Gussie Clarke Says ‘Pass The Dutchie’ Debacle Spurred Him To Become A Music Publisher

Veteran music producer Gussie Clarke has explained that he resolved to master music publishing and establish himself as a publisher after an American record company denied him earnings from the British band Musical Youths’ cover of Mighty Diamonds’ Pass the Kutchie.

Speaking on matters of copyright and publishing with YouTuber Teach Dem recently, Clarke, who is the CEO of Anchor Records, said the denial was due to The Mighty Diamonds’ association with California-based record label Strictly Rockers.

“Let me tell you how mi get inna music publishing inna a sense.  1982, mi mek Pass the Kutchie with the Mighty Diamonds.  Musical Youths come and seh ‘bway, I want do a chune pon it name Pass Di Dutchie.   Legally, I didn’t have a footing in it, because, mi teck a riddim, mek somebody write a song pan it, when the person who wrote the song on it they were signed to somebody else in California,” Clarke stated.

“Mighty Diamonds were signed to a publishing entity called Strictly Rockers in California – there was a white man named Turk Arsounaut who is dead – he had the right then.   An I said to myself seh, ‘no sah.  Dis nuh look good enuh.  Me plant di corn, an can’t raid di barn?  I went and I learned everything I could was available about publishing’,” he added.

At the time of its release, Pass the Kutchie stayed on the Jamaican chart for 52 weeks.   Apart from Musical Youth, it has been sampled by numerous other artists, among them Lauryn Hill, Michael Franti, and Wyclef Jean.   

As for Pass the Dutchie, it was released in September 1982 and became the fastest-selling British single of that year, selling more than 100,000 copies in one day. It was also used as synchronization music in Netflix’s Stranger Things season 4 and in the Scooby Doo movie.

While Musical Youth rose to global stardom with the interpolation of Pass the Kutchie, it was not without controversy, as it was plagued by issues of royalties and publishing ownership.

In 2021, Mighty Diamonds member Judge Diamond had said that despite being proud of the impact of Pass the Kutchie, the song’s success had almost been marred by issues of unpaid royalties and publishing, and plagued by the actions of greedy persons within the global music industry.

Judge had argued that the publishing rights were to have been spilt 50/50 between his group and the musicians who did the Full Up riddim, but that attorneys and “persons from overseas got involved and eventually the Mighty Diamonds signed their publishing with a company out of France that advanced them US$17,000, and were never heard from again.”

Back in 2014, Clarke, in an interview with United Reggae, had explained that the song had come about after he decided to “lick over” a Studio One riddim and give it to the Mighty Diamonds to write a song.   The use of that beat, he had said, “made the copyright very confusing”, with even The Mighty Diamonds themselves saying “there were too many cooks involved”.

The producer had also said that he had never interacted with Musical Youth or anyone associated with them, as they were “dealing with the Diamonds because basically it was a copyright issue”.

As he did in the Teach Dem interview, Clarke had also said that following the problems with the royalties and copyright issues associated with the song, he decided that going forward, he would ensure he understood “this whole matter of copyright” and that he and his artists have controlling interests in respect of copyright, as while he had “created all of this from concept”, he realised that “everybody is going to make some money and I won’t be party to it”.

Musical Youths was formed in 1979 as an all-boys band, with members Dennis Seaton, Michael Grant, Kelvin Grant, Mr Waite Jr and Patrick Waite.   The youngsters were between the ages of 11 and 15 when Pass The Dutchie was released in September 1982.

In 2012, the Guardian reported that the ex-members of Musical Youths had lost a legal battle with their former lawyers, after a high court judge ruled in favour of partners in the law firm Woolf Seddon, which no longer exists, declaring that their case “had no merit”.

According to the report, the ex-members had claimed that lawyers gave them bad advice about the royalty money they might make from Pass The Dutchie.  Upon beginning legal proceedings in 2004, the members had claimed that solicitor Tony Seddon – and other partners in Woolf Seddon – had “been in serious breach of their duties” by failing to “protect a distinct copyright” held by Musical Youth.

They had also argued that Pass The Dutchie was a “sufficiently original work to attract distinct copyright even though it was an arrangement of Pass The Kutchie” and that Woolf Seddon was in breach of duties because lawyers had failed to protect that distinct copyright by agreeing to a division of publishing royalties on the basis that the two songs were subject to the same copyright.

But, in his verdict, the judge had ruled that Pass The Dutchie was an adaptation of Pass The Kutchie recorded by the The Mighty Diamonds, and in a footnote to his written ruling, explained that “Kutchie” was Jamaican slang for a “pot in which marijuana is kept” while “Dutchie” was the Patois name for “Dutch stewing pot”.