Ken Boothe

b. 22 March 1948, Kingston, Jamaica · reggae vocalist

Kenneth George Boothe is a Jamaican singer known for a vibrato and timbre unlike anyone else in reggae, and his 1974 reading of “Everything I Own” is the version most of Britain carries in its head. Produced by Lloyd Charmers at Federal Studios in Kingston, it went to No. 1 on the UK Singles Chart on 26 October 1974 and stayed three weeks. The only error in the popular memory is chronological: the record is a cover, and a superb one. Trojan Records’ collapse in 1975 meant Boothe saw little of what it earned.

Who recorded it

Songs credited to Ken Boothe that are covers

Everything I Own

Cover — originally recorded by Bread

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