Thursday, June 21, 2007

A Celebration Of Summer

Summer officially arrives in this neck of the woods at 2:06 PM today and I for one couldn't be happier! Some of my most treasured moments in life center around this four month stretch of seemingly non-stop heat and humidity and I actually find myself counting down the days until it officially arrives. I often get this unrelenting urge to dance nude around a gigantic bonfire fueled by my burning snow shovel, gloves, scarves, boots and winter hats... after a couple libations of course. Next, as a sacrifice to the Summer Solstice, I plan to pulverize my car's windshield ice scraper with the biggest boulder I can lift. The blissful destruction would continue as I would roam the roads and byways searching for any of those unsuspecting metal road signs you often see near bridges warning that "Bridges Ice Before Roadway" and I would beat them off their posts and into chunks of recyclable metal chunks resembling wadded sheets of paper... but I usually wise up. For one, no one would appreciate or enjoy seeing me in the nude dancing around a fire in broad daylight, next I remember that all those winter articles will again come in handy and finally that the police don't look too kindly to destroying public property. Oh well, it sounded good in theory. Maybe I'll just fling the snow shovel into the shed with some brute force in celebration.

I'm happy to provide this 22 track Summer mix of Jamaican music to heighten your enjoyment of this festive season! No fancy effects or intricate mixing - just a bunch of (mostly) light hearted tunes I hope you'll enjoy! Here's wishing it brings you good vibes and puts a smile on your face whenever you give it a listen. It makes for great listening at the family cook-out whether the menu includes hotdogs and hamburgers or jerk chicken and rice and peas. It'll even work at your pool party whether you have a fancy inground pool complete with diving board or a galvanized tub complete with plastic tugboat and garden hose.

Tracklisting...

1. Rupie Edwards - Here Comes The Sun
2. The Aggrovators - Sun Is Shining Dub
3. Bob Andy - The Sun Shines For Me
4. Laurel Aitken & The Skatalites - Sunshine
5. Honey Boy - Theme For A Summer Place
6. David Isaac - Place In The Sun
7. The Clarendonians - Sunshine
8. Gregory Isaacs - Private Beach Party
9. Lord Tanamo - Dash Of The Sunshine
10. Winston Groovy - In The Summertime
11. Pat Kelly - Summer Time
12. Scientist - Sunshine Version
13. The Paragons - On The Beach
14. Cornell Campbell - The Sun
15. Laurel Aitken & The Skatalites - Summertime
16. The Melodians - Bless The Sunshine
17. Leon Wint - Sunbeam Rock
18. Lloyd Charmers & The Hippy Boys - Summer Place
19. Dotty & Bonny - Sun Rises
20. Jackie Mittoo - Summer Breeze
21. Delroy Wilson - Sun Is Shining
22. The Jivers - Down On The Beach

Download here!

Monday, June 18, 2007

The Dub Experiment... You Can Play Along At Home!

Pace from Liverpool brought it up in the comments section of the last post by identifying a "sound effect" I had used in the rub-a-dub mix and it got me to thinking...

Check out Dubselector... it's a website that provides you with the tools to create your own dub track on the fly - and along with a track broken down into a couple loops they give you a plethora of sound effects for you to click on to enhance the end product. Sadly they don't include an option to save your work and this is where this idea popped up.

If you check out Dubselector 2 you notice they use the Lee "Scratch" Perry track "Underground" off his spectacular 1976 album Super Ape broken down into a vocal portion and a drum and bass section. It sounds great when you're online killing time at work but in order to make it into a usable track worthy of listening to on an Ipod or even on a CDR I decided to use the original track and my trusty Garageband software to make transitioning from vocals to strictly drum and bass a little smoother. Next I used the trial software from a program called Audio Hijack and downloaded the various sound effects that Dubselector provides. Then I got to work.

What started off as a relatively short 2:57 Perry production became a 4:48 Reggaexx/Dubselector remix and I really dig how it all turned out! Aside from lots of echo and filter effects that Garageband provides and a lot of chopping and resectioning of the actual tune - Dubselector did the hard work by providing the "dub effects" laced throughout. I've given my end result a super long Scientist style title, "Reggaexx And Dubselector Go Deep Underground For A Do-It-Yourself Dub Experiment" Give the uncut Perry track a listen first try my remix second... and then let me know what you think!

In the zip file you'll also find the slew of sound effects (in one MP3 file) so you can mess around with the song on whatever audio editing software you may have lying around clogging your hard drive. After you've done be sure to share your end result with us!

Check It Out!

Thursday, June 14, 2007

Strictly Rub-A-Dub Mix!

This has been an enormous amount of work so don't expect another of these from me anytime soon! Now that I'm done with the disclaimer let's get to the mix... I think the 40 songs will speak for themselves once you give 'em a listen. I just hope you all enjoy it as much as I did putting it together. I definitely consider this mix to be a true labor of love since the rub-a-dub/early-dancehall era is my favorite "sub-genre" of Jamaican music! The tracklist is below and I'm keeping it simple to avoid rambling on for another 4-5 hours...

1. Don Carlos - Laser Beam
2. Papa Tullo - Nuff Stylee
3. Toyan - Over Me
4. Alton Ellis - Skateland Girl
5. Sugar Minott - Jah Is On My Mind
6. Charlie Chaplin - Diet Rock
7. Yellowman - Me A Don
8. Michael Palmer - Mixing And Blending
9. Josey Wales - Undercover Lover
10. Buro - Jolly Bus
11. Yellowman & Fathead - The Good, The Bad And The Ugly
12. John Holt - Police In Helicopter
13. Cultural Roots - Love Feelings
14. Sister Nancy - Bam Bam
15. Yami Bolo - When A Man In Love
16. Admiral Tibet - Trouble To A Man
17. General Echo - Arleen
18. Little John - Look What You Have Done
19. Brigadier Jerry - What Kind Of World
20. Technique All Stars - Stalag 17
21. Johnny Osbourne - Love Is Universal
22. Little John - Janet Sinclair
23. Little John & Billy Boyo - Janet Sinclair
24. Scientist - Dangerous Match 1
25. Leroy Smart - All Of My Love
26. Michigan & Smiley - What Type Of World
27. Al Campbell - Chant Rub A Dub
28. Yellowman & Fathead - Come We A Come
29. Lone Ranger - Gunshot Mek Daughter Drop
30. Toyan - Tribute To Entertainers
31. Barry Brown - Sweet 16
32. Peter Ranking & General Lucky - Island In The Sun
33. Ranking Dread - Love A Dub
34. Barrington Levy - Collie Weed
35. Blackskin - Hey Mr. Babylon
36. Lone Ranger - Barnabas Collins
37. Toyan - Please Mi Barister
38. Barrington Levy - Please Jah Jah
39. Yellowman - 2 To 6 Supermix
40. Yellowman - Why You Bad So

Strictly Rub-A-Dub Mix

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Strictly Rub-A-Dub Mix Coming Later This Week!

I've been working on a rub-a-dub mix for two weeks now and instead of posting little segments at a time, as I've been known to do, I'm going to finish it up and post it as one continuous mix for your listening pleasure! Alongside the mandatory Junjo Lawes stuff I've even got a mini George Phang mix wrapped up inside this one and it's turning out real well...

One side note - I know Blood & Fire concentrates on more "roots era" releases but someone definitely needs to remaster George Phang's catalog and release it on CD... I probably spent about 5 hours trying to get 5 of his tracks to even sound presentable. I used a couple of his tunes off the original LPs and to be honest... they sound like crap. I've heard that the Power House represses are notorious for their terrible sound quality and I can't even imagine how bad they must be considering the originals sound this lousy. Phang has always been one of my favorite rub-a-dub/early dancehall producer and his music deserves to be heard as it quite possibly has never been heard before - crisp and clean; minus the pops, scratches, hiss, poor bass and ear drum rupturing treble that seems to be the trademark of the Power House label.

Well enough about that... keep checking back for the completed mix! I'll get it done as soon as real life stops interfering with my quality blog time!