Fred Locks
Artist. Reggae, roots
- Active
- 1960s-present
- Sunrise
- East Kingston, Jamaica
- Also known as
- Fredlocks, Stafford Elliot, Stafford Elliott, The Lyrics, Fred Locks & the Creation Steppers
Fred Locks is a Rastafari singer whose "Black Star Liners" became an enduring roots anthem, and whom the Rough Guide counts among the most distinctive Rasta singers to make a substantial contribution on record.
As Stafford Elliot he was the youngest member of the Lyrics, a harmony trio with Danny Campbell and Albert Tomlinson that recorded a handful of singles for Studio One, for Clive Chin at Randy's, and on its own Lyric label in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The name came from passersby who heard the group rehearsing on a street corner and told them, "You guys have a lot of Lyrics!" After accepting Rastafari he wrote "Black Star Liners" in 1968 with Owen Goode, from a Twelve Tribes of Israel pamphlet on Marcus Garvey, and sang it in 1972 at a Bull Bay event backed by Count Ossie's Mystic Revelation of Rastafari.
Recorded in 1975 under his new name, with a riddim laid at Randy's by Earl "Chinna" Smith, Earl "Bagga" Walker, Benbow Creary and Pablove Black, and released on the Twelve Tribes-affiliated Jahmikmusik label, the record first circulated within the Twelve Tribes. It took off after Tommy Cowan got it onto the radio. An album of the same name, with "The Last Days" (also known as "Time to Change") and "True Rastaman," followed, and Pablove Black cut instrumental versions of both hits for Studio One.
In Britain, the sound-system man Lloyd Coxsone produced Love & Only Love with Fred Locks and the Creation Steppers at Channel One and Harry J's, with Sly Dunbar, Albert Malawi and Leroy "Horsemouth" Wallace among the drummers. After years in the United States he recorded Never Give Up (1998) for Phillip "Fatis" Burrell, his voice, in the Rough Guide's view, unchanged from the 1970s. The vibrato that marks that voice he could not explain ("I don't know where the vibrato came from but that was my style!"), though he credited his mother's singing and the Nancy Wilson and Frank Sinatra records of his childhood.
Last updated November 5, 2026
Connections
- Coxsone Dodd (producer)
- Fatis Burrell (producer)
- Clive Chin (producer)
- Sly Dunbar (session work)
- Leroy "Horsemouth" Wallace (session work)
- Earl "Chinna" Smith (session work)
- Tommy Cowan (collaborator)
- Count Ossie (collaborator)
- Pablove Black (collaborator)
- Studio One (studio)
- Channel One (studio)
Notes
- Steve Barrow and Peter Dalton, The Rough Guide to Reggae, 3rd ed. (London: Rough Guides, 2004), 207, 208.
- Howard Campbell, "Black Star Liner: Fred Locks Recalls Tribute to Garvey," Jamaica Observer, August 17, 2012, https://www.jamaicaobserver.com/2012/08/16/black-star-liner-fred-locks-recalls-tribute-to-garvey. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 114, 208.
- Angus Taylor, "Interview with Fred Locks 1: From Clement Coxsone to the Black Star Liner," Reggaeville, March 12, 2012, https://www.reggaeville.com/artist-details/fred-locks/news/view/interview-with-fred-locks-1-from-clement-coxsone-to-the-black-star-liner/.
- Campbell, "Fred Locks Recalls Tribute to Garvey." Yasmine Peru, "Singer Fred Locks Talks 'Black Star Liner,'" Jamaica Gleaner, August 17, 2026, https://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/entertainment/20260817/singer-fred-locks-talks-black-star-liner.
- Campbell, "Fred Locks Recalls Tribute to Garvey." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 208. The Observer and the Gleaner name the label as Jah Love Music. Fred Locks has given different sales figures: 9,000 copies in three months in 2012, and 15,000 in 2026. Peru, "Fred Locks Talks 'Black Star Liner.'"
- Campbell, "Fred Locks Recalls Tribute to Garvey." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 208, 209.
- Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 208. Coxsone's dub album King of the Dub Rock Part Two includes "raw versions" of this music. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 234.
- Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 362.
- Taylor, "Interview with Fred Locks 1."
