track Fisherman first,” he goes on. “Scratch put on the tape and we…
