Desmond Dekker’s ‘Israelites’ Certified Silver In The UK
Desmond Dekker & The Aces’ hit song Israelites is now certified Silver in the United Kingdom, 54 years after its release.
According to the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), Israelites was issued a BRIT Certified Silver award today (January 13), after it sold over 200,000 copies in the UK, as measured by The Official Charts Company.
The song was first released in Jamaica in 1968 as Poor Me Israelites, with The Aces, which comprised Wilson James and Easton Barrington Howard.
Along with Millie Small’s My Boy Lollipop —which was released four years earlier—Israelites is regarded as one of the first Jamaican Ska/Reggae songs to become a worldwide hit.
It reached No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in June 1969.
In the UK, it peaked at No. 1 and has spent 15 weeks on the Singles Chart.
It was also a top ten hit in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Ireland, Netherlands, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Israelites was a tale about ghetto life on the island, according to Dekker.
“I was telling people not to give up as things will get better. I didn’t write that song sitting around a piano or playing a guitar. I was walking in the park, eating corn,” he explained, according to the Independent.
“I heard a couple arguing about money. She was saying she needs money and he was saying the work he was doing was not giving him enough. I related to those things and began to sing a little song: “You get up in the morning and you’re slaving for bread.” By the time I got home, it was complete.”
Dekker continued: “And it was so funny, that song never got out of my mind. It stayed fresh in my head. The following day, I got my little tape and I just sang that song and that’s how it all started.”
The song has appeared in numerous films over the years, including the American films Drugstore Cowboy (1989), Miami Blues (1990), The Rebound (2009) and the British film Made In Dagenham (2010).
It has also been used in several TV programs, including the HBO tv series Watchmen (2019), Death In Paradise (2018), and Transparent (2017).
Dekker, who was born in Kingston, lived in England until he passed away from a heart attack at 64 in 2006.
Born Desmond Dacres, he had signed with Leslie Kong’s Beverly’s record label and released his first single Honour Your Father and Your Mother in 1963.
Many of Dekker’s popular songs celebrated the culture of “rude boys,” including Rude Boy Train, Rudie Got Soul, and 007 (Shanty Town), which had peaked at No. 14 on the UK chart and was featured on The Harder They Come movie soundtrack.
With The Aces, Dekker entered the Jamaica Festival Song Competition in 1967 with UNITY, and then won the following year with Intensified.
Dekker’s other songs to hit the UK Singles chart include It Miek, Pickney Gal, his version of Jimmy Cliff’s You Can Get It If You Really Want, and Sing A Little Song.