Max Romeo, Leading Voice in the Heyday of Roots Reggae, Dies at 80

Max Romeo, a reggae singer whose earliest hits dripped with sexual innuendo, but who then switched to a soulful, politically engaged message that provided a soundtrack to the class struggles of 1970s Jamaica and made him a mainstay on the international tour circuit, died on April 11 outside Kingston, the capital of Jamaica. He was 80.

Errol Michael Henry, a lawyer who represented Mr. Romeo, said the cause of his death, in a hospital, was heart complications.

Mr. Romeo, whose real surname was Smith, was among the last of a generation of Jamaican musicians who came to prominence in the 1970s, among them Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and Burning Spear. Their sound, known as roots reggae, centered on the lives of ordinary people in Jamaica, blended with a heavy dollop of Black liberation and Rastafarianism.

Until then, reggae had been seen, at least beyond Jamaica, as a musical novelty focused on fleeting love and sex. But the 1970s musicians’ political message and laid-back sound, combined with their open marijuana use, gave reggae a new and lasting cultural resonance.

Mr. Romeo’s career tracked that transition. He began as a clean-cut crooner in Jamaica, part of a trio called the Emotions. After setting out on his own, he found success with raunchy songs like “Wet Dream,” a 1968 track so explicit that many radio stations refused to play it. Nevertheless, it spent 25 weeks on the British singles chart, peaking at No. 10.