Lovers Rock

The genre of lovers’ rock has heavily influenced the R&B, hip hop and pop music scenes since its peak in the 1960s and 1970s. Songs incorporating a mixture of love and romance, politics and reggae-inspired sounds have become an accepted trend in music. Most notably is Bajan singer Rihanna, whose songs such as “Man Down“, “No Love Allowed“, and others follow the same subject matter and structure as songs belonging to the lovers’ rock genre. Other artists such as Drake, Lauryn Hill, Musiq Soulchild and countless others utilise techniques from lovers’ rock to create reggae-influenced love songs in their discography. British singers Sade and Estelle both titled their albums Lovers Rock and the songs on those albums were inspired by the genre.^[8] Steve McQueen‘s Lovers Rock film (with Dennis Bovell in a minor role), released in December 2020, chronicled a night at a 1980 blues party in West London where lovers’ rock music played a central part both the storyline and soundtrack.^[9]Lovers rock has been heavily constructed in line with romantic sound and themes. Lisa Palmer’s “Men Cry Too: Black Masculinities and the Feminisation of Lovers Rock in the UK” discusses the lyrical contents found within this genre, which are notable due to how they shaped its gendering and politicisation. For instance, the song “Men Cry Too/Man a Reason” was important because it “captured the sense of loss, longing, and vulnerability that was part of black male life in Britain, but was and remains frequently overshadowed by the notion that black masculinity within the British roots reggae music scene is constructed upon the paradigm of political resistance and protest detached from the emotional or erotic expression” (Palmer 128).^[10]An element of lovers’ rock was also featured in British director Steve McQueen’s Small Axe BBC series.Monday to Friday on Classic Unique Radio, catch the sounds of Lady Elegance playing the best in Lovers Rock and Reggae vibes. https://youtu.be/r99-ff1RKaEWhy is it called Lovers Rock?

Lovers Rock is a style of Reggae music noted for its romantic sound and content; hence the name. While love songs had been an important part of Reggae since the late 1960s, this style was given a greater focus and a name in London in the mid-1970s.