Being moved from a smaller to the main stage of a leading music festival, one’d usually grab the phone to let family know. No need for Courtney Panton Junior, drummer of New Kingston, as his Dad, Courtney Panton Sr. -a foundation musician from Kingston, Jamaica- (on the bass), his older brother Stephen (vocals and guitar) and his younger brother Tahir (vocals and keyboard) were right there on the spot when the band was asked to play the Main Stage instead of the Lion Stage of the Rototom Sunsplash festival 2017 in Spain.
Listen to Courtney Panton Jr. right after their Rototom Sunsplash Main stage show sharing their initial reaction to these news:
After their performance, ilo from inews24.co.uk finds out more about this family affair.
The New York based family band New Kingston “is about love, family and just positive vibes … it is a different element. You see music and you see family. So, there kind of is a oneness feel”, Courtney Jr. explains and adds “that’s why we [also] always big up Morgan Heritage because they are from Brooklyn, New York, but they are Jamaican and they are a band”.
“Steel Pulse, Black Uhuru” are amongst the ones “that inspire us to keep going”, the drummer and vocalist reveals. And when Junior mentions that “you know, my pops, he gave us all the foundation music: Alton Ellis, Sister Carol..” the urge comes to find from Courtney Panton Sr. himself, when and why he had involved his sons in the music business. “There is no time when it actually happened … I have been a musician all my life, so, I have been around all their life. At some point a transition was made, but I can’t pinpoint an exact time, can’t say, oh today, you are musicians, it just happened”. Talking to the family members one feels that the family’s relationship with music did come together naturally and over some time.
Finally, when I observe the brothers giving autographs and jingles for several radio stations, Mr. Panton Sr. admits to me: “I am really proud of them because I give them music and they took positiveness in their approach to represent themselves as musicians”.
Their fourth studio album “A Kingston Story: Come From Far” is out on New York indie label Easy Star Records on August 25, 2017.
Ilona “ilo” Kepic
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More love, more music…
