As a college student in the '80s, when I first started listening to Zeppelin, and saw the song title on the album, without ever hearing it pronounced, I assumed it was pronounced something like “DYE-er MAHK-er,” and thought maybe it was Welsh or something. 
I heard Plant explain it as (from a long ago memory):
Person A: I went to the Island
Person B: Jamaica?
Double entendre translation -
Person A: I went to the Island
Person B: (to the island of) Jamaica?
And..
Person A: I went to the Island
Person B: Did you make (have sex with) her (while you were there?
I’m assuming Brits pronounce Jamaica with an ‘r’ sound at the end?
The reverse, actually. With the typical English non-rhotic (unpronounced) “r” at the end of a word, “her” would be pronounced without the “r” sound, and thus, would sound like the last syllable of “Jamaica.”
Makes sense.
All their material is ska or rocksteady. They don’t do reggae.
No, the joke is :
"My wife’s gone to the West Indies|
“Jamaica?”
“No, she wanted to go”
No one reads my posts 
No, the interview I heard, he said it was about sex. A quick googling shows I’m not the only one who heard that interview;
“I heard Robert Plant on the radio years ago saying it resulted from a conversation about a date. Bob asked his mate if he made her (did you get laid?) Brit pronounciation D’yer Mak’er? Sounds like Jamaica so let’s put it to a reggae beat.”
I’m sure he’s told it both ways down through the years.
That seems like an odd claim to make, since this whole discussion started with a mention of their cover of the reggae song “Israelites.” Which came from The Dangerman Sessions, which was essentially an album of reggae covers.
Also, I hear reggae in some of their earlier work, like “A Day on the Town.”
I agree that they started out as a ska band and never totally abandoned that style, but they did incorporate other styles into their music as well. For example, the review of Keep Moving that appeared in Rolling Stone acknowledged their debt to “the British art-pop song, as epitomized by the midperiod Kinks.”
“Israelites” is a ska song. One of the most famous, sure, but not reggae. It came out when ska was still transforming via rocksteady and lover’s rock into reggae, which still wasn’t quite developed and defined in 1968.
Not entirely sure what that period was, yet again I’m pretty adept at running bands (at least those as great as the Kinks) through my head, and a song that I had to play first as I know Ray does a certain patois voice in it is this:
If not Reggae or Ska, proto- one of the other?
Agreed, but it’s pretty close to the edge. There’s definitely some blurriness between the two genres.
All done in a ska style.
With all those horns? I’d still call it ska, maybe rocksteady.
Sure - they were pop, and new wave.
Oh sure there is, and not being good in music theory, I’d have a heard time explaining the difference between ska and reggae (and rocksteady and lover’s rock, for that matter). But I can hear the differences.
If you go to spotify and search for bozobrain (my Spotify handle), I have a pretty good ska playlist put together.
Of course the posthumous Bob Marley compilation “Legend” really is a legend, and deservedly so, but many people complained at the time that it had too many love songs and not enough protest songs. So his estate/label (I don’t really know who finally was responsible) decided to release “Rebel Music” two years later, which paled in comparison in record sales, but was just as strong a compilation, only consisting of political songs.
Nip it!
I always assumed the Sheriff shot the deputy and tried to frame the narrator.
But maybe he shot the Sheriff and the deputy was nearby and took the bullet too.
So maybe his guilt is over shooting someone he didn’t mean to.
Maybe this song is about collateral damage.
Never read the lyrics until today.
I guess I got the “Legend” CD just to have with me in Australia (I already had a few LP’s). I think I also bought Peter Tosh’s “Legalise It” where the title track includes the line “And I’ll advertise it”. In Melbourne ‘da weed’ was rather readily available.
Rather often when I come into this three story building (in the UK), I can smell the Rastaman living it up. I do not partake (anymore) as neither does my wife, yet she doesn’t mind the smell.
Anyways, I’d have expected more of his “love songs” to have been covered
Never mind Jamaica, does Indiana want him?