Johnny Nash, the angelic reggae-pop singer-songwriter who had US hits with “I Can See Clearly”, “Stir It Up” and “Hold Me Tight” died Tuesday at his Houston home. He was 80 years old. No cause of death was found.
Nash scored a pop smash in 1972 with his self-penned “I Can See Clearly Now,” which was # 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for a month. He followed this success with a cover of reggae legend Bob Marley’s “Stir It Up”, which just missed the top 10. Nash’s first big pop hit was “Hold Me Tight,” which reached # 5 in 1968.
He began entering the US pop charts in the late 1950s, with “A Very Special Love” and “The Teen Commandments” reaching the top 30. The latter was a spoken inspirational conversation in which his ABC Paramount label colleagues Paul Anka and future film star George Hamilton also took part. Nash’s career began after he began recording in Jamaica in 1967, but its commercial peak was short-lived, and it only managed to dent the pop charts a few times after 1973.
Nash began appearing on local television in his hometown of Houston at the age of 13 and appeared frequently on Arthur Godfrey’s radio and television shows from the mid-1950s to 1963.
He also enjoyed a brief film career, starring in 1960’s Noir Key Witness as a member of Dennis Hopper’s LA Street Gang. He also starred in the socially conscious drama Take a Giant Step from 1959, which won the Golden Globe for Best Picture Promoting International Understanding. Nash also received the Silver Sail at the Locarno International Film Festival in 1960, an award for the humanity and intensity of his performance. Nash was also a co-top of the 1971 Swedish drama Love Is Not a Game.
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