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Singer Junior Murvin, born Murvin Smith, best known for the reggae single Police and Thieves, has sadly passed in Jamaica. The Jamaica Observer reported that he died at Port Antonio hospital on Monday.
The artist, who was thought to be between 64 and 67, began his career as a lounge singer in Portland parish in Kingston and went on to perform under the name Junior Soul. He recorded music for more than 30 years, and broke out of the local Jamaican scene with the 1976 track Police and Thieves, a song that outlined the police brutality and social unrest of the time, and became synonymous with the riots of Notting Hill carnival in the year that it was released.
Murvin worked alongside legendary producer Lee "Scratch" Perry on the single and his debut album, also titled Police and Thieves, which was released on Island Records in 1977. The single found a new audience through the punk movement, and was famously covered by the Clash.
The singer had five children and eight grandchildren.
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