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One World Tribe's 'Unity and Diversity' has more soul, brims with more vitality, than half the discs that pass for music on corporate labels.

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On Broadway, Savion Glover brings da funk, brings da noise and it's good, very good. On Unity and Diversity, Erie's One World Tribe not only brings da funk and da noise but da reggae, R&B, dancehall, rap, African chant, Latin, rock, and enough horns and cookin' percussion to get an entire island chain moving.

And it's good, very good. This disc has more soul, brims with more vitality, than half the discs that pass for music on corporate labels. Jam-packed with 74 minutes of music, Unity and Diversity shows off One World Tribe's many faces and facets to astonishing effect.

To be sure, it's not only a big band - with ten members - but a mighty diverse one. Members boast credentials in a variety of musical genres, including classical, jazz, reggae, rock, Latin, funk and R&B. With One World Tribe, they find a way to bring all those under one roof in a joyous, celebratory way.

What ties it all together - more than the world-music tag - is a common vision. Their assorted songwriters - and pretty much everybody contributes - ascribe to a similar world view. It's a we're-all-in-this-together thing, so let's-get-along utopianism; a belief that one universal truth governs us all. They mistrust power, decry poverty and violence, urge tolerance and respect of people's differences. And yet - beyond the lyrics - they say all this by the simple act of standing together on stage, making music. It's one thing to preach unity and harmony, regardless of race and sex and religion, and another to actually DO it, play it live, loud and proud.

AND DID THE DOC SAY THEY PLAY
it good, very good? Musicianship here is first-rate, ditto the production and mixing.

Many Styles, One Band

'I wanted to see what the reaction would be when ...the first song was reggae and the next song was funk. Would people accept that?' Five years later, they're still saying yes to Kennedy Thompson and One World Tribe.

One night after Chick corea and Orign helps initiate the new Pepsi Amphitheater, One World Tribe takes over. No one's happier about that prospect than Kennedy Thompson, the Tribe bandleader.

"He's one of my favorite artists!" exclaimed Thompson. "I've seen Corea like four times. Chick Corea's Elektric Band is one of my bands. Yeah, I'm going to be in the front for Chick Corea."

Musical adventurers such as Corea and Carlos Santana inspire Thompson and One World Tribe, the long-running Erie crew that refuses to play favorites with musical genres. From reggae to soul, hip-hop to funk, jazz to salsa to African pop, they cover styles like water covers the globe. For Thompson, that's the natural path to follow, the only one that makes sense.

"I was always a person who was into so many things," said Kennedy. "I could never understand how people couldn't like more than one style of music. My taste was so varied. I wanted to hear all those other things. I was into Latin music. Anything with a strong rhythmic presence, I was there."

Thompson remembers making an Earth, Wind and Fire record his first musical purchase. He attended Cathedral Prep, then studied music at Mercyhurst College, where he continued widening his range. His CD collection spans a wild, woolly gamut from AC / DC to McCoy Tyner, John Coltrane to Rolling Stones, Eddie Palmeri to Rolling Stones (sic). Thompson was determined to incorporate his varied tastes into one band. Why pick one style when you can do them all?"

"I wanted to see what the reaction would be when a band went on stage and the first song was reggae and the next song was funk or whatever," he said. "Would people accept that?"

Five years later, dance-mad, arm-waving crowds supply the answer. Yeah, mon.

On two separate nights, more than 700 people turned out to see One World Tribe at the new Docksider. In Buffalo - at Broadway Joe's and the Calumet - crowds from 300 to 700 regularly turn out. That crowd covers as wide a range as their music, too, from professors to students, from bankers to hippies.

"We have a very diverse crowd," said Thompson. "Matty [Walker] and I went to Cleveland to the Parliament-Funkadelic show to promote George Clinton [at the Warner last November], and we were like 'Does this crowd remind you of anyone else's crowd? Yeah. Ours.' It's similar to the Clinton and P-Funk All-stars crowd, really diverse."

Makes sense, considering this band appeals to so many tastes. That stew never sits still, either. Senegal-born drummer M'Baye Diagne has become a permanent guest Tribesman, of sorts. Whenever not previously engaged, Diagne - who lives in Buffalo - joins the Tribe.

Continued on next page

One World Tribe will appear Friday at 10 p.m. on the mainstage of the Erie Summer Festival of the Arts at Liberty Park's Pepsi Ampitheater, West Bayfront Parkway. Admission is free.

One World

But they share a common spirit and vision. Thompson said One World Tribe - like Corea, Santana, and Bob Marley, his musical heroes - aims to uplift and inspire.

"Those people are the true rebels," said Thompson. "People like Santana are not afraid to stand on the hardest issues. ... He has always been positive in his music, he speaks to consciousness and upliftment. And that's what we're about. So no matter how dark things get and how dark the world of music gets, [we consider] Santana and Bob Marley and those people to be the light in the darkness."

Lately, Thompson sees a newer artist forging a similar path as his heroes. He hopes Lauryn Hill sparks a trend away from negative music.

"Most music coming out now is about destructive things," said Thompson. "I see some of this stuff, and I'm like, 'How can these people be into this?' Some of it is really scary. I don't want to name names, but you know who's saying what, and that stuff's scary. Some kids don't have too many things to turn them in the right direction, and they're getting an earful of that stuff, and it's not right.

"But once in awhile a new artist comes along like Lauryn Hill who represents a lot of positivity in what she's doing. And she's rare. She proves you can come out and be positive and sell records. That gives you hope."

Meanwhile, "Tell Them" serves up righteous reggae and the percussion-driven "Unity a Parte" opens with tribal drums before sequeing into an intriguing blend of bossa nova and samba. Meanwhile, Frank Singer cuts loose with some funk-infected guitar work. It's a tune that starts intense and keeps building, like "Remain in Light"-era Talking Heads.

"World Today" also features some rippling piano in the sparkling, Latin-rocker "No Looking Back," while "Resistance" opens in a churchy gospel / R&B vein. "Touba (Holy City)," M'Baye Diagne's bouncy, infectious groove of African reggae, closes the CD just as it began - on a highly dancable note.

Now, will a label take a chance on One World Tribe? In an era of teen pop, where does sophisticated world-beat music fit in?

"It's going to take a label that has some vision to try to push some different stuff at radio," said Thompson. "Because our stuff is a little different. But I think it'll sell. I have no doubt if you play some of this stuff and let it sink into people's heads, it'll sell a couple million copies, easy. But radio is so in a box with its format, it doesn't want to try anything new. They're scared to put anything new on the air."

But One World Tribe - together six years, despite an oversized lineup that can range from 11 to 13 members - will stay the course.

"We haven't reached our goals," said Thompson. "[When] you know you can't reach your goals, then it's time to go on. We're trying to take our music everywhere."

One World Tribe plays with Sonic Garden, a Buffalo-based Grateful Dead cover band, on Saturday at Docksider. On Sunday, they'll take part in a big Gifts for Kids benefit show at Forward Hall, open to all ages. That show also features Storey, Rd., Sam Hyman and Boyd Baker, and the Frog Tree Gorge Band.

estern New Yorkers were favored with near-ideal weather conditions for an outdoor concert by one of the finest of the old-guard reggae artists still alive, Burning Spear.

The sky was blue and cloudless over an audience that might very well have been one of the biggest (and perhaps the liveliest) in this year's Lafayette Square series.

It was a remarkable confluence of meteorological conditions, infectious rhythms and an enthusiastic, pumped-up crowd.

Winston Rodney, knows around the world as Burning Spear, proves his greatness every time he and his band set foot on stage.

Those mighty Wailers, Bob Marley and Peter Tosh, may be gone, but their fellow traveler is still around, fueling reggae's incendiary grooves and beats with his righteous voice and a historical perspective and purity of art lacking in many of the current day toasters and boasters.

Words and music are one in Burning Spear's art.

In Thursday's show they audibly showcased Third World policitcal concerns in addition to preaching aspects of Rastafarian doctrine, providing a lyrical double axis around which songs like "Marcus Garvey" and "Calling Rastafari" revolved.

There was a sense of majesty and sureness of purpose to Spear's show.

The band, a tautly focused outfit with a killer horn section and a powerful, pulsing drum/bass combo, laid down a basic riff as the mighty man started by exhibiting a kind of static charisma for the first few songs.

A little further into the program, Spear expanded his personal space to include the set of congas and percussion toys to his right, bending the other rhythm players to his own vision before returning to center stage for more vocalizing.

The singer then retreated, seemingly, into his own world, caught up in the moment and circling like a dervish in slow motion, before returning, like a true professional, to a song's lyrics right when the rhythm required it.

The whole process was timelessly organic yet subtly powerful in its execution.

In many ways, One World Tribe, based in Erie, Pa., was a perfect choice to open up the show for Buring Spear. They shared a similar, if less well-formed, political dynamic but also showcased a musical backdrop that included reggae stylings alongside snippets of juju, calypso, soul horn bands from the 1970s and Parliment/Funkadelic.

In fact, their putative lead guitarist (there is a veritable host of multi-instrumentalists in the band) seems to draw heavily on the influence of George Clinton's string benders, Gary Shider and Eddie Hazel, especially in songs like "No Justice, No Peace" and "Money Don't Make It Right."

The band also had quite a stage show, augmenting the basic octet with three of four dedicated percussionists and a quintet/sextet of dancers that moved like a combination of holiness parishioners and an African chorus line.