Toots Hibbert posthumously won the 2021 Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album for his final record with Toots and the Maytals, Got to Be Tough. Hibbert died in September at the age of 77 due to complications caused by COVID-19.
Got to Be Tough was the band’s first LP since 2010’s Flip and Twist. In claiming Best Reggae Album, it beat out releases like One World by The Wailers, It All Comes Back to Love by Maxi Priest, Higher Place by Skip Marley, and Upside Down 2020 by Buju Banton.
Accepting the award from his home in Montego Bay, the group’s bassist for over 50 years, Jackie Jackson, said, “This is a great honor for a legend and so well-deserved. No words can express how we guys are feeling right now.”
Toots and the Maytals previously won Best Reggae Album in 2004 for True Love. They also received Grammy nominations for 1980’s Toots Live!, 1988’s Toots in Memphis, 1998’s Ska Father, and 2012’s Reggae Got Soul: Unplugged On Strawberry Hill.
Editor’s Note: Are you a fan of reggae? Make sure to check out our new podcast Rootsland, which tells the story of two friends who take a musical and spiritual journey from the suburbs of Long Island to the streets of Kingston, Jamaica.
