SUNDAY, AUGUST 3, 2008, AT 7 PM

Concert generously sponsored by WaMu.

Media Sponsor: KCRW

The tenth anniversary season of the KCRW World Festival at the Hollywood Bowl continues with the 7th Annual Reggae Night on Sunday, August 3, 2008, at 7 p.m. Headlining are crossover reggae supergroup, UB40, performing hit after hit including, “Red Red Wine,” “Here I Am,” and “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” Warming things up are the soulful reggae veteran vocalist Beres Hammond and reggae/dancehall phenomenon Barrington Levy. KCRW DJ Tom Schnabel hosts.

UB40 is arguably the world’s biggest reggae band. The band’s combined single and album sales are in excess of 70 million with a staggering 41 Top 40 singles worldwide. From the very first album release, Signing Off, in 1980, UB40 has continually been both a worldwide ambassador of reggae music and an advocate of political and social conscience. In June 2008, the band released its impressive 25th album, titled TwentyFourSeven. Over a career spanning three decades, repeated gold and platinum awards, chart-topping hits and countless sold-out arena tours, UB40 has transcended race, gender, genres and generations to popularize reggae around the globe.

Over the course of a 30-year career, Beres Hammond has poured his smoky-sweet voice over every kind of “riddim” track, from the funked-up reggae jams of the '70s fusion band Zap Pow to the lush instrumentation of his 1976 album Soul Reggae to the spare digital beat of his 1985 dancehall breakthrough "What One Dance Can Do." His voice is an instrument of both subtlety and power, reminiscent of an Otis Redding or Teddy Pendergrass.

Reggae/dancehall singer Barrington Levy released his first album in 1977 at the tender age of 13. His popularity spread like wildfire in Jamaica, and by the age of fourteen, Levy was the hottest performer at the local dancehalls. Thirty years later, Levy continues to be a sought-after performer and guest vocalist while his hit singles are still a staple at dancehalls across the globe.

UB40, Beres Hammond, and Barrington Levy all make their Hollywood Bowl debuts at the Seventh Annual Reggae Night at the Hollywood Bowl.

UB40 first tasted global success with the 1983 release Labour of Love, their tribute to the musicians who had inspired and influenced them. The first single, “Red, Red Wine,” shot straight to No.1 in the UK and stayed on the British charts for two years. It was also the band’s first No.1 single in America. Baggariddim, their adventurous and prolific 1985 collaboration with local DJ’s continued their success with two unforgettable singles, “Don’t Break My Heart,” and “I Got You Babe,” a duet with the lead singer of The Pretenders, Chrissie Hynde. Hynde joined the band again for “Breakfast in Bed,” the hit off their 1988 eponymous album, UB40. 1989 saw the release of Labour of Love II, from which “Here I Am” and “The Way You Do The Things You Do” were both big hits in the U.S. In the ‘90s, UB40 saw their biggest hit yet with the release of Promises and Lies, which sold over 9 million copies worldwide and produced the smash hit, “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” In the new millennium, UB40 released The Fathers Album, a collaboration with reggae greats Toots Hibbert, Gregory Isaacs and John Hold. In 2003, they received an Ivor Novello Award for International Achievement. That same year, they released Homegrown which included the hit song, “Swing Low,” their 49th UK chart single. The only other bands to have notched up more hits in the UK are The Shadows, Status Quo and Queen. In April 2005, UB40 united with Roger Daltrey, Eric Clapton, and John Mayer to play their first show ever at the Royal Albert Hall to benefit the Teenage Cancer Trust. They also performed at Live 8 in London’s Hyde Park with the likes of U2, Pink Floyd, Coldplay, Madonna, Robbie Williams and The Who. In 2006, UB40 announced that they would work with the Birmingham Repertory Theater to stage a new musical based on their most successful album, Promises and Lies. And, in June 2008, UB40 released their 25th album, TwentyFourSeven, the band’s final recording with founding member Ali Campbell.

The '90s proved to be BERES HAMMOND's decade, during which he blazed a trail of modern classics for a variety of producers. It started in 1990 with his album, A Love Affair, which raised his popularity to new heights. Hammond’s sophisticated musical taste translated easily across cultural divides, yet the international reggae massive has remained his most loyal fan base. A brief encounter with Elektra Records in 1994 yielded the album In Control, but for the rest of the decade, Hammond focused his attention on his own label and production company, Harmony House, distributed by VP Records. In the last few years, Harmony House and VP have released memorable albums like Love From A Distance and A Day In The Life, which have in turn yielded chart-topping hits like "Can You Play Some More" and "Can't Stop A Man." With the release of Music Is Life, Hammond is poised to share his considerable gifts with an even larger audience. For Hammond, music truly is life and few artists can tell a story and bring it to life more vividly than he can.

Since the day BARRINGTON LEVY met record producers Junjo Lawes and Hyman Wright and subsequently released his first few hit singles, he has been a staple on the reggae/dancehall scene. Throughout the ‘80s he was an anticipated performer at Reggae Sunsplash and continually released hit singles in both Jamaica and the UK. His crossover success in England earned Levy a Best Vocalist prize at the British Reggae Awards. In 1998, he released Living Dangerously, which included a dynamic collaboration with one of Jamaica's most prolific DJs, Bounty Killer. The release was one of Levy's most successful singles since the start of the ‘90s, and earned him recognition with the younger generation of dancehall patrons. After the death of Sublime's Bradley Nowell, Levy and the surviving members of the band recorded "Right Back,” under the new moniker Long Beach Dub All Stars. To this day, Levy is consistently tapped for collaborations. In 2004, he contributed to a track on the album White People by Handsome Boy Modeling School, a project by Prince Paul and Dan the Automator. Most recently, Levy made a guest appearance on the single "No Fuss" by Red-1 of the Rascalz, from his 2007 album Beg For Nothing.

One of the largest natural amphitheaters in the world, with a seating capacity of nearly 18,000, the HOLLYWOOD BOWL has been the summer home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic since its official opening in 1922, and in 1991 gave its name to the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, a resident ensemble that has filled a special niche in the musical life of Southern California. The 2004 season introduced audiences to a revitalized Hollywood Bowl, featuring a newly-constructed shell and stage and the addition of four stadium screens enhancing stage views in the venue. To this day, $1 buys a seat at the top of the Bowl for many of the Los Angeles Philharmonic's concerts. While the Bowl is best known for its sizzling summer nights, during the day California's youngest patrons enjoy "SummerSounds: Music for Kids at the Hollywood Bowl," the Southland's most popular summer arts festival for children, now in its 40th season. Attendance figures over the past several decades have soared: in 1980 the Bowl first topped the half-million mark and close to one million admissions have been recorded. In February 2008, the Hollywood Bowl was named Best Major Outdoor Concert Venue for the fourth year in a row at the 19th Annual Pollstar Concert Industry Awards. The Bowl's summer music festival has become as much a part of a Southern California summer as beaches and barbecues, the Dodgers, and Disneyland.

EDITORS PLEASE NOTE:

SUNDAY, AUGUST 3, 2008, at 7 PM

HOLLYWOOD BOWL, 2301 N. Highland Ave. in Hollywood



KCRW’s World Festival



UB40

BERES HAMMOND

BARRINGTON LEVY



Concert generously sponsored by WaMu.

Media Sponsor: KCRW

Tickets ($10 - $96) are on sale now at HollywoodBowl.com, at the Hollywood Bowl Box Office (Tuesday–Sunday, noon–6 p.m.), or by calling 323.850.2000, or Ticketmaster at 213.480.3232, and at all Ticketmaster outlets. Groups of 10 or more may be eligible for a 20% discount, subject to availability; call 323.850.2050 for further details.

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