The Slickers
Band. Reggae
- Active
- 1967-1970s
The Slickers were a Kingston vocal group of the late 1960s and 1970s built around Derrick Crooks, a founding member of the Pioneers with his brother Sydney Crooks. They are known for "Johnny Too Bad," which was on the soundtrack of The Harder They Come.
Crooks formed the group with Winston Bailey around 1965. The first record issued under the name was "Nana" (1968), and the Slickers have often been taken for a Pioneers alias. In practice Crooks was the only constant member and recruited singers as he needed them; Sydney Crooks, Roy Beckford, and Abraham Green, later known as Ras Abraham, all sang in the group at one time or another.
"Johnny Too Bad," a rude boy song written by Trevor "Batman" Wilson, Winston Bailey, Roy Beckford, and Derrick Crooks, came out in 1970, after Green joined. Its inclusion in The Harder They Come (1972) took it abroad, and it has been covered by UB40, Sublime, and Taj Mahal, among others. The group toured Britain and the United States on the strength of it and continued until 1979, when it made the album Breakthrough, which included a disco remake of the song and is sometimes credited to Lee Perry's production.
Last updated November 5, 2026
Connections
- Yabby You (band)
- Lee "Scratch" Perry (producer)
- Byron Lee (producer)
Notes
- Bradley calls "Johnny Too Bad" "the song that summed up so much of the film that it could be taken as an alternative title song." Lloyd Bradley, This Is Reggae Music: The Story of Jamaica's Music (New York: Grove Press, 2001), 284. On Crooks and the Pioneers, "The Slickers," Wikipedia, accessed October 5, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Slickers.
- Wikipedia says the mid-1960s group "consisted of the Crooks brothers and Winston Bailey." "The Slickers," Wikipedia. Bradley cites a Slickers record, "You Done Me Wrong," from "the first half of the sixties." Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 165.
- "Nana" was issued in Britain on Blue Cat in October 1968; a Guyanese pressing couples it with Nehemiah Reid's "The Fiddle." "The Slickers / Martin Riley - Nana / May Never See My Baby," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/3467395; "The Slickers / Nehemiah Reid - Nana / The Fiddle," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/15410798. Wikipedia says the Slickers "have often been wrongly assumed to simply be an alias for The Pioneers." "The Slickers," Wikipedia. The Rough Guide praises their "glorious vocal harmonies" on the Amalgamated sides. Steve Barrow and Peter Dalton, The Rough Guide to Reggae, 3rd ed. (London: Rough Guides, 2004), 102.
- Wikipedia says Derrick Crooks "was the only constant member" and that Green joined the Crooks brothers when "Johnny Too Bad" was recorded. "The Slickers," Wikipedia.
- On the writers, "The Slickers," Wikipedia. The single was issued in 1970 on the Panther label, pressed at Dynamic Sound. "The Slicker - Johnny (Too) Bad," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/26925794.
- Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 284; on the cover versions, "The Slickers," Wikipedia.
- Wikipedia dates "Breakthrough" to 1979 and says the group toured Britain and the United States on the strength of "Johnny Too Bad." "The Slickers," Wikipedia. The album, on Tad's, credits Earl Chin and Tad Dawkins as producers and Lee Perry among the engineers, and includes "Johnnie Too Bad - Disco Style." "The Slickers - Breakthrough," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/release/2090774.
