Sooner or later, everyone who loves dub techno becomes acquainted with the gossamer tenor of Paul St. Hilaire. His voice gets stretched and pulled across so many of the greatest records in the genre, from his early collabs with Basic Channel’s Mark Ernestus and Moritz von Oswald to his rousing appearance on Intrusion’s late-period benchmark The Seduction of Silence in 2009. As befits a style whose exponents obscure themselves behind stark record sleeves and inscrutable aliases, the artist formerly known as Tikiman — born on the Caribbean island of Dominica but based in Berlin — has been modest about his importance. “I prefer to say a little ting and stay out of the light,” he told Resident Advisor’s Richard Akingbehin in a 2021 feature, but since striking up…
Category: dub
…Featuring 6 previously unissued studio recordings and 7 previously unreleased live recordings.
Released at the dawn of the 21st Century, On the Wire marked the long awaited return of Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry’s to Trojan Records, 14 years after the company had issued his powerful come-back long-player, Battle of Armagideon.
Demonstrating The Upsetter’s eccentric and innovative approach to music-making, the 2000 album comprises a compelling blend of weird and wonderful sounds, over which he delivers typically unpredictable yet captivating lyrics that range from the profound to the absurd.
Upon its release, the Trojan collection was comprehensively praised, with many critics proclaiming Scratch was finally back to his…
London’s The Lo Yo Yo was conceptualized by John “Alig” Pearce in 1984 after his primary group, the deservedly legendary Family Fodder, went dormant. Soon enough a few others were enlisted to round out the quartet, including Mick Hobbs of The Work and Officer! fame, alongside friends Joey Stack and Carrie Brooks. The Lo Yo Yo took elements from their other groups and, in the tradition of somewhat like-minded acts like The Raincoats, Naffi and Amos & Sara, added a strong dub/reggae element.
Shortly before their lone studio LP, which was recorded by Charles Bullen of This Heat fame, the band self-recorded a demo tape at home on an eight track reel to reel, reissued here on vinyl for the first time by Concentric Circles.
UK dub maestro and producer, Adrian Sherwood is hardly what anyone might call a slacker, but it’s 13 years since the release of his last solo album, Survival and Resistance. Those who have been eagerly anticipating more of his particular take on one of Jamaica’s greatest musical exports, however, need wait no longer.
While The Collapse of Everything doesn’t offer too many surprises to those familiar with the On-U Sound, it does bring in plenty of other textures along the way. Smouldering, moody and intoxicating, it is an album that may not hit the extremes of some of Sherwood’s previous collaborations, but it does have more than enough to earn some space in any dub set.
Indeed, the presence of fellow travellers…
The Fateful Symmetry is the posthumous eighth solo album by the groundbreaking and influential artist Mark Stewart, completed shortly before his passing in April 2023. It is set to be released on July 11, 2025, on Mute, his long-standing label.
Across an illustrious career of pioneering music with The Pop Group, Mark Stewart & The Maffia and as a solo artist, Stewart has produced a seminal body of work, galvanized by the DIY ideals of punk, radical politics, protest movements, theory, philosophy, technology, art and poetry.
With The Fateful Symmetry, Stewart’s abiding legacy as a ‘“revered countercultural musician” (The Guardian) is sustained, with an album as fearless and visionary as his best work.
Testifying to his prolific, unrelenting ingenuity,…
Alongside fellow heavyweights like Channel One, Aba Shanti I, and the late Jah Shaka, Iration Steppas have been carrying the torch for British sound system culture for over 30 years now. The sound system and production unit — nicknamed “Year 3000” for their futuristic sound — was founded by Mark Iration and Dennis Rootical in Leeds in the North of England in the early ‘90s, straddling both the past and the future. In that way, they had much in common with the mighty label Greensleeves, whose deep archive Mark Iration has mined for this essential compilation.
Founded by Chris Cracknell and Chris Sedgwick in 1977 out of their record shop in Shepherds Bush, West London, Greensleeves became known for championing Jamaican dancehall.
…Born in Puerto Rico and now based in Los Angeles, producer Pachyman (also known as Pachy Garcia) doubtless understands the complexities of the Caribbean – and of dub, whose innovative anti-establishment histories he cites as informing many of his choices. He’s demonstrated that on each of his releases, but it’s on his new album, Another Place, that he makes some of his most interesting moves to date.
Even the simplest of his tracks here have enough layers and emotional textures to keep a firm grip. Opening single “Calor Ahora” and following track “In Love” use dub’s inherent soft glow to radiate melancholy from even the most minimal lyrics (“I’m in love again / Falling for a friend,” sings Garcia on the latter, a two-line story that…
It’s been said that in space, no one can hear you scream; but sometimes you can feel the echo of vibration. From the outer reaches of the star Melodious, a spectral sound alchemist known as Blanc du Blanc has partnered with dub pioneer Scientist (a.k.a. Hopeton Overton Brown) to reimagine dub music as an interstellar language, a cosmic dialogue stretching from the genre’s Jamaican roots into expansive, uncharted sonic territories. The result is the deeply spiritual Scientist Meets Blanc du Blanc: Before the Beginning: equal parts otherworldly and earthbound, Zion and Babylon.
Since 2020, Blanc du Blanc has released four sets of original dub music on central New Jersey’s Soul Selects Records, led by Chris Harford.