As the title indicates, this material was recorded in New York City during a time that many consider reggae’s golden hour. In 1983 Bob Marley had only been dead for two years, and the world was hungry for more of the great music that the superstar had introduced them to. Package tours like this one were still playing large venues (in this case, the Empire Roller Skating Club arena.)

The first half of the show features a couple of veteran performers; Max Romeo winds up the crowd Rasta-style with a version of “War Ina Babylon” while Ken Boothe, the Jamaican Al Green, waxes soulful with a few of his oldies and a cover of Bread’s “Everything I Own.” Delroy Wilson and the Blues Busters also play short sets as do brothers Tinga Stewart and Roman Stewart, who perform separately.

With a simple light show and singers who concentrate on singing as opposed to histrionics, most of the show is not visually stimulating. That changes when Big Youth and his Roots Connection band take the stage for a nine-song set to close the concert.

Big Youth is quite the showman, delivering rapid-fire vocals in a Jamaican patois and occasionally wildly screaming out a line or two, all the while reggae dancing to the rhythm. When the band launches into “Dreadlocks Dread,” Youth appropriately removes his cap and shakes his head until his lengthy dreads are flying around like a nest of angry snakes.

Some of the Big Youth songs are stretched into jams that include snippets of Marley or Marvin Gaye songs; when he’s done improvising Youth merely turns around and waves his hand at the band members, and they quickly fade the song out. Similarly when the last song is finished, Youth simply stalks off the stage, and the show and the film are over.

Grade: B

Vintage Reggae Bash: Brooklyn 1983 is currently available.