Reggae

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BRAND NEW LTD. EDN. 12" All-time Studio One party ANTHEM now available for the first time ever on loud 12" with version on the flip. 100% ESSENTIAL MONSTER TUNE - ROCKS ANY DANCEFLOOR!

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Soul Jazz Records new Studio One release Rocksteady Got Soul is a collection of uplifting and superb rocksteady and soulful reggae from the late 1960s and early 1970s. Studio One is the number one label in the history of reggae and he album features - as ever with Studio One - an impeccable and unbeatable line-up of reggae superstars all soaring at the height of their creative powers. Alton Ellis, John Holt, The Heptones, Jackie Mittoo, The Ethiopians, Lee Perry and more.

The album is a mix of classic tunes and rhythms alongside super-rarities that were released in a dazzlingly complex web of Studio One labels and issues, deftly navigated with new sleevenotes from author and Studio One authority Rob Chapman. But enough with the chatter, just spin the platter - these tunes rule the town, hands down!

This Soul Jazz/Studio One album is released as deluxe gatefold double-vinyl + house inners + download code. Also as jewel case CD housed in card slipcase. Both formats come with full sleeve notes/discography and exclusive photography. (The album is also available digitally on day of release onwards)

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This is the new 20th anniversary edition of one of Soul Jazz Records’ classic Studio One releases now available as a one-off pressing special blue vinyl very limited-edition pressing ( 2000 copies worldwide).

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Studio One Roots set the standard for Soul Jazz Records’ long-standing series of Studio One collections and features many of the classic artists from Clement 'Sir Coxsone’ Dodd’s mighty roster of reggae.

This album includes Freddie McGregor, Willie Williams, Cornell Campbell, Alton Ellis, Devon Russell alongside some of the defining crack-session men groups of Jamaican reggae history - The Sound Dimension, Brentford All-Stars, The Skatalites, New Establishment and more. As ever the album is filled with a mixture of seminal cuts and super-rarities from the vast vaults of 13 Brentford Road.

Stand-out tracks include Alton Ellis’s Blackish White, a surreal and powerful Afro-centric dream, Count Ossie Nyabinghi and Rastafarian drummers genre-defying interpretation of Booker T and The MGs ‘Meditation’, Willie Williams awe-inspiring versioning of the Skatalites' seminal Rastafari anthem Addis Ababa and many, many more.

This album has been fully digitally remastered, analog cut and packaged complete with the following: Original sleevenotes by Lloyd Bradley (author of When Reggae Was King), compiled by Mark Ainley (Honest Jons), high-quality Soul Jazz mastering, wicked images of Count Ossie and the Mystic Revelation of Rastafari on the cover, and a rare image of Clement Dodd and musicians inside the studio at Studio One on the full colour inner sleeves.

REVIEWS:

"Having established himself as one of Jamaica's top producers the day Studio One opened its doors in the early '60s, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd was unable to maintain his status during the roots era of the subsequent decade. This can be attributed to a couple of factors. One was Dodd's apparent reluctance to record the new, overtly Rasta-inspired music. The other was an infusion of new blood into the Jamaican music business. Eager to make a name for themselves, producers like Joe Gibbs, Bunny Lee, Lee "Scratch" Perry, and Winston "Niney" Holness managed to supplant the island's "big three" (Dodd, Duke Reid, and Prince Buster) in the process, driving the music's evolution in the '70s.

There isn't a weak number across these 16 tracks, from the Gaylads' ode to "Africa" and Devon Russell's version of the heavyweight "Drum Song" rhythm, to a trio of stunning instrumentals: Jackie Mittoo and the Cyclones with nyahbinghi drummer Count Ossie on "Meditation," Lenny Hibbert's sparkling vibe work over Mittoo's "Ghetto Organ" ("More Creation"), and Sound Dimension's "Congo Rock."

The music of this compilation is of a rare, rare beauty and is essential to anyone's reggae collection." All Music

Owned and founded by Clement "Coxsone" Dodd, Studio One's output serves as a comprehensive guide to the history of Reggae music. The music on Studio One Rockers covers all areas of Reggae such as Ska, Rocksteady, Roots and Dancehall, all areas in which Studio One led the field.

Studio One Rockers features many legendary Studio One tracks brought together for the first time by Soul Jazz Records. From the beginning of Reggae, when the Skatalites developed a new sound of Ska in 1962 up until today, Studio One has been the number one innovator in Jamaican music.

Included in this compilation are classic Ska tracks ("Phoenix City"), Rocksteady ("Feel Like Jumping"), Roots music ("Truth and Rights"), Dancehall (Freddy McGregor, Michigan and Smiley) and many more.

Featured here are many of the classic tracks from Studio One. From Dawn Penn's legendary "No, No, No" to classics such as Horace Andy's "Skylarking" and Marcia Griffith's "Feel Like Jumping".

The Coxsone Soundsystem in the early 60s was one of the three main soundsystems operating in Jamaica alongside his competitors, Prince Buster and Duke Reid. The Studio One catalogue is possibly the largest in Jamaican music and this release is the first in a series of Studio One compilations on Soul Jazz Records.

This album comes with an in depth interview with Mr C.S. Dodd, about how he set up and ran his record label in the 1960s and 1970s.

"Compilation of the month. 100% Essential" SEVEN "Compilation of the month. A compilation of unbelievable quality. Awesome" MUZIK "A who's who of Jamaican music" MUSICWEEK "An essential slice of musical history" WAX "The most credible compilation of reggae you can 

Seminal, uplifting, righteous, soulful roots anthem!

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MONSTER STUDIO ONE TUNE FIRST TIME EVER ON A SINGLE !

Two highly sought after tracks from Jackie Mitoo's legendary 'Showcase' album, originally released on Studio One in 1980

Hypnotic, blissed out funky reggae from Jamaica's finest - Bagga Walker on bass, Leroy 'Horsemouth' Wallace on drums, Ernest Ranglin on guitar and, of course, the inimitable Jackie Mittoo on keyvoards

Cut super loud on a 12" single, its literally impossible to find a copy of this album, and if you did it would set you back hundreds of £'s

Housed in a heavyweight card Studio One sleeve these won't be around for long ! Very Limited edition 1000 copies worldwide 12” pressing

It's the bomb! Two massive Studio One cuts back to back.

MASSIVE STUDIO ONE ANTHEM ALERT!!!

Willie Williams' roots rock reggae classic Armagideon Time – the rare 12" extended Discomix version split into two sublime heavyweight slices and cut super-loud on a 12" single.

Produced by Studio One supremo Coxsone Dodd this is a huge Reggae anthem on the classic 'Real Rock' rhythm, famously covered by The Clash and sampled by KRS One, The Fugees and many more.

A dancefloor devastating Reggae party bomb!

Soul Jazz Records’ new Studio One DJ Party is the latest instalment from the mighty Studio One Records catalogue, a wicked new collection of the finest DJs and toasters ever to inhabit the world of reggae – seminal Jamaican artists including Prince Jazzbo, Dillinger, Dennis Alcapone, Michigan & Smiley, Lone Ranger as well as a host of lesser known artists and rare cuts from Studio One.

From the earliest days when Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd ran his Downbeat soundsystem up and down the length of Jamaica, DJs and toasters such as King Stitt and Count Machukie were always a part of the sound of Studio One, introducing new records and exciting audiences with catchphrase lines such as:

“No matter what the people say these sounds lead the way

It's the order of the day from your boss deejay” King Stitt

So when DJ emerged as a distinct reggae style at the start of the 1970s, Studio One was, as always, way ahead of their competitors. Legendary artists of the calibre of Dillinger, Dennis Alcapone and Prince Jazzbo all queued up to record for the equally legendary label.

At the end of the 1970s, as dancehall exploded onto the island, Clement Dodd was once again able to maintain Studio One’s position on the throne as the number one sound in the Jamaica, fighting off upstart competitors such as Channel One and Joe Gibbs who tried to replicate Studio One’s unique sound. During this period Clement Dodd released a series of stunning dancehall releases from young DJ/dancehall artists at the label including Lone Ranger and Michigan & Smiley.

This selection spans the early 70s up until the mid-1980s, from the earliest days of deejay toasting right up until digital dancehall, ground-breaking tracks over the finest selection of the ultimate Studio One rhythms and tracks. Who could ask for more?

Studio One DJ Party includes specially commissioned sleevenotes by Chris Lane, founder of the legendary British reggae label Fashion Records, as well as fantastic original artwork commissioned by the illustrator Ski Williams. The album is released as double heavyweight vinyl (+download code), and distinctive Soul Jazz Records CD with slipcase.

This is the latest new installment of Soul Jazz Records’ on-going collection of Rastafarian music at Studio One, featuring classic material from legendary roots and culture artists The Gladiators, Horace Andy, Freddie McGregor, Sugar Minott and the Wailing Souls, alongside a superb selection of rarities from Sir Coxsone’s musical empire made up of one-off and practically unknown Rastafarian artists who recorded on a myriad of Studio One off-shoot labels in the 1970s – The Manchesters, Mellodies, The Nightingales and others.

In this new collection, we see that once again the prescient Clement Dodd was a man who saw the wider picture. In the 1960s it was Sir Coxsone who identified the creative potential of The Wailers, Toots and the Maytals, Heptones, Burning Spear and many, many others. In the 1970s Studio One released an untouchable selection of the finest as styles moved from reggae to deejay to dub and, in the latter half, the emergence of dancehall.

But what is also clear is that throughout this era Studio One released an incredible amount of roots music, and not just the most commercially obvious. For alongside the career-building catalogues of Burning Spear, The Wailing Souls, The Gladiators and so on, one needs to be an ardent Studio One collector to know some of the truly raw Rastafarian music featured here. Groups such as The Manchesters or The Nightingales feel as if they were recorded straight out of the churchical chants of the mansions.

Black Man’s Pride explains the links between the ideology of Clement Dodd at Studio One and the Rastafarian faith, which was the creation of Afro-Jamaicans and concerned above all else with a black consciousness and empowerment, a rediscovering of the personal and racial identity of black people. The movement began in the 1930s and, in tandem with this black consciousness, called for a rejection of the British imperial culture that dominated Jamaica, while creating an identity based on a re-appropriation of an African heritage.

The Rastafari movement was like a pivot, bringing together and balancing many vectors of ideologies. Marcus Garvey’s Back to Africa movement, trades union discourse, anti-colonialism and nation independence, maroon self-definition and independence, the spirit of African rebellion in the Caribbean. For Clement Dodd, a black man and producer growing up in Kingston in this era, Rastafari was simply a part of his everyday world – from witnessing Count Ossie’s grounations to the faith of many Jamaican artists at Studio One – from the Skatalites onwards.

Featured here alongside these classic and rare tracks from Studio One are new and extensive sleeve notes with track-by-track notes by Rob Chapman, author of the acclaimed Downbeat Special and Never Grow Old Studio One books.

The album is released as double heavyweight gatefold vinyl (+ free download code), CD with slipcase and booklet, and digital album.

Long-out-of-print re-release of this classic Sugar Minott album on Soul Jazz Records bringing together the best of his classic material recorded at Studio One in the 1970s.

Lincoln Sugar Minott was born in Kingston, Jamaica in 1956. He grew up in a poor area of West Kingston and from an early age developed a love of Reggae music and the music of Studio One in particular. As a teenager, he became selector for Sound of Silence Keystone and Gathering of Youth local sound-systems. By the late 1970s Minott had risen to become one of the biggest stars in Jamaican music.

Sugar Minott began his career at Studio One. After auditioning in front of Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd in the early 1970s, he became the first artist to record new songs over classic rhythms, singing over original Studio One tapes – the significance of which led directly to the birth of dancehall, as Channel One, Joe Gibbs and hundreds of other Jamaican producers quickly began releasing their own material based on these same classic Studio One rhythms replayed by Sly and Robbie, The Aggrovators, Soul Syndicate, Roots Radics and many others.

“I knew Studio One spiritually before I knew Studio One physically. You know I grew up beside a dancehall and Sir Coxsone’s sound used to play there from when I was a boy. So from that influence you know I used to love Studio One sound so much, I became a sound selector. So that was my first involvement with getting to know Studio One music like The Heptones, Alton Ellis, Ken Booth, the whole works and that was my life from a youth.”

After Sugar Minott’s debut many other artists followed suit at the label such as Freddie McGregor, Johnny Osbourne, Lone Ranger and Michigan & Smiley leading to one of the most creative periods for the label. This is the first retrospective of Sugar Minott at the label and most of these recordings have never been widely available outside Jamaica.

Soul Jazz Records new Studio One album is a fantastic selection featuring all-star legendary Studio One vocalists – Alton Ellis, Marcia Griffiths, The Heptones, Horace Andy, Freddie McGregor, Sugar Minott – alongside a host of classic and super-rare Lovers Rock cuts all of which Clement Dodd recorded at the Brentford Road studio.

Lovers rock brought together many elements and here you will find sweet harmonies, late 1960s rocksteady, 1970s soul covers, discomixes, recuts and new rhythms – which all fit together in a timeless twilight of love & harmony – as if lovers silhouetted by a Kingston sunset.

Here you will find stone-cold classic Studio One tunes – Marcia Griffiths ‘Truly’, Horace Andy’s I’ll Be Gone super-rare cuts like Carlton and The Shoes killer 70s versions of Never Give Your Heart Away and Let Me Love You (vocal cut to Jackie Mittoo’s mighty Wall Street), The Invaders sweet lovers rocksteady bomb ‘Sweet Soul Rocking’ (currently for sale at £2,500 on discogs!) and many more!

This new album comes with sleevenotes by Lloyd Bradley, the acclaimed author of Bass Culture, Sounds Like London and Reggae: The Story of Jamaican Music. The album is pressed on heavyweight double gatefold vinyl (+ free download), deluxe slipcase CD and digital.

Studio One Freedom Sounds is the new collection from Soul Jazz/Studio One focussing on the intense period in the second half of the 1960s when Studio One’s vast and unbeatable output of ska, soul, rock steady and reggae made it literally one of the hottest musical empires in the world.

During this highly successful period, Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd released hundreds and hundreds of superlative singles seemingly on an almost daily basis, in the process making huge stars out of Jamaican singers such as Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson, The Wailers, Slim Smith, Jackie Opel and many more.

Powered by the finest in-house musicians working in Jamaica, whether it was The Skatalites, Jackie Mittoo’s Soul Brothers, The Sounds Dimension or The Soul Vendors, Studio One functioned as hit factory on the scale of Motown in the USA, shaping and defining reggae music for decades to come.

Singlehandedly Studio One’s founder Clement Dodd was able to create the most successful vertically-integrated record company that Jamaica had ever known with pressing plant, printers, studio, shops, and sound systems all running at once, with over 50 employees and hundreds of artists working with Studio One during this time.

Studio One Freedom Sounds tells the story of Studio One in the 1960s with a stunning set of ska, soul, rock steady and reggae killer tunes as well as informative sleevenotes and track-by-track info by Noel Hawks. The album is released as heavyweight double vinyl (+ free download code), deluxe CD and digital album.

This is the second installment of deep roots Rastafarian reggae at Studio One and features classic music from some of the most important figures in reggae music – Alton Ellis, The Heptones, Jackie Mittoo, The Gladiators – alongside a host of rarities and little-known recordings, such as a truly rare Mystic Revelation of Rastafari seven-inch single, Willie William’s first ever recording ‘Calling’ and Horace Andy’s righteous (and equally rare) masterpiece ‘Illiteracy.’

Black Man’s Pride 2 extends the legacy of Studio One’s ground-breaking path in roots reggae which began at the end of the 1960s and continued throughout the 1970s. The album tells the story of how the rise of Studio One Records and the Rastafari movement were interconnected, through the adoption of the Rastafari faith by key reggae artists – everyone from the Skatalites and Wailers in the 1960s, major singers such as Alton Ellis and Horace Andy at the end of the decade, through to major roots artists such as The Gladiators in the 1970s – and how Clement Dodd consistently recorded this heavyweight roots music throughout Studio One’s history.

The extensive sleeve-notes to this album also discuss the links between Rastafari and Studio One in time and place, noting how both the religion and Clement Dodd’s musical empire had their roots in the intense period of pre-independence Jamaica in Kingston, expanded in the 1960s following the visit of Haile Selassie in 1966, and how roots music then came to dominate reggae music in the early 1970s. Also discussed is how the outsider stance of both reggae music and the Rastafari movement relate back many hundreds of years to the original rebel stance of the Maroons, escaped slaves who set up self-sufficient enclaves in the hills of the Jamaican countryside.

There is also a track-by-track history by the noted Studio One writer Rob Chapman (Never Grow Old). This new album comes as heavyweight gatefold double vinyl (+ download code), deluxe CD and digital album.

REVIEWS of Black Man's Pride:

"Soul Jazz’s albums are different: not only have they encouraged a new, younger audience, parallel to the one that enjoys rare funk and spiritual jazz, to appreciate this music, their records are coherent. They’re not just a heap of tunes that happen to be sharing a black vinyl apartment. They’re themed and meld musically. They have a reason to exist.
In this instance, that reason is an exploration of 70s vocal roots reggae with a theme of black pride and dignity." Record Collector

While the righteousness of blackness is at the heart of the Rastafarian faith, this collection illustrates how black pride remained a central theme, if not the defining essence, at the very core of all the music created at Studio One Records.

Black Man’s Pride is the striking new Studio One collection of deep heavyweight reggae featuring Horace Andy, Alton Ellis, The Gladiators, Sugar Minott, The Heptones, Freddie McGregor, Cedric Brooks & more.

In order to understand the centrality of black identity in the music created at Studio One, we need look no further than Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd who, who created the first black-owned record company in Jamaica.

In similar fashion Alton Ellis’s defining ‘Black Man’s Pride’ brings up emotions that are at the heart of many of these uplifting songs. Alton Ellis’ birthplace was the Trench Town ghetto of Kingston, also the birthplace of The Wailers, Ken Boothe and many other Studio One luminaries.

Clement Dodd established a musical empire firmly rooted by the core musicians working at Studio One many of whom came out of the Alpha School for Wayward Boys, run by Roman Catholic nuns, whose luminaries include Don Drummond, Johnny Moore, Leroy ‘Horsemouth’ Wallace, Cedric Brooks, Vin Gordon, Tommy McCook & more.

Many of the songs featured here come from the transitory phase in reggae at the start of the 1970s. After the exhilaration of Ska and following the cooling down of Rocksteady. While reggae awaited the arrival of roots, Studio One’s vocalists were already producing some of the moodiest music imaginable! Here are 18 heavyweight tunes, both classic cuts and super-rare tunes!

This new album is released as a heavyweight gatefold double-LP edition (+ download code), CD and digital with full text.

REVIEW

"The bottomless pit that is Coxsone Dodd’s Studio One label(s) yields more gems. Soul Jazz and before it, Heartbeat in the US, United Artists, Bamboo and various other labels in the UK have released numerous collections, yet the catalogue remains largely under-exploited, despite the late Mr Dodd’s tireless efforts to wring every last cent from it in unlikely ways. Little wonder that some reggae fans, spoilt by knowledge and racks of original vinyl, can be inclined to shrug when another comp emerges: there have been so many. However, Soul Jazz’s albums are different: not only have they encouraged a new, younger audience, parallel to the one that enjoys rare funk and spiritual jazz, to appreciate this music, their records are coherent. They’re not just a heap of tunes that happen to be sharing a black vinyl apartment. They’re themed and meld musically. They have a reason to exist.

In this instance, that reason is an exploration of (mostly) 70s vocal roots reggae with a theme of black pride and dignity. This music was recorded as a cultural statement, if not a cry, from the roots; strong stuff, deep, dark and heavy. But don’t mistake that for leaden. It may have bass frequencies that drive your neighbour’s dog under the sofa, thinking it’s 5 November all over again, but this is no gloomy exercise in musical storm clouds. Right from Alton Ellis’s title-donating opening tune, there are aspects of Black Man’s Pride that will have you skipping around the room, literally or mentally, and thanking Jah that you didn’t spend the money it cost you on a pizza, dough balls and Diet Coke meal deal. This is not musical junk food, it’s a keeper fit to lift the heart whenever needed.

One reason for this is the sequencing. Glen Miller (not that one) may have a light, soulful voice but the rhythm track he’s riding on Love And Understanding is a minor chord churner, as sad as a wet Sunday. But it’s held up on either side by Sugar Minott (and an uncredited Gladiators) floating through Woman Shadow (as sung by The Meditations as Woman Is Like A Shadow), and The Nightingales’ gorgeously swinging Rasta Is Calling, a glorious take on Delroy Wilson’s Cool Operator rhythm that’s a sod to find on 45. The Heptones make a rational case for Equal Rights in a manner that ought to have been perky enough to win them at least an audition for a CBBC presenter’s role. Their lead singer Leroy Sibbles pops up uncredited on John Holt’s heart-lifting yet cool Let’s Build Our Dreams. Heavy 70s roots is gloomy? Nope. Jamaica’s ghettos were suffering; they didn’t need more misery.

There’s also judicious joining up of vocals and their dubwise 45 flipsides: The Gladiators’ Roots Natty is one such. I heard the vocal, and immediately wished it was the devastatingly moving dub cut. Compiler Stuart Baker evidently thought likewise, so it extends to the version. For variety, there’s a lone sax instrumental to wreck things up too: Cedric Brooks’ melodic Why Can’t I.

There’s room for the unique, deep and breathy voice of Larry Marshall. More “international” stars Horace Andy and Dennis Brown are here too, recorded as youths, as is a teenage Freddie McGregor on a rootsy rewrite of Cat Stevens’ Wild World – with what sounds like JS Bach on synth! The set shuts with Johnny Osbourne’s sophisticated and spiritually openhearted Forgive Them.

With an informative, eminently enjoyable sleeve note about the growth of roots reggae and its place in Rastafarianism and black awareness, fittingly Black Man’s Pride lacks nothing." Ian McCann, RECORD COLLECTOR

By the 1970s Studio One and Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd had already proved himself to be the defining force in Reggae for almost two decades. From running the Downbeat sound system on the lawns and yards of Kingston in the late 1950s to opening Studio One at 13 Brentford Road at the start of the 1960s, ushering in Ska and Rocksteady and establishing the careers of most of Jamaica’s artists – everyone from Bob Marley and The Wailers, Ken Boothe, Toots and The Maytals, The Skatalites, Jackie Mittoo and more – Clement Dodd had until this point dominated the Jamaican musical world.

And yet, incredibly, Clement Dodd was barely half way through his musical path, maintaining Studio One’s number one position in the Jamaican music scene throughout the 1970s with a combination of musical and creative innovation and an endless capacity to adapt and create new musical fashions. By the end of the 1970s Dancehall had become the defining sound on the island. Dancehall was essentially a tribute by other Jamaican producers and artists to the classic music of Studio One created in the 1960s as young artists across the island created new songs, while musicians recreated these original classic foundation Studio One rhythms. As on other occasions, Clement Dodd rose to this new musical challenge by producing a whole new era of classics for Studio One.

The roots of Dancehall begin with the DJs of the early 1970s, who were the first to sing new material over earlier classic rhythms. Early DJ pioneers such as Dillinger and Prince Jazzbo both feature here toasting over classic songs - The Mad Lad’s Ten to One and The Eternals’ Queen of the Minstrel. But it is the new wave of artists who arrived at Studio One at the onset of Dancehall which enabled Studio One to maintain its number one status as the whole of Kingston’s rival music producers – Channel One, Joe Gibbs and many others – attempted to challenge this position.

Sugar Minott, Michigan and Smiley, Willie Williams, Lone Ranger had all grown up listening to the classic Studio One music of the 1960s and were able to pay the greatest compliment to the label by creating the defining new music of this new era with songs that combined all the musical and technological developments of the 1970s – dub, deejaying, discomixes, syndrums, synthesizers and more – into the sound of the future: Dancehall.

Throughout this era Clement Dodd also continued to work with a number of original and returning artists – such as Alton Ellis, Horace Andy, Freddie McGregor, Johnny Osbourne – updating old rhythms and creating new ones while employing the in-house band variously known as The Brentford All-Stars/Rockers/Disco Set to update these sounds in order to maintain Studio One’s number one position as the defining force in Reggae.

This is Soul Jazz Records’ latest new collection of classic and rare Studio One recordings and is released on triple LP (+ download code), deluxe CD and digital album.

Fantastic new collection of rare and classic killer ska from the legendary Skatalites, one of the most important groups in the history of Reggae.

This album was first released only as a limited-edition  collectors 7-inch box set (now deleted) and is now available for the first time as a double LP edition (+ Download Code), CD and digital release - complete with 10 extra bonus tracks and new extensive sleeve notes!

The Skatalites brought the sound of Jamaica to the world. At the start of the 1960s, in the space of just a couple of years Don Drummond, Tommy McCook, Jackie Mittoo, Ernest Ranglin, Johnny ‘Dizzy’ Moore, Lloyd Knibbs, Lloyd Brevett and others defined the exciting beat of ‘Ska’ as the sound of newly independent Jamaica.

As the house band at Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd’s newly launched Studio One Records at 13 Brentford Road, the group comprising the finest jazz musicians on the island played on literally 1000s of recordings – Bob Marley and The Wailers, Toots and The Maytals, Delroy Wilson, Ken Boothe, Alton Ellis and many, many more.

During their existence (1963-65) The Skatalites also recorded 100s of their own songs, released either under their own name, or The Studio One Orchestra, or that of band members Drummond, McCook etc. This is the first collection on Soul Jazz Records to bring you some of their finest material – from classics such as ‘Guns of Navarone’, ‘El Pussy Cat Ska’, ‘Christine Keeler’ through to some serious rarities such as Dizzy Johnny and The Studio One Orchestra’s ‘Sudden Destruction’ and Don Drummond’s ‘Coolie Boy’.

The Skatalites’ ska sound brought together aspects of jazz, latin, rhythm and blues, proto-Rastafarianism (tracks such as ‘Full Dread’, ‘Beardsman Ska’) and more. The intensity and energy of their sound was matched by the experimentation of the troubled genius of Don Drummond whose ‘far east’ modal trombone sound added a complex melancholy to the music of the Skatalites (the group split-up after Drummond was charged with murdering his wife, dancer Margarita Mahfood).

Soul Jazz Records’ new ‘Studio One Dub Fire Special’ brings together 18 heavyweight dub cuts all recorded at 13 Brentford Road in the 1970s.

Featuring a stellar selection of dub cuts to classic and foundation songs recorded at Studio One with music from the legendary in-house bands - The Sound Dimension, New Establishment, Soul Defenders and Brentford All-Stars – featuring the likes of reggae’s finest musicians - Jackie Mittoo, Leroy Sibbles, Cedric Brooks, Freddie McGregor and more.

These fresh dub sounds employed the mighty mixing desk skills of The Dub Specialist, aka Clement ‘Sir Coxsone’ Dodd and studio engineer supremo Sylvan Morris to full effect. Studio One Dub Fire Special features our latest chapter of raw, stripped-down bass and drum sounds direct from Studio One.

"Brilliant, absolutely superb collection, a hand-picked selection of dubs straight out of Studio One" David Rodigan

* (no digital in USA)

Soul Jazz Records’ new journey into the mighty vaults of Clement Dodd’s Studio One steps once more into the fertile musical environment of Jamaican music in the late 1960s and early 1970s, from the sweet harmony vocals of seminal 1960s Rocksteady right up to the nascent birth of Reggae and Roots music at the start of the 1970s.

Sleevenotes to this album are by Steve Barrow, author of ‘Rough Guide to Reggae’ as well as Soul Jazz Records’ own ‘Reggae Soundsystem Cover Art’ books.

While Ska at the start of the 1960s had taken American rhythm and blues as its main influence, Rocksteady focused on the emergence of American Soul music – with Jamaican vocal harmony groups such as The Gaylads, John Holt & The Paragons, Carlton & The Shoes showing a particular fascination with the close harmonies of Curtis Mayfield and The Impressions and other US soul acts. Here The Heptones even feature with a cover of Bob Dylan’s ‘I Shall Be Released’.

The influence of Soul music on Jamaican rock steady and reggae is almost palpable, so much so that one wonders how much more successful singers like Delroy Wilson, Alton Ellis, Slim Smith and John Holt would have been had they been born in Chicago, Detroit or Memphis

Artists such as Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson and Owen Gray defined the era – a slowed down beat as Jamaican political and social heat slowly increased as the 1960s progressed into the start of the 1970s –  and the music evolved further from rock steady into roots reggae.

Wicked tunes!

Double vinyl + download code, Deluxe CD, Digital album.

Reviews:

"Every tune is a bonaflide classic" Pitchfork

Read full Pitchfork article here

Stone-cold classic Studio One on limited-edition brand new 7" - loud, clean, boom!

Back to back two KILLER soul to reggae instrumental monsters!

RARE CUTS! Very Limited edition bespoke Studio One Collector's 45

ONLY AVAILABLE DIRECT FROM SOUL JAZZ RECORDS & SOUNDS OF THE UNIVERSE

RARE CUTS! Very Limited edition bespoke Studio One Collector's 45
ONLY AVAILABLE DIRECT FROM SOUL JAZZ RECORDS & SOUNDS OF THE UNIVERSE

RARE CUTS! Very Limited edition bespoke Studio One Collector's 45

ONLY AVAILABLE DIRECT FROM SOUL JAZZ RECORDS & SOUNDS OF THE UNIVERSE

Stone-cold classic Studio One on limited-edition brand new 7" - loud, clean, boom!

ALL TIME ROOTS ANTHEM!

Stone-cold classic Studio One on limited-edition brand new 7" - loud, clean, boom!

Classic party tune + wicked dub