by Howard Campbell
SOUTH FLORIDA – It’s summer and reggae artists are gearing up for tours of Europe and the United States. Among those acts is Beres Hammond, who at 68 years-old, is still one of the music’s biggest attractions.
While he has spot dates scheduled for California, Montreal and Massachusetts in June and July, the singer’s US tour gets underway on August 1 at College Street Music Hall in New Haven, Connecticut.
The main tour has 14 dates that cover cities where Hammond has an established fan base. Several of the venues, including New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, and Broward Center For The Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale, are two of his favorite stomping grounds.
Singer Mikey Spice is opening act for the shows in Connecticut, New Jersey and New York.
The Hammond tour will also make stops in Glenside, Pennsylvania, Baltimore and Silver Spring, Maryland, Norfolk, Virginia, Raleigh, North Carolina and Atlanta, Georgia.
Typically, he closes his US tour with three dates in Florida. They take place at Hard Rock Live in Orlando on August 23, and back-to-back gigs at Broward Center For The Performing Arts on August 24-25.
George Crooks, who has booked shows for Hammond since the early 1990s, told South Florida Caribbean News that “things are shaping up well and tickets are going fast.”
He added that many of the fans who show up for a Beres Hammond are attracted to more than hit songs like What One Dance Can Do, Tempted to Touch, Putting up Resistance and Step Aside Now.
“He’s a master storyteller, he tells great stories that appeals to the mind…young and old,” said Crooks.
Hammond began his professional career during the early 1970s as lead singer for the Zap Pow Band which included guitarist Dwight Pinkney and bassist Michael Williams. Late that decade, he scored with easy-listening ballads such as One Step Ahead and Got to Get Away.
His remarkable 20-year stretch of hit singles began in 1985 with the Willie Lindo-produced What One Dance Can Do. During the 1990s, he released a flurry of chart-toppers for various producers including Tappa Zukie, Richard Bell and Donovan Germain.
