Dub from the Roots

Description

“Tubby did three original dub albums, ‘Dub From The Roots’. ‘The Roots of Dub’ and
the third is ‘Brass Rockers’ with Tommy McCook ‘pon the flying cymbals. Where he
mixed it with the horn going in and out in a dub way and one named ‘Shalom Dub’
you can call Tubby’s too because he mixed the versions as they were off forty fives’’
Bunny ‘Striker’ Lee
King Tubby and Producer Bunny ‘Striker’ Lee are intertwined in the birth of Dub
Music. After discovering a mistake that made a ‘serious joke’ (more of which later…)
they went on to release the first pressings of this new musical genre namely ‘Dub
Music’. Tubby’s vast knowledge of electronics and Bunny’s vast catalogue of rhythms
would lay the foundations of what today is taken as a standard… the Remix / Version
cuts to an existing vocal tune.
Osbourne ‘King Tubby’ Ruddock was born in Kingston, Jamaica on 28th January 1941
and grew up in the High Holborn Street area of downtown Kingston. He studied
electronics at Kingston’s National Technical College and also on two correspondence
courses from the U.S.A… When he had qualified Tubby began repairing radios and
other electrical appliances in a shack in the back yard of his mother’s home. His work
in the early days included winding transformers and building amplifiers for Kingston’s
Sound Systems. Tubby built his first Sound System in 1957 playing jazz and Rhythm
& Blues at local weddings and birthday parties. His reputation as a man who knew
and understood both electronics and music grew steadily and as the sixties drew to a
close. Tubby
purchased his own basic two track equipment. He installed this alongside his dub
cutting machine, a home-made mixing console, and his impressive collection of jazz
albums in the back bedroom of his home at 18 Dromilly Avenue which he christened
his music room.
Tubby and Striker were at Treasure Isle Studio’s one day while Ruddy from Spanish
Town was working with the engineer Byron Smith….
“Tubby and myself was talking when Ruddy was cutting some dub but Smithy
(engineer) made a mistake through we were talking and forgot to put in the voice. It
was two track recording in those days. Ruddy said ‘No Man! Make it stay! and so
they cut the rhythm. When I went over to Ruddy’s that Saturday night a dance was in
progress and when they played the vocal to the tune… then he said we’re going to
play ‘Part Two’. They never called it ‘Version’..and then he played the rhythm track.
The song was a catchy song and everybody started to sing along and the deejay
started to toast so everything went down well. On Monday morning I went up and I
said ‘Tubbs the mistake we made was a serious joke.It mash up Spanish Town! The
people went wild. So you have to start to do that now ‘cause when the man put on
the ‘Part Two’ everyone start singing this song. It played about twenty times. I said
you try Tubbs!’…Well the next Saturday night now when Tubby strung up down the
farm U Roy said he’s going to play ‘Part Two’ but Tubby did it different now. He
started with the voice then dropped it out and let the rhythm run and then he
brought in the voice in the middle and from there Tubby started to get really
popular.’’
Bunny ‘Striker’ Lee
Dynamic Sounds upgraded to sixteen track recording in 1972 and Tubby purchased,
again with the help of a deal brokered by Bunny Lee. The old four track equipment
and the MCI console from their Studio B. The four tracks now gave him far wider
scope to work with and he began to create a new musical form where the bass and
drum parts were brought up while the faders allowed Tubby to ease the vocal and
rhythm in and out of the mix. It was only a matter of time before Tubby’s dub plate
experiments began to make it on to vinyl and the first ever long-playing King Tubby
releases would feature a collection of his mixes to a selection of Strikers rhythms. So
please sit back and enjoy this historic set of sounds. Lovingly restored and with a few
extra gems added to the CD Editions. These releases were the first to carry the name
of King Tubby and the first to credit the great musicians that contributed so much to
the rhythms that made these albums possible.