Reggae luminary and cosmic traveller Lee Scratch Perry is embracing BitTorrent technology at 78 years of age.
Perry has worked with nearly every reggae legend as a producer, writer, and composer spanning a 50-plus year career -- he was one of the first to produce Bob Marley in the early 1970s in Jamaica -- and now he's released his first song on BitTorrent, a new track called "Jesus is a Soul Man." It marks a seismic shift for the singer.
Perry's enthusiasm for BitTorrent technology dovetails with the new documentary about his colorful life. The film is called "The Upsetter: The Life and Music of Lee Scratch Perry."
Academy Award winner Actor Benecio Del Toro narrates the film.
According to the film promoters:
Filmmakers Ethan Higbee and Adam Bhala Lough spent seven years documenting the strange world of Scratch Perry; and another three self-distributing the film to over 80 theaters across the globe. Their film, The Upsetter, narrated by Academy Award-winning actor Benicio Del Toro, is Scratch’s story, his footage, and his words: an uncommon look at one of music’s (maybe last) true eccentrics and agitators.
Perry -- called Scratch by his friends -- has embraced cutting edge technology since he launched his career in the late 1960s. He's known as a studio wizard who makes magic happen and was one of the first reggae titans to use a computer in the sound room.
The BitTorrent move makes perfect sense. The peer-to-peer file sharing protocol is one of the easiest ways to transmit and distribute large data files on the Net.
Long live the disrupter!