Artist · chart history · #781 in indie & aaa artist polls
Jimmy Cliff
Solo artist Adelphi Jamaica Jamaican ska, rocksteady, reggae and soul musician
Jimmy Cliff is an artist from Adelphi. Jimmy Cliff has 25 chart appearances on 18 radio countdowns from 10 stations on RockLists, spanning 1989–2026. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “Many Rivers to Cross”, which appears on 8 lists with a best position of #180. The station that charted Jimmy Cliff most often is The Colorado Sound (Fort Collins–Denver, CO), with 6 appearances. The artist’s biggest year on year-end countdowns was 2011.
Jimmy Cliff, born James Chambers in 1944, sang ska, rocksteady, reggae and soul with a voice that could break your heart and then hand it back mended, and he did as much as anyone to carry Jamaica's sound out into the wider world. He went after that world on purpose, chasing record deals that opened doors in Britain and covering songs the pop audience already knew: his version of Cat Stevens' "Wild World" went to number eight in the UK in 1970, and the album named after it brought "Sitting In Limbo".
Before that came "Many Rivers to Cross", from the 1969 set Jimmy Cliff (also known as Wonderful World, Beautiful People): a slow, aching gospel plea, sung like a man at the end of a very long road. Then he starred in The Harder They Come, the first major commercial film out of Jamaica, and its title song and soundtrack did more than any record yet to put reggae on the map.
He kept at it for decades, from "Shelter of Your Love" in Cocktail to "I Can See Clearly Now" on the Cool Runnings soundtrack. He won the Grammy for Best Reggae Album twice from seven nominations, joined Bob Marley as one of only two Jamaicans in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2010, and held his country's Order of Merit. He died on 24 November 2025.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by Jimmy Cliff on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Many Rivers to Cross | 8 | #180 | – | – | |
| 2 | The Harder They Come | 7 | #75 | – | – | |
| 3 | Guns Of Brixton | 2 | #67 | – | 2011 | |
| 4 | Sitting In Limbo | 1 | #1244 | – | – | |
| 5 | I Can See Clearly Now | 2 | #658 | – | – | |
| 6 | Ruby Soho | 1 | #591 | – | – | |
| 7 | Wonderful World, Beautiful People | 1 | #1422 | – | – | |
| 8 | One More | 1 | #85 | – | 2012 | |
| 9 | You Can Get It If You Really Want | 1 | #812 | – | – |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
Year-end chart timeline
Combined year-end countdown points per year. Taller bars mean more songs placing higher across more stations.
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