bluebeat

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From blue +‎ beat, named after Blue Beat Records, a London record label that released Jamaican R&B and ska in the 1960s. The label was named after the blues genre.

Noun

bluebeat (uncountable)

  1. Any of various styles of Jamaican music, popular in the United Kingdom in the 1960s, precursor of reggae.
    • 1971 November 13, Billboard, volume 83, number 46, page 34:
      Reggae music came to the UK shores as bluebeat and later through names like ska and rocksteady.
    • 2010, Joe Boyd, White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s, page 180:
      Chris returned with a trunk full of bluebeat 45s that sold out in days. On his next trip he decided to learn more about the Jamaican music business.
    • 2011, Ted Curtis, Robert Dellar, Leslie Esther, Mad Pride, page 38:
      There we could all dance, or in my case tap my feet the night away to OUR music: ska, bluebeat and motown.
    • 2013, Joseph O'Connor, Where Have You Been?, page 271:
      Bluebeat and ska from a boombox on the pavement. A suedehead dancing a delirious, inebriated moonstomp with a girl who looked like a solicitor's apprentice.
    • 2019 February 16, Kim Willsher, “From Soho to Paris, how migrant music brought two capitals to life”, in The Guardian‎[1], →ISSN:
      West Indian youngsters, marooned in this cultural maelstrom and kicking their heels in inner-city estates, took refuge in their musical roots: ska, bluebeat and rocksteady.
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