Tena Stelin interviewed by Jakob Levi on the 20:th May 2005 at Dub Corner Studio, London, England.

When Tena Stelin first broke into the UK reggae market things were in change. The UK reggae sound were changing into a more heavy digitalized rockers sound favoured by Jah Shaka and others. Tena Stelin's first album "Wicked Intention" is said to be one those who have set the standard for how UK roots reggae sound today. Tena Stelin have continued in the same direction throughout the years with a number of albums as well as numerous singles for UK's top producers. His choice of subjects and reasoning in the songs he deliver are always refreshing and instructive which makes each new release of his even more interesting.

By some reasons beyond my understanding the first couple of minutes of this interview were erased. So I will try to recall what was told. Tena Stelin talked about his childhood years hearing music in his home especially remembering "Long Shot Kick De Bucket" by The Pioneers and when no one was home he used to play the records and sing to the b-sides. Then the fact that he always used to sing as a child and how it just came naturally to him. He also tells me as he got older he got into the soundsystem thing and started singing on a couple of sounds which ones I can't recall other then the one he mentions in begin of what was not erased of the interview.

Tena Stelin: ...a different Jah Warrior then the one we know of today. There's was another Jah Warrior back in the day. A local sound, but they're no longer going. So from soundsystems to a band called Coptic Roots. Coptic Roots from Firstgate.

Guidelight Movement: Which you were singing or playing with ?

TS: Singing. We did two shows together. Life keep moving on and different things happen. Then my grandmother moved from London to North Hampton in 1981. I joined her in 1982. I met Earthquake and we did some four track stuff. Then some few years later I move back to London, East London of course. I'd brought some four track stuff down and Keety Roots heard them. Them times he was a young boy. All of us was younger, almost the same age. He heard the stuff and it was decided that we should meet and we met. The first time we met was in the studio and we just done some stuff, made some music. The studio was called Vibes Studio and we had a dub cutting machine there. To cut dubs for people and sounds like that. I think that were where we first met Blackamix, but he was not known as Blackamix at the time. I think maybe he was slighty dealing with another kind of music then, kind of in a dancehallish thing. Steve Jah Warrior came there to cut some dubs. Manasseh came to cut dubs and of course it was there I met Manasseh. They were to play against Jah Shaka, the great legandary Jah Shaka. So they wanted a dub cut so I voiced something special for Manasseh sound.

Then we put out "Commercial Bwoy" and "Burial Tonight". When I say we, it was me, Keety and the owner of the studio which name was Blacka, not Blacka Dread another Blacka who's no longer in the business. We put out that track "Commercial Bwoy" on the A-side and "Burial Tonight" on the B-side.

GLM: This was your first release ?

TS: That was my first release. We had dug in our pockets to do that. Anyway, then "Jah Equity" came out at a later stage, because what happen was Manasseh got back to me and approached me about doing a album project for some producer called Mr Modo or something like that. Then we decided that I would do the album and before the album came out a single called "Jah Equity" came out, a twelve inch who was well received.

The UK thing were only Jah Shaka, Twinkle Brothers and established elders like that. But it is said that the album "Wicked Invention", which I'd done for Manasseh, was the start of a new wave or something new happening like another chapter to the UK thing. Then there was other few people who said well yeah, this gwaan and I gwaan with this to so it was all good. That was how I got started really. There were a lot of more other things as well but I'm just trying to cut it clean and get straight to the point.

GLM Then after that album "Wicked Invention", what happened then ? Was that then you met up with Dougie Wardrop ?

TS: Oh yes, Dougie Wardrop. He heard the album and I think he was a friend of Aba Shanti because they were really close, same kind of area, just around the corner. So Dougie contacted me and we met...no hold on. No, what happen was that I've done a track in Nick Manasseh's studio, four track studio at the time, and it was "Can't Touch Jah". Dougie heard it, said he'd love to put it out and said ok go ahead. So he put it out. I think he'd already done one release before that. It was, not a vocal, a seven inch single dub. I forgot the name of it.

GLM: Stepping Time ?

TS: Yes, that's most probably it. Then "Cant Touch Jah" was his second release but first vocal and after that I think he did one with Danny Red titled "Original Formula". Then after that I said look an album can gwaan and he say yeah an album can gwaan. His studio was up in Camden, so I travel up to Camden and I got the tracks, worked on them. Then the album "Sun & Moon" came out. Then after the "Sun & Moon" album it was "Take A Look At The World" of course, because Keety Roots and myself had still always been recording and vibing because we're friends. Friends then and friends now. It was decided that this album "Take A Look At The World" was to come out and it did. Then after that I think it was "Sacred Songs".

GLM: Weren't "Sacred Songs" produced by yourself ?

TS: No, that one came out after "Sacred Songs". First "Sacred Songs" came out which was done by World Records. I wasn't very happy with the way it was mixed so that ended that project. Then an album with Jah Warrior entitled "Lion Symbol" and after that I produced an album myself called "The Order". Booked a studio, booked musicians and done that. What came after "The Order" ? Some different stuff.

GLM: Alright. Taking a look at the vocal contents of your songs one can find all kind of topics and angles to things and not exactly the typical Rasta message. Is it because you feel these things have a necessity to be spoken or is it just vibes passing through ?

TS: Well, when it comes to the music thing I always liked to do my best and if that is what my best entails than so be it. It just comes. When I think of something I sing about it. I mean I might thought about something a while ago back and I hear music and that music touches that chord for that subject and then I just relay it thus.

GLM: Alright. At what part of your life did you adopt the philosophy of Rastafari ?

TS: Well, I would say about since I was ten years old. Growing up in England you have to find yourself because you could be lost. I mean everyone have to know themself. Suppose a Chinese youth grows up in England, he can not just know about Francis Drake, Henry VIII, Sir Walter Scott and year 1066. It's good to know these things though because he's in the land where these things happened that devoloped the place where he's living over a time. He has to know about it so he can positively input into it because that is principle. Whoever you are in that land you must positively put in into that land because we are all servants of each other. Not servants in no begger low way but service one another because no man is a island and everyman plays a part. No man is for himself no matter what.

So growing up I was always coming from a kind of biblical background because my grandparents were them kind of people who always were quoting certain things from the bible. Like if you're good, if you're bad. I'd have to say grace sometimes. On sundays my mother would carry me to my grandmother and she'd go to church with the rest of the family. That church was a Penticostal church. You would see people getting a kind of expression, they call it the spirit. I 'd say it's the spirit because spirit is a feeling. So they get this kind of feeling and they start to react to this feeling in a certain physical way like dancing, letting off and expressing. So as a youth I used to sit and watch this. I would see some people cry, sit down and just cry and I'd wonder why they were crying. Sometimes me and my friends would laugh and say look she's at it again, haha look she's crying. We were just kids. Very mischievous. But at the same time I noticed these things. So that religious and spiritual vibe was in me now, so then going to other lessons now. End of teenage that's when a youth is finding his self. His making this claim that I am. Claim of growing or of a identity or whatever. At the same time we had this thing called "Roots: Alexander Haley's Roots", which of course was the history of the people that have been taking away from Africa and eventually he was the last of his lineage but at that time he wanted to trace his roots, so that was what it was all about, tracing it back to Africa. That story there were very moving. We knew the story that we had been taking away, but as youths watching it that was like how all of the people in England watch "EastEnders" or as some people sit down and watch "Dallas" every sunday, we would sit down and watch "Roots". You know Kunta Kinte et cetera. At the same time they made the mistake, haha, mistake of sending me off to Jamaica. At that time when I was growing they sent me to Jamaica.

GLM: Your parents ?

TS: Yes, because my mother had emigrated to Jamaica and left me with her grandmother over here. Then there was decided that my mother was able to make me come over. So I was sent to Jamaica to my mother and her family. At that time now reggae music in Jamaica was rockers days. You ever seen the film "Rockers" ? It was those days and everything was Rasta. Bob Marley was at his heights. Bob Marley, Johnny Clarke, a Rasta thing was going on. So at school now, Kingston Technical High School, which was the school I managed to get into just because I came from England. I think I was maybe one year under age or something like that but I still went there. There were two Rasta youths there and one of them lent me his bible. In his bible there were many things underlined like Genesis, the garden that ran through the Gihon that ran through Ethiopia. Then something about Abraham's children being under bondage and slavery for four hundred years and later on Judah, Jacob's son, having the sceptre over the rulership...

GLM: The power shall not depart from Judah.

TS: Yes, and later on Samson with the seven dreadlocks and then things like the nazareth vow in Numbers, chapter 6. Then Psalm 68 "...by his name JAH" and in the same psalm "Ethiopia shall stretch out her hands to God" and things in Isiah about God actually coming on earth sitting on a throne but through king David's lineage, although how preposterous it may sound to many but that is what it's writting and many other things like the the woolly hair, the title king of kings and conquering lion of the tribe of Judah in Revelation. So many things. Babylon shall fall and all these kind of things just pointed me to Rasta. There was no other thing for me, as a youth growing up, where I could look to and identify with, saying this is me. Not to say I'd fight against other religions and faiths but I would say this is my expression. This is my expression were I...

GLM: ...can find comfort.

TS: Yes I. At the same time I grew to understand this other faiths and religions. It's good to understand them because at the bottom line they are the same thing. General goodness towards human beings, the world and yourself. Not to forget tolerance. Also to put your mentality and spirituality at the highest yet in time, don't rush it. Just take your time to trod up the mountain slowly. That's why I was pointed towards Rastafari.

GLM: Now later on have you looked these things up because back in the day there wasn't much information to be found except the reading the bible in contrary to today where you can find the Kebra Nagast and Book Of Enoch on the internet ?

TS: Yes, I looked up a few things like that of course. I get to realize to myself that these things are just great inspiration that came to man and have served in different ways. These things are still being written now. Still being done now. That's the whole beauty of it. It's still unfolding and we're actually living in it, in the book that's being written. The human being are more than lucky because we are the ones who can change destiny, I'm saying we have choice to go high or low, to go here or there. We are like creators in that respect. Things are being written right now even as we sit down here. If it's not been written already ? You see, that's a part we can't know. It's been written already but yet it's still being written now. It's true but can one really follow what it means ? It's just things going deeper and deeper. In time things will reveal.

GLM: Being a roots singer spreading a positive and conscious message, what do you think about todays popular slackness scene ?

TS: Well, if you have God you must have the opposite. What is God to me maybe not be God in another man's eyes. God and good is the same thing. So what be good to me may not be good to another man. Because we are in this region called earth known as terra. We have choice and are under the cosmic constitution of free will. So within that zone and region which is under that constitution you will have good and you will have bad. Day and night. Light and darkness. It have to be balanced but you can find it there, the slackness or whatever, and you can find the good vibe which is consciousness trying to uplift you morally and intellectually. You can find it over here and over there. So it's all there. It's just up to you to choose want you want. That's what I think about it. It doesn't astound me and it doesn't really move me to any chocking thing. These things have gone on since long time. In the bible you have Sodom and Gomorra and that story was written apparently thousends of years ago. Sodom and Gomorra is a place of badness. People are doing certain things that you know other people will not agree with. That's just life. We are in the region of free will so you have to know what is good for you. So that's how I think of it.

GLM: Alright. You mentioned Keety Roots before. He did a lot of good work but now he seems to have disappeared from the scene. Can you tell us a little bit about him ?

TS: Well, you see when you look upon that sun there. The sun goes down doesn't it but the sun is still there. Still blazing. So that's what it's like with Keety. You see when you read the psalms and you read the psalm of King David to the chief musician. You can say that the chief musician is the almighty but then you bring it down to another interpretation according to my circle of life. I know the higher chief musician but physically I have a brethren who is a chief musician not thee chief musician but a chief musician. So when I say a psalm of King David to the chief musician that's like I could say a song by Tena Stelin to the chief...Keith because his name is Keith, chief musician. When I tell him this he laughs but to me now he just comes naturally to do what he have to do. It seem that he might have been out of the scene for a long time but...

GLM: He's bubbling under the surface.

TS: Yeah man, maybe no releases. We have been speaking to each other lately, just yesterday, that he's going to mix a tune, so release a gwaan. I say what tune and he say a tune called "Hallelujah", deep real deep. So it's going on with the chief musician. He's going on.

GLM: What could you tell me about other people you have been working with like TNT Roots ?

TS: Before I speak about TNT Roots... His name is Tony Todd but there was another brethren called Winston up in North Hampton. I don't know what he do now but it was with these two that I done my first recording with. I used to see how they used to fiddle about with the sounds and certain things. Also when I came to London I saw Keety Roots fiddle around as well and that's where I learned to mix. Anyway TNT had some stuff out before. The two of them had some dub stuff out before. Apparently I just found this out the other day the were known as Darkness. He laughed when he told me this the other day. The dubs had these basslines that was so out of standard. There's nuff dubs that are out of standard because everybody trying to be creative, individual and unique. Apparently what they were going on with was even for some hardcore guys a bit to much, too unconventional for them. So they took a break and just the other day me and Tony link up. He came to my studio with some tracks, went back there, finished them. Sent them to me. I voiced them. Sent them back to him and he mixed them. That's how we got this CD here called "Cosmic Intervention". "Cosmic Intervention" is the latest in the present but there's more and more coming with Gussie P and other people. The reason I chose the title "Cosmic Intervention" was because I find out that a lot of people are under some kind of trauma, anticipation or by the way things are going. But what I'm saying is look whatever is going on will be sorted out in its own natural time. I'd say it's a divine intervention but not just that in a click of a finger. It may even be after I'm gone physically. But even when we're gone physically things have to be sorted out because we have faith in good over evil. So that's how I see cosmic intervention. Even in your life, in your personal surrounding from when you start to elevate and realize a vibe than you have a transformation of self and that's your intervention. You willed it. You see this change of life and there's a intervention of certain things of what was going on. There's a divine intervention from within you, because the kingdom of heaven is within. If the kingdom of heaven is within then the throne is within and if the throne is within the one who sits on it is within. It's all parts of you because you are part threaded to the divine. All man are threaded to that divine. So therefore we are all threaded to each and every one. I'm just trying to break it down a bit. God is within everyone and everything. See God in yourself first then you see God in others. So that's the cosmic intervention. Part of it. If more people would think like this, I'd say oh boy what a day. That would be like the golden age. That's what we're all hoping for and going towards. Although different walks of life and different endeavours that is the ultimate goal and desire.

GLM: What inspires you to do what you do ? To keep up the vibes and carry on because you've been doing this for some years now and always been quite of underground ?

TS: It's just what I'm comfortable with doing. Some men are born to be sculptures among other things and then some men are great footbollers among other things but that's them. Then you have other men who are not known but they still contribute because they vibe and it's more to that than what meets the eye. Just because you see a man and he's not great of whatever. He's not a singer or not even able to talk but because there is more to it than what meets the eye, you don't know what that man is doing. So what I'm saying is that I'm about to continue to do what I'm doing because I just love doing it and that's my nature. Every since I was little I had this vibe to just move to music and speak a language through the music. It just came. Where it came from who knows ? One could say different things but it just is. It's what is meant by I am that I am. Every man is I am that I am. It's just a mystic vibe which is more than compelled to manifest. I can't even express it in mear words. It's just endless music and endless songs. That's the beauty of it. It's like the universe who got no boundaries and so it is with I and I. There's no boundaries. There's so many things to see. So many stars, different worlds, galaxies and states of mind. It's all there. That's what it is, I am that I am.

GLM: What can we expect from Tena Stelin in the future ?

TS: More vibes. More songs. Definitely more songs.

GLM: Don't you have a ten inch inch or something coming out soon ?

TS: Yeah, a single called "Salute" which is the A-side and the B-side got a track called "Chakra"

GLM: And this will be out on your own label ?

TS: Yes, on Dub Corner Productions. Coming to "Salute", really and truly that song is about Jah Shaka. I'm saluting the sound. When I came back from Jamaica to England I was fourteen and I used to go to some blues dances. They might play one or two steppers and dub but it was more lovers rock, dancehall reggae and soul. Then one day one youth say, yo lets go down Norick North London and check Shaka. Say what Shaka ? Yeah Jah Shaka man, wait till you hear the soundsystem. We're fourteen years old and going down there. Them time there I were already looking towards Haile Selassie Jah Rastafari and then going down there what I see is like, yeah this is my vibration, it's like worship. It was biblical and spiritual. When the man say King David vibes, King David style, that was it, that done it. From when I was a youth I'd always been hearing of King David in my family. My grandmother used to talk about this biblical person and she even call one of her son, my uncle, David. So this vibe, knowledge and character of this person in the bible was in me. So to me a King David vibe was, I knew he was a musician because I red the psalms which said to the chief musician bla bla the lord is my shepard et cetera. The psalms were songs. So it was like yeah man. So we used to go to Shaka dances and growing up as a youth now that was thee roots dub soundsystem end of story. I rememeber one time we went to a dance when he turned on the sound, did the siren and he said, tune into the sounds of Jah Shaka, the sound that Jah built. Then he just roar and you could just hear the cheer from the youth them which was nuff of us and then he just run Kunta Kinte (classic seventies dubplate). You just heard the foghorn of Kunta Kinte and then the tune start. That was the vibe. So what I'm doing is saluting to those memories. Just listen to the lyrics. But I never really say his name because I thought that might spoil it. Those who know know. Not to say his name would spoil it but I wanted to give some kind of mystery to it still. I feel that if he hear it he know it's about him and if another man hear it he know it's about him. It's just one of those tunes there who's simple but effective.

Then on the other side there is "Chakra". That's me trying to make music and not war in trying to kind of heal with music. Instead of just saying meditating or lets meditate to Jah. I try to go a little bit further and give a method of how you can actually meditate. I mean there is the chakras, check your chakras. You have to do your own research and find out what it is. Some will and some won't but I'm sure a few will and those few that will I'm sure will achieve certain heights within themself. We come to heal, soothe, comfort and to uplift. It's like a musical ministry, dub ministry. We are dub soldiers. So that's what it's all about uplifting, elevating and giving strength to the people, uniting the people with words sound and musical power

GLM: Going back to Jah Shaka, what do you think his impact has been on the UK roots scene ?

TS: What Bob Marley is to reggae Jah Shaka is to dub. From that now it's like he planted a seed knowingly or unknowingly. That is going to grow and to fruition so much. Just from around him it shone and many youths came to it because that's what they saw in themself. That beat, that tempo, that vibe. And many of those youths now are men. Some come on a earlier stage and some arrived in a later stage but many came and they've branched out now. Not to say they're elevating or doing greater things. It's nothing like that. What it is is that it's transcending further and further now. Really and truly it was like Jah Shaka planted the seed. He was there, igniting it and it just blaze up and just burn hotter and hotter, nicer and nicer, stronger and stronger. The vibes that that sound let off just kept us rocking and vibing even to now. Even though many of us might not pass the dances anymore but when we do it's just like a joy. It's like a oneness to see the man in action. My tune "Salute" is like a thank you to the legandary.

GLM: You mentioned having works in progress with Gussie P as well ?

TS: Yes, I have some works with Gussie P. I got some works with Gussie P coming. When he's ready he'll release them. There's some interesting subjects within that I've done with him. One of the tracks is "Africa Awaits Its Creators". You know, Africa is awaiting its creators, Africa is calling for its people. There's a few other tracks like one about William Wilberforce.

GLM: Is that a recut ?

TS: Yes, "Africa Awaits Its Creators" is a recut. That was...

GLM: ...Ewan Naphtali. A Twelve Tribes production.

TS: Maybe so. Could be. I've heard that and used to hear it when I was child. So I kind of knew the vibe and then he gave me the tune, I listened to it and then we met up again in Paul Chue studio and recorded it. I got some stuff with Riverbank coming as well. Some stuff with Gussie P coming like the track about William Wilberforce which is on the Nebuchadnezzar rhythm and some other tunes. Then an album with Iration Steppaz.

GLM An album with Iration Steppaz ?

TS: Yes, an album coming with Iration Steppaz and some tracks with people in Brighton called Shashamane.

GLM: Yes, there was a seven inch released a couple of years back called "Religious War". That album have been in progress now for a long time havn't it ?

TS: Well, it was done maybe four years ago or something like that. The Iration Steppaz one was even done longer before that but we have re-done some tracks. Updated some of the subjects, topics and vibes. I think I have a couple of tracks in Keety Roots studio too. We have just been discussing that instead of calling the studio Black Legacy. Maybe we shall call it Nubian Heights because I think we have moved on in many ways. So now it's about the heights. So when he's coming back look of for Nubian Heights productions.

GLM: Will do. Do you have any words of wisdom to leave us off with ?

TS: Just live and do your best. Sometimes it's going to be up and sometimes it's going to be down but just remember that you are a soul. Just close your eyes and feel that I am, feel the you. Don't carry no bad feeling within you because that's not really you. The real you is just goodness so elevate towards the heights of that goodness. We are all growing and we are all getting there in different times and ways.

GLM: Alright, give thanks for your time Tena.

The first photo is used with kind permission of Jah Warrior Records

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