Robin Campbell of UB40 Says His Father Folk Singer Ian Campbell Helped Him On Early Songs
UB40’s Robin Campbell can thank his father, folk singer Ian Campbell, for guiding his early songwriting.
Ian Campbell had a skiffle band in the late 1950s. He was also a television presenter in the UK. Ian wrote the words to UB40’s ‘Madam Medusa’ and also guided Robin in the creation of UB40’s first hit ‘Food For Thought’.
Watch the Noise11 interview with Robin Campbell
Robin says UB40’s cover of Randy Newman’s ‘I Think Its Going To rain Today’ was for his dad. “That was the influence of my father (Ian Campbell) who was a recording artist,” Robin Campbell tells Noise11.com. “He was a folk musician (in the 50s and 60s) and he was a Randy Newman fan. He loved that tune. He recorded that tune in the 60s around about the time Randy Newman wrote it, I guess”.
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Singer Ali Campbell, 62, said that UB40 were the real deal when it came to tackling social injustice and fighting against then PM Margaret Thatcher, of whom the anti-capitalist song Madam Medusa was written.
The lyrics to the song include From the land of shadows, Comes a dreadful sight, Lady with the marble smile Her tree of evil knowledge, Sprouts a special branch, Madam Medusa .
Speaking in the G2 supplement of The Guardian, frontman Ali said: We were the real deal. Jeremy Corbyn poses with members of UB40. Left to right: Norman Hassan, Robin Campbell, Duncan Campbell, Jimmy Brown and Brian Travers after a joint press conference in which the reggae band announced their support for the party leader, on September 6, 2016 in London
âWe were politicisedâ ⦠UB40 in 1984. Photograph: Sipa Press / Rex Features
The Brummie reggae stars are back, but in two rival groups. They talk about clocking up 39 hits, partying hard and the bitter split
Thu 6 May 2021 01.00 EDT
UB40 are remembering the days when they were dangerous. âMI5 were tapping our phones, watching our houses, all sorts,â says drummer Jimmy Brown. âWe thought, âHavenât they got criminals to catch?â We were just a bunch of potheads, smoking weed and playing music. We werenât planning the revolution, but if the revolution happened, we knew what side we were going to be on.â