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| King Tubbys Meets Rockers Uptown | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| From the book: Reggae. The Rough Guide.
100 essential CDs |
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| If you had to pick just one album to represent dub
"King Tubby Meets The Rockers Uptown" is the disc. The title really says it all: the collaboration between the premier engineer and the top roots producer of the mid-’70s resulted in definitive King Tubby interpretations of some of Pablo’s deepest rhythms. It also demonstrated conclusively that a studio engineer could be considered as creative as the singers, musicians and visionary producer who made the music. A dub is essentially a remix In the hands of an engineer as good as King Tubby (1941 – 1989) it became an artform, and an incredibly popular one. From the 1970s on, Tubby cut dubs for all the top sound systems and producers. The impact of his pioneering efforts has since resounded far beyond its birthplace in the dancehall and it shows no sign of diminishing. Back in 1972, at the time of this recording, King Tubby was based in the Waterhouse ghetto, and was the acknowledged ruler of the sound system world. Pablo (1953 – 1999), a scion of the more "uptown" Swaby family, was aged just 19 but had begun producing himself and already knew the sound he was seeking: a minor chord-based "Far East" sound. This is what came to fruition on King Tubby Meets The Rockers Uptown and it was a major component in the whole roots sound of the '70s, forged along with others of similar spiritual temperament, like Yabby You. For this ground-breaking disc, Pablo assembled a brilliant cast: the Upsetters/Wailers drum and bass duo of Aston "Family Man" Barrett and brother Carlton, guitarist Earl "Chinna" Smith, horns-men Richard "Dirty Harry" Hall, Bobby Ellis, Vin Gordon and bassist Robbie Shakespeare. All sessions were recorded by the engineer Errol "ET" Thompson at Randy’s Studio on North Parade.
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Pablo then took the tapes to King Tubby for mixing.
He initially released instrumental, deejay and vocal cuts as 7-inch
45s on his Hot Stuff, Rockers and Pablo International labels, between
1972 and 75, but as the vogue for dub albums exploded in 1976, Pablo
compiled twelve of his b-side dubs to make this set. The centrepiece of the album is "King Tubby Meets The Rockers Uptown", a killer dub version of Jacob Miller’s vocal "Baby I Love You So" which almost single-handedly defined dub for a non-Jamaican audience when it was released as a single by Island Records (UK) in 1975; it also appeared on the company’s massive-selling "This Is Reggae Music" sampler. Using his custom sliders, Tubby eases Miller’s voice in and out of the mix, adding stabs of guitar and melodica. Carlton Barrett’s explosive snare fills further serve to punctuate the elastic rhythm, which was first cut for producer Herman Chin Loy’s 1973 album Aquarius Dub. Similarly, "Frozen Dub" propelled the Heptones on a recut of their Studio One classic "Love Won’t Come Easy". Hopefully someone, some day, will undertake to present this crucial set in all its glory, with alternate mixes. This CD reissue could do with better remastering and more care. Unaccountably, the exclamation "Lion!" is missing from the beginning of the album’s opener, "Keep On Dubbing". Oddly, too, the record’s last track is not actually listed on the CD, though it’s there on the disc: it’s Pablo’s take on the Abyssinians’ classic anthem "Satta Massagana", given a beautifully understated mix by Tubby. But quibbles aside, this really is an essential essential – and, especially given that Blackboard Jungle, Tubby’s epic collaboration with Scratch, continues to be poorly reissued, it is the first of all dub CDs to acquire for any collection. :: Steve Barrow & Peter Dalton |
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