Eine feine, zum Glück nicht typisch sonnendurchflutete, vielmehr überraschend raue Reggaeplatte ist Jimmy Cliff mit REBIRTH gelungen. Mindestens zwei Songs weisen direkt auf alte Zeiten von Clash und dem viel zu früh gestorbenen Joe Strummer, dessen Radiosendungen bei der BBC heute noch ihre Zeitlosigkeit im Netz beweisen. In eInem Interview wurde der unverwüstliche Jimmy Cliff zu seinem alten Freund befragt:
It seems like a part of this new record is a tribute to your old friend Joe Strummer.
The last song that he recorded in the studio was a song called “Over the Border,” with me. He just walked into the studio and said “I have some lyrics, and I hear Jimmy Cliff singing these lyrics.” I was doing the album with Dave Stewart and Dave said, “Well, how does the melody go?” And he said, “I don’t have a melody. I just hear Jimmy Cliff singing these lyrics.” So Dave took up his guitar and started playing some chords, and I came up with the melody and we put the lyrics together. Joe was one of the stalwarts of social justice expression in his music, so I felt like I really had to lift my hat to him this time.