10 Minutes with Ali Campbell of UB40

Ali Campbell says UB40 has sold almost 100 million albums worldwide. That’s right, a reggae band from the UK is one of the best-selling acts of their or any other generation. The band has split in two, with Campbell fronting a version including keyboardist Mickey Virtue and toaster/rapper/trumpet player Astro. UB40 performs at the Long Center Tuesday.

Austin Chronicle: Silhouette is almost a year old. Is there anything new in the pipeline?

Ali Campbell: We just finished an unplugged session, actually. It’s a really new approach to reggae because there’s no bass [laughs]. There’s no drums and there’s no bass, which sounds impossible doesn’t it? Radio kept asking me to do little sessions where they don’t want to pay for the whole band and there’s not much room in there anyway. So I kept on doing these acoustic sessions with bongos and acoustic guitars. Those went so well I thought I’d make an album of them.

AC: How’d it turn out?

AC: It actually sounds like the Seventies kind of rock steady where you couldn’t really hear the drums and bass because the recording wasn’t that good.

AC: What songs are they? Songs that people know or something else?

Ali Campbell: What happened was I did songs from my solo albums and stuff. Songs that not everybody would know. But then Warner Bros. got interested in the album and wanted some of the hits. I fought them tooth and nail. I didn’t think songs that were No. 1 hits with horns and drums could be done with bongos and guitar, but eventually I came around and did songs like “Cherry Oh Baby” and they sound brilliant. I’m really chuffed that they got involved and wanted me to some of the songs like that.

AC: How did you pick the songs for Silhouette? Would you agree that a good song can be adapted to any genre?

Ali Campbell: I agree with that. What I tried to do was stay faithful to the melody. Always. What I heard originally as reggae and presumed was original was their cover versions of songs from American soul bands.

AC: The other side of that is someone like Jimmy Cliff, whose songs have been covered by a variety of American artists.

Ali Campbell: Or look at a song like “I Shot the Sheriff” covered by Eric Clapton. I can remember being horrified by that, but it did open the doors for Bob Marley and helped reggae immensely. Making reggae in America has always been an uphill struggle, because black Americans don’t seem to relate to black Jamaicans. The thought of being repatriated to Africa isn’t something they buy into. Snoop Dogg made a reggae-influenced album and opened up the doors, so black Americans are a bit more accepting of reggae music. I think reggae is more influential in contemporary music now than it’s ever been.

AC: One of the standout tracks on Silhouette is “Cyber Bully Boys.” I understand that means something special to you.

Ali Campbell: I’m a patron of a site called Cybersmile. It’s about abuse of all kinds, really. We’ve all experienced online abuse, and my fans have experienced abuse from members of the band I left behind. They came online screaming madly through their fingertips with words that would’ve burned their lips – talking nonsense and actually threatening my fans.

Everyone knows someone who’s been abused that way and it’s quite an important topic. You’ve got school kids hanging themselves because of the bullying they’re experiencing. And it’s not like they can come home to get way from it. When they come home, the bullying continues online. It’s destroying relationships worldwide.

The web is an amazing thing, but it does open doors to every nut case in the world. They can sit there with little fear of consequence saying what they like. I truly believe if you’re going to go online you shouldn’t be able to do it anonymously. I think you should have to log in under your real name and there should be a way to prove it.