Sly Dunbar

Lowell Fillmore Dunbar was born in Kingston, Jamaica, on 10 May 1952, the youngest of three children. Both of his parents worked at Kingston's international airport. He spent his formative years on Windward Road in east Kingston, and by the age of seven the family had moved to Waterhouse, a former sugarcane estate in western Kingston that had become a low-income housing scheme after Hurricane Charlie in 1951. At his funeral his daughter Natasha recalled that he never forgot his roots in the Compound area of Waterhouse.

Dunbar was self-taught. He watched professional drummers and practised on tin cans and other makeshift drums at home, and he listened closely to music arriving over the radio from North America. He named Lloyd Knibb of the Skatalites as his mentor and also cited Al Jackson Jr. of Booker T. and the MGs, Earl Young of MFSB and Philadelphia International, Steve Gadd, Harvey Mason and Bernard Purdie as major influences, alongside Jamaican drummers he called Santa and Carly of the Wailers band.

Dunbar attended Trench Town Comprehensive High School in Kingston. During lunch breaks he listened to Skatalites records on a jukebox and would pound the rhythms out on his school desk. According to The Guardian, he resolved to pursue music professionally at around 13, after Ken Boothe and the Gaylads performed at the school. He had no formal musical training; his education as a drummer came from watching others, sitting in on rehearsals, and taking pointers from established players including the Wailers drummer Carlton Barrett and Mikey Richards of Now Generation.

Dunbar joined a young band called the Yardbrooms and, after sitting in on a rehearsal with the RHT Invincibles, began recording with the keyboardist Ansel Collins. His debut session produced the organ instrumental "The Night Doctor", which Lee "Scratch" Perry released on his Upsetter label in 1969. He briefly played with the Supersonics, and a session for producer Winston Riley with Collins and singer Dave Barker yielded "Double Barrel", which topped the British pop chart in 1971.

Guitarist Bertram McLean then brought him into the Volcanos, the resident band at the Colony Club in Discovery Bay, where he was nicknamed Sly because of his devotion to Sly and the Family Stone. The group regrouped in Kingston as Skin, Flesh and Bones and by 1974 was resident at the Stables nightclub on Red Hills Road. Bassist Robbie Shakespeare, playing nearby, recommended him to producer Bunny Lee for sessions with the Aggrovators.

At Channel One, Dunbar led the house band the Revolutionaries, recording classics such as the Mighty Diamonds' Right Time, "I Need a Roof", the Wailing Souls' "Jah Jah Give Us Life" and the instrumental "MPLA". There he developed the "rockers" drum pattern that challenged the one drop orthodoxy of 1970s reggae and helped open the way for dancehall. He and Shakespeare joined Peter Tosh's Word, Sound and Power band, played on Tosh albums including Equal Rights, Bush Doctor, Mystic Man, Wanted Dread and Alive and Mama Africa, and toured with Tosh when he opened for the Rolling Stones in 1978. Dunbar also recorded the solo albums Simple Sly Man (1978) and Sly, Wicked and Slick (1979) for Virgin.

Sly and Robbie launched their Taxi label around 1980, producing hits including Jimmy Riley's "Love and Devotion", Gregory Isaacs' "Soon Forward" and Junior Delgado's "Merry Go Round", and later releases by Black Uhuru, Chaka Demus and Pliers, Ini Kamoze, Beenie Man and Red Dragon. Black Uhuru, signed to Island Records in 1979, became the most popular reggae act in the world after Bob Marley's death, and the duo's production of Anthem won the first Grammy Award for Best Reggae Recording.

Through Chris Blackwell they became the rhythm engine of the Compass Point All Stars in Nassau, Bahamas, playing on Grace Jones' Warm Leatherette, Nightclubbing and Living My Life, including "Private Life", "Pull Up to the Bumper" and "My Jamaican Guy". International sessions followed with Bob Dylan (Infidels, Empire Burlesque, Down in the Groove), the Rolling Stones (Undercover), Mick Jagger (She's the Boss), Serge Gainsbourg, Ian Dury (Lord Upminster, including "Spasticus Autisticus"), Joe Cocker (Sheffield Steel), Joan Armatrading, Gwen Guthrie, Herbie Hancock (Future Shock), Carly Simon, Jackson Browne, Yoko Ono, Jimmy Cliff and Dennis Brown.

In the late 1980s and 1990s Dunbar became one of the most sought after builders of electronic rhythms in Jamaica, using drum machines, Simmons pads and synthesisers. With Shakespeare he produced Chaka Demus and Pliers' "Murder She Wrote" (1992) and the 1993 album Tease Me, whose singles repeatedly entered the British chart. He played drums on the Fugees' The Score and appeared on Simply Red's 1997 cover of "Night Nurse" and Suggs' "Cecilia". The Sly and Robbie album Friends won the Grammy for Best Reggae Album in 1999, and in 2001 and 2002 the duo co-produced No Doubt's "Hey Baby" and "Underneath It All". In 2008 they remixed Madonna's "Give It 2 Me" and Dunbar collaborated with percussionist Larry McDonald on Drumquestra. He played on and co-wrote Omi's "Cheerleader" in 2014.

Robbie Shakespeare estimated that the pair had worked on 200,000 recordings. Dunbar continued touring until Shakespeare's death in 2021 and remained active in the studio, recording "Revolución" in 2025 with the Argentine band Nonpalidec and singer Micah Shemaiah and contributing to the reggae supergroup the Mighty Rootsmen.

Dunbar was married to Thelma Dunbar for more than 40 years. Their only child, Natasha, remembered sitting on stage behind him at Reggae Sunsplash when she was six. She told mourners that when she was born he arrived at the hospital with 13 dollars in his pocket, and that everything he built afterwards came from sacrifice, discipline and commitment to his family. He was also survived by his sister Norma.

Colleagues described him as humble, courteous and easy going, a counterbalance to the more mercurial Shakespeare. The Guardian noted that he was a wiry, muscular man who kept garlic to hand to ward off colds while touring. Bassist Lloyd Parks had been his friend for more than 60 years, and saxophonist Dean Fraser had known him since their teens.

Dunbar's musical philosophy was restless experimentation rooted in reggae. "R&B, hip-hop, African, pop, I'm always searching," he told The Scotsman in 2009, describing how he merged everything with reggae to find a new flavour. He told Billboard in 1999 that he and Shakespeare never refused an idea: if it did not work, they moved on.

Unlike many Jamaican drummers who insisted on analogue sound, he embraced MIDI sequencers, drum machines and electronic pads. He also believed in the value of a consistent house band, telling the Jamaica Observer in 2004 that, like Studio One, Treasure Isle, Philadelphia International and Motown, Channel One could guarantee how a record would come out just from the drum sound. Prime Minister Andrew Holness said that despite his international success he remained "a humble son of the soil, always ready to mentor the next generation".

Dunbar is widely regarded as one of the most important drummers in popular music. His rockers rhythm, his rim shot signatures and his early use of electronic drums shaped roots reggae, dub and dancehall, and made it easier for R&B, funk and rock to absorb reggae. In 1979 Brian Eno remarked that when you bought a reggae record there was a 90 percent chance the drummer was Sly Dunbar. Rolling Stone included him in its list of the 100 greatest drummers of all time and wrote that, because his riddims had been sampled so often, he was quite possibly the world's most recorded musician.

On his death Prime Minister Andrew Holness called him "an architect of sound", and Opposition Leader Mark Golding called him Jamaica's most influential session drummer. DJ David Rodigan described him as one of the greatest drummers of all time, and UB40's Ali Campbell and the singer Protoje were among many artists who paid tribute. The Jamaica Observer wrote that with Shakespeare he "redefined what a rhythm section could be".

Dunbar received 13 Grammy Award nominations and won twice: Best Reggae Recording for Black Uhuru's Anthem, at the first ceremony to present a reggae award, and Best Reggae Album for the Sly and Robbie album Friends in 1999. His other nominations included Reggae Sunsplash '81, A Tribute to Bob Marley, "Bass and Trouble", Brutal, The Dub Revolutionaries, Rhythm Doubles, Anniversary, Amazing, Made in Jamaica, One Pop Reggae, New Legend and Reggae Connection.

The Government of Jamaica awarded him the Order of Distinction, which The Guardian dates to 2015, and the Institute of Jamaica awarded him the Musgrave Gold Medal in 2015. In May 2025 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the University of Minnesota, according to The Gleaner.

Solo albums: Simple Sly Man (Virgin, 1978) and Sly, Wicked and Slick (Virgin, 1979). With Robbie Shakespeare he released a long run of Sly and Robbie albums, including the Grammy winning Friends (1999) and later dub projects such as Dubocalypse, Nordub and Dub Serge.

Selected sessions: Dave and Ansel Collins, "Double Barrel" (1971); the Mighty Diamonds, Right Time (1976); Peter Tosh, Equal Rights, Bush Doctor, Mystic Man, Wanted Dread and Alive and Mama Africa; Black Uhuru, including Anthem; Grace Jones, Warm Leatherette, Nightclubbing, Living My Life and Hurricane; Bob Dylan, Infidels and Empire Burlesque; the Rolling Stones, Undercover; Mick Jagger, She's the Boss; Sinéad O'Connor, Throw Down Your Arms (2005); Simply Red, Life and Blue.

He appeared in the BBC documentary Reggae Got Soul: The Story of Toots and the Maytals (2011), and gave a long lecture with Shakespeare for the Red Bull Music Academy.

Dunbar had been unwell for some months and was being treated by physicians at home and overseas. His wife Thelma found him unresponsive at their home in Kingston (St Andrew) on the morning of Monday 26 January 2026, and doctors pronounced him dead. He was 73. His friend and collaborator Guillaume Bougard told The New York Times the cause was cancer. Bougard recalled that only days earlier, though extremely weak, Dunbar had asked for a new MPC drum machine and woke at 6 a.m. to start punching beats. His death came a week after that of Third World co-founder Stephen "Cat" Coore.

His funeral took place on 7 March 2026 at the Cathedral of the Most Holy Trinity on North Street in Kingston, with an all star band of longtime colleagues backing Chevelle Franklyn, Nadine Sutherland, Leba Hibbert, Tarrus Riley, Luciano, Maxi Priest, Bitty McLean and others. Lloyd Parks sang "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother", Mafia and Fluxy performed, and Chris Blackwell, Protoje and Donovan Germain were among the mourners. Senate President Tom Tavares-Finson read a tribute from Prime Minister Andrew Holness. The Jamaica Observer described his "final taxi ride" from the cathedral to Strawberry Hills in the hills of St Andrew.