Millie Small opens a door nobody had opened

In 1964 a seventeen-year-old from Clarendon reached number two in both Britain and the United States with "My Boy Lollipop" — the first Jamaican record to sell in those numbers anywhere. It was cut in London, not Kingston, which is the pattern: Jamaican music has usually crossed over when something outside Jamaica translated it. She opened the door and then largely disappeared from the story told about it, which is the other pattern this path follows.

person · Well supportedMillie Small

Millie Small (Millicent Dolly May Small CD, 6 October 1947 - 5 May 2020), born in Clarendon, was, in the words of the reference works, "the Caribbean's first international recording star and its most successful female performer". Her "My Boy Lollipop", released in early 1964 when she was sixteen, reached number two in both the UK and the US — held off the top by the Four Pennies' "Juliet" and the Beach Boys' "I Get Around" respectively — and has since sold more than seven million copies. It was the record that launched Island Records into mainstream pop, although Chris Blackwell licensed it to Fontana rather than overextend Island's then-meagre resources, and it appeared on Mercury's Smash subsidiary in the US. It is also cited as the first hit recorded in the bluebeat style, a direct ancestor of reggae.

Open record →