Rebop Kwaku Baah

The other night Becky and I were watching some music concert clips on YouTube and one of them I put on was Traffic performing The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys from a concert in 1972. She asked about the African percussionist playing with them and did know who he was or when he played with them. I always remembered Rebop as he was known from the early 70's until the band broke up in 1974. The African percussion was an important part of their second band sound. He was not with them in their earlier 1967 to 1969 period.

I saw Traffic in concert in Norfolk in early 1973 and Rebop was playing with them at that time. I had also seen them in 1969 but of course that was a somewhat different band at the time with Steve Winwood, Dave Mason, Chris Wood and Jim Capaldi. 

So today I looked up Traffic and their history because I was interested in the backstory of Rebop. I saw that he was Ghanian from the Ivory Coast. He played on five Traffic albums and also on Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert album which has always been one of my favorite live records. After Traffic broke up he joined the band Can and played with them until they broke up in 1979.

Sadly I read of his death in January 1983 from a ruptured brain aneurysm that occurred on stage while performing on a tour with Jimmy Cliff. Another brain aneurysm connection that kind of freaked me out.