Issue 66 (March/April 2004)

We find out who’s really who in West Indies cricket, profile the brilliant anti-colonial theorist Franz Fanon, explore the 365 beaches of Antigua, talk to hard-working Trinidadian fashion designer Meiling and remember legendary jazz trumpeter Ellsworth “Shake” Keane plus all our regular departments and a whole lot more.

Aston "Family Man" Barrett. Photograph by Tim Barrow/Urbanimage.tv

Bassmasters

The classic reggae beat is built on the interaction of drum and bass guitar. To Garry Steckles’s ears, there’s nothing in the world to compare with a solid reggae bass line
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Frantz Fanon. Photo courtesy Grove/Atlantic

Frantz Fanon: black skin, no mask

Frantz Fanon was a brilliant, maverick thinker, a theorist of anti-colonialism who tried to understand the damaged psyche of his native Martinique and the violence that racked his adopted country, Algeria, in its struggle for independence. His writings — especially Black Skin, White Masks and The Wretched of the Earth — are lauded by contemporary postcolonial scholars, but few manage to grasp the complexity of his thought or the depth of his humanism. Jeremy Taylor searches for the man behind the revolutionary icon, and ponders Fanon's relevance to the 21st century world
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Ffryes Beach. Photo by Mike Toy

Essential Antigua: a traveller’s guide

Antigua’s fabled 365 beaches are just the beginning of the attractions of this popular tourist destination, conventionally positioned along the Antillean chain, at "the heart of the Caribbean". Tranquil, rolling countryside dotted with old churches and windmills; the sprawling English Harbour district, centered around an 18th- century navel yard; sailing diving, cricket, and "the Caribbean's greatest summer carnival"; plus miles and miles of pink and golden beaches. And then there is sister island Barbuda, where visitors learn what it really means to get away from it all. Melanie Etherington offers an easygoing introduction to her beautiful adopted island
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Brian Lara of the West Indies in action. Photo by Hamish Blair/Getty Images

Who’s really who in West Indies cricket

With their (painful) South Africa tour just behind them, and as they prepare for the arrival of their English and Bangladeshi visitors, the West Indies cricket team is once again in the glare of public scrutiny. As impassioned fans across the Caribbean debate the state of the game, one big question recurs: who's calling the shots? Who's setting the agenda? Georgia Popplewell polls three outspoken experts and compiles a list of the real powers- that- be in West Indies cricket.
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Tanya Stephens. Photograph courtesy VP Records

What’s fun and fresh in the Caribbean this month

Buzzworthy: Tanya Stephens speaks her mind about sex and power; Nigel Harris heads back to UWI; Ria Ramkissoon creates high-drama handbags; Christopher Chambers is a man of mystery; Imran Khan calls it like he sees it; Michelle Henderson makes sweet creole jazz; and Sugar Daddy teaches Europe the soca beat. Catch this month's reading picks and new music releases to get you in the groove- from soca to pan
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Ellsworth "Shake" Keane

Real “Shake” Keane

Born into a musical family in St Vincent, Ellsworth "Shake" Keane was one of the international jazz world's most admired musicians in the 1960s, but for 20 years he disappeared from the limelight, devoting himself to the writing of poems. Philip Nanton investigates the contradictions and juxtapositions in the life of this "musical chameleon" who saw jazz as nothing less than a mode of being
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