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teste
chicodub
ecos:
Domingo, Abril 17, 2005
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Dubversão Sistema de Som
arte do magrão
foto de josé gabriel lindoso
Leia aqui uma entrevista bem bacana feita com o dj Yellow P, um dos caras mais gente boa que conheço, e o produtor Miguel(ito) Salvatore.
chicodub
ecos:
Quinta-feira, Abril 14, 2005
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The big sound system splasdown 4: Sir. Coxsone Outernational
"Sounds called Coxsone is the first. Sounds that control the universe and quench your musical thirsts..."
(I Roy: 'Coxsone Affari')
"PEOPLE SAY Coxsone sound is finished now... but we are the professor. We maintain a standard since ´69 straight to this time and we are still here."
Sir Coxsone (Lloyd)
BEHIND THE combination of superlative equipment, a rare library of music, the creative ability to "present" reggae music and the teamwork which has ensured that Coxsone has for over a decade been the sound against which all others are judged is its founder, Lloyd Coxsone.
A tall slim man whose angular features are framed by a crown of locks, Coxsone is an articulate and outspoken representative of the sound system fraternity in the U.K. Hailing from Morant Bay, place of the biggest post slavery rebellion led by Paul Bogle, Lloyd arrived in England in 1962. Apart from a six month stretch on British Rail and a couple of short sojourns at Her Majesty´s pleasure, last 18 years have been spent working that subterranean network of blues and sound system dances. Since his arrival Coxsone has been based in South West London; it often comes as a surprise to one and all, especially aspiring sound men, that Lloyd lives in a more than somewhat down market residence, the fourth floor of a red brick council block in Wandsworth. Affluence and sound rarely go together, and though he says "it is a good business" will also concede "it is a hard life, uncertain. . . today up, tomorrow down. We have been up and down many times but we have experience."
It is an experience that Coxsone readily shares with the youth sounds, like the local up and coming Young Lion, who show up at his door to reason or seek his assistance. The disasters of the past become wisdom of the future and Coxsone shakes his head as he recalls how his first system Lloyd the Matador blew up due to water in the amp. Being young and reckless, living for the moment and not dealing with saving and bank accounts, Coxsone was left no option but to return to deejaying a next man´s sound, as he had done originally with Barry Pierocket, reluctantly accepting an offer from the UK Duke Reid.
With Coxsone at the controls Reid controlled south of the Thames and regularly made forays into territory of other sounds north of the river. Competition was fierce, with a tendency for rivalry to spill over into dance. But it was at Carnaby street´ s notorious Roaring Twenties which was the premier venue from late 50s and 60s through to the 70s, and the residency at the Twenties was Coxsone´s ambition.
With the formation of Sir Coxsone sound in 1969, based on a team born out of Duke Reid´s, that ambition was soon fulfilled. It was this team that the man called I Roy was to celebrate in his 'Coxsone Affair' and 'Lloyd Coxsone Time', and it is teamwork that is the foundation of Coxsone sound now.
"To run a good sound in the UK is teamwork... a young team of men who are ambitious, record crazy and have young ideas, If I get old within my ideas there is many young men who come up with suggestions. By building a team you are building your sound for a long term. In my time in England I have seen a lot of good sound die ´cause they didn´t build a team to manifest the work of the sound. Teamwork and effort is crucial as you can´t live off your name."
For his endeavour Lloyd Coxsone can boast an unrivalled selection of music, that his sound was the first UK system to play dub, that they set the pace in equipment and pioneered the use of echo, reverb, equaliser, and also in paving the way for a sound system such as Shaka to take sound to a new dimension, creating atmosphere out of rhythmic weight and effects. Sound system has come a long way since the days of Lloyd the Matador when upon asking an electronics man named Fred to build him a 600 watt amp, Coxsone was greeted with: "You must be fucking crazy. Do you know how much power it takes to drive a cinema? Ten watts!"
The past 15 years has seen a shift from one extreme to another, and the banks of amplifiers in evidence at any sound dance are testimony to the current fixation with wattage rather than, Coxsone feels, an ability to select and present the music.
"People can´t dance to wattage. If a man comes to me and he deals with sound he almost always deals with wattage. Listen, the more you step up weight you lose quality, and a man must be able to hear your vocal playing. Too much sound in this country is running down weight, but I don´t see sound as is rootin´ down like bulldozer as good sound. I am more interested in quality and selection of music."
SIR COXSONE HI-Fl - TECHNICAL INFO
AMPLIFIERS: five pieces of 600 watts
(valve) - weight; four pieces of 600
watts (transistor) - treble. Use
depends on size of venue: Brixton
Town Hall determines three pieces of
valve and one piece of transistor.
Pre amp with built in equaliser to
cover weight, treble, midrange.
HH Echo Unit.
Special percussion box.
SPEAKERS: on average play 19-20 bass speakers ("other sounds play around 50 and still don¿t sound good," says Lloyd Coxsone.)
Many different horns in treble section and small speakers.
Several thousand yards of cable.
Seven ton truck and transit van.
Different philosophical attitudes result in different approaches. Those who have witnessed Shaka and Coxsone in dub conference will know that in following Shaka´s distorted swirling dubonics and sheer physical weight, Coxsone will operate one piece of amp less and maintain a sharpness and a clarity, a kind of "round beat" and initially let the music do the work, before Poppa Festus - the Coxsone Hi-Fl controller - puts on the pressure, injecting tension into the rhythm and building the climax into the dub cuts.
Playing reggae and presenting reggae are two different things, and to Coxsone playing a dance means more than catering for the militant steppers who mainline warrior rhythms.
"We think of our dance public all the time. I am supposed to select music for the people to dance to, that is our job. That´s hat they´re paying us for. If I Lloyd Coxsone am playing as a disc, I like to have the majority of the people dancing. I have no other excuse than to make people enjoy themselves, and I can´t do that if I´m not fit to do my job.
"We have to use our brains. You just can´t sling record onto the turntable, it have to be selected. Each rhythm coming after a next one have to be directed so that if you play a song with a certain argument you must find a next one with an argument to match the first."
Lloyd Coxsone´s reasoning and observations on sound are incisive and revealing and he is justifiably proud that "no other sound have achieved what Coxsone have done for reggae in the UK". Yet he is aware that they still need discipline to maintain this standard. After an initially disappointing sound confrontation with yard sound Ray Symbolic, Coxsone´s current dance hall style has sharpened up, and watching the present team of Festus, Blacka, Harlesden, Frankie, Napthali, Bike and Country (aka Levi Roots) swing into action is an education in collectivity.
Current holders of the coveted and controversial Black Star Liner Cup Coxsone is still pragmatic about his sound¿s present position, and knows there is no room for relaxation on the UK sound scene with the likes of Shaka, FrontlIine, Stereograph, Jungle Man, Quaker City, Tubbys and the rest injecting momentum and ideas into the sound business. As the saying goes "new broom sweep clean, old broom know corner best."
chicodub
ecos:
Quarta-feira, Abril 13, 2005
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The big sound system splashdown 3: Jah Shaka
IT´S something like seeing the Wizard of Oz for the first time; all that mighty, awesome thunder and noise of great rushing waters, then a faint start when you realise the tumult is coming from one man.
Shaka detests dealing in competition, and indeed every sound has its strengths. Mighty Observer gain credit for carrying the sound system revelation abroad, and to people of different cultures. Ray Symbolic the Bionic are the slickest dudes, with Ranking Joe rapping like a sassy fridge salesman having fun among the eskimoes.
All sound system followers have their favourites, and there is a certain section of the population who love only Shaka.
It seemed that when the other sounds had done with their boasting and toasting, there would come a discreet hiss from the corner, and Shaka would mutter a title, or more often an invocation to Jah RasTafari, and the old-style heavy bakelite-style head of his arm would lower to the vinyl. Then it might seem that the walls were tumbling down around your ears. Then it might seem that your body had never felt those rhythms to impel and overwhelm, you´d find your feet flashing like sparklers.
A crowd gathers round Shaka, watching entranced as if he was a conjuror. Sometimes he plays the vocal section straight, then he rides the rhythm until it disintegrates, you hurtle through the instruments like a dance of swop-your-partners, now whirling to the hi-hat, or fist-fighting with the bass. When the music hits, Shaka, well into the dub section now, looks like Lee Perry, swaying faster to a frenzy, bobbing and weaving as the music´s penetrating. His hands seem to flash from knob to knob of his HH amp like lightning. A picture of Haile Selassie sellotaped above the deck acts as an inspirational icon.
Then come certain sounds, the sounds that mark out Shaka. A keening sound cuts you, trailing a tail like a comet. Shaka playing his harp, then syn-drum; he hits it with a drumstick or plays it with his hands, the abstract texture melodies that race like liquid neon through each vein. This is a music, a great improvisation, that goes beyond reggae or any other musical division. Almost beyond physical music, into the mystic; sheets of energy shooting from the barricading standing store speakers.
Some people complain, say Shaka carries too much weight, too much distortion. It´s true it can verge on pain when Shaka shakes a sound by the scruff of its neck till it gives up its secret But he is an extreme artist. Unlike most sound system organisers, he stays alone at the controls, speaking only when the spirit says so, choosing the music that will re-charge the people´s batteries like an orgone accumulator. If Shaka´s sound sticks needles in your ears, it´s like acupuncture, shaking up the sluggish circulation of the blood. He is a serious and dedicated man, who will only play inspirational music.
Shaka inspires the stepper dancers. When his turn comes round, the music hits new intensity, and the youths launch into gymnastic feats. As much mime as dance, the motions of stepping on stones over river currents, of peering through curtains and shinning up drainpipes, of finding your way from a fortress to freedom. These are guerilla movements to complement Shaka´s warrior style. Purposeful and athletic, with the frenzy of dervishes. It is no coincidence that Shaka cites Aswad, and Misty, the two warrior bands, as particularly crucial.
Such a stance is crucial in these times. Last Friday Shaka was making the rafters rattle like loose teeth in a South London Town Hall, playing a new Aswad dub. He cries:
"JAHOVIAH I", a long, warbled yowl that seems to span octaves, the cry he´s adopted from the Twinkle Brothers´ great 'Daniel' record. The warrior youth start to step with the crisp decision that marks a militant stepper.
Shaka named himself after the great Zulu warrior; the man who re-structured the Zulu armies in the early 1800´s. He devised a new, lethal, fighting blade: imposed strict discipline, including months of celibacy at a stretch: divided the spoils of war radically, giving most to the poorest soldiers, and less to the rich. Jah Shaka says it´s the Zulu´s work he sets out to continue.
That same day, the papers report a 17-year-old skinhead Sieg Heiling in court as he¿s sentenced for the murder of an Asian youth. Akhter Au Baig. Another item next to it quotes Joan Lestor, MP, saying that many victims have no confidence in the determination of the police to seek out-perpetrators of racial violence.
It´s a warrior time, if you want to survive. Daily harrassment of all kinds, the feeling of not being free to walk the streets; Shaka´s answer, in the face of any argument, is repatriation to Africa.
"It´s a complete solution. With the knowledge we¿ve got over the years, we know the task. We are not fighting to stay here. If I was to meet with the head of the National Front, it would solve a lot of problems."*
The man who inspires such fierce devotion does not like to talk about himself. "It´s nothing to do with my private life or my slave name, it´s nonsense to bring yourself out into the limelight. I´m not involved with that. All I want to do is get on with my work, till such time as I leave the country.
"I don´t know what the other sounds are doing, I only know what I
"Moa Anbessa-ah-ah-ah. Got a woman want fe hold little rub, check out Shaka fe play some dubs, check out Fatman fe spin some dubs, Coxone see you come tonight but no bother broke no fight..
Cimarons: 'Rub A Dub Shoes'
am doing. It´s nothing to do with what kind of speakers or amps I´m building; I´m only concerned with building spiritually.
"I spend a lot of time with the sound. Talking to the people is more important than the studio business. (Although Shaka himself is a musician and has just released his first record ("Jah Children Cry" by African Princess on his own label.) I´ve got to bring people to remember that we, the black people, have been forgotten. You could call us the forgotten race, as it says in the Bible. I take it very seriously. The people that are mentioned in the records I play - the Children of Israel - that is directly us.
"This is my most important job. People get depressed in this country. You have to give them something to hope for. There´s a lot of pressure. People complain - they say the whole world is upside down. People jump off buildings so as not to face earth as it is at the moment. The only thing to look to is God. People have tried everything else. Haile Selassie came to show us that everything we´ve been hearing about is not in the sky - there is such a place where we could be - Ethiopia."
Shaka´s views are controversial. He arrived from Jamaica when he was five; kept dances from when he attended the Samuel Pepys School in. South London. He gives thanks that he was raised here: "It´s been like a college here for me."
The first sound he checked for was Metro, who still build his amps.
Shaka moves with twelve youths who help set up the sound, transporting the mighty, hand-carved speakers with their heavyweight thunder old American RCA boxes, and amps. Most of them are unemployed. They have followed Shaka for anything from five to seven years, devote their lives to his sound.
Between them the youths around Shaka number the several skills - carpentry, electrical, and so on - necessary to maintain the sound. They are unemployed simply because work is scarce; but this is probably the most fulfilling job they could do. "Money doesn´t even come into it," says one youth whose two brothers have also worked alongside the dub warrior for years. "It´s a message we´re carrying, not just a sound."
Those who followed Rasta as a fashion have moved on to roller disco. For the large hard core who are serious about their beliefs, Shaka is still here. When you hear Shaka play his sound, it´s easy to believe his inspiration is divine.
chicodub
ecos:
Terça-feira, Abril 12, 2005
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The big sound system splashdown 2: Fatman Hotspur Hi-Fi
fatman
"Tottenham rock. Said you gotta forward down the track. When I take this stop I said I won't be coming back. When I play my musical shock attack, the sounds-like the Tottenham rock as I would tell you. Say so. Jah know."
U. Brown: 'Tottenham Rock'
THE TEAM:
Selectors: Robert Fearon, Michael Edwards;
Microphone: Richard Fearon, Raymond McCook;
Caretaker: Bouncing Stanley;
Supervisor: William Richardson;
Box Boys: Carl, Leroy, Michael, Tony, Teeth, Andy, Stud, Bigfoot Barry;
Honorary Member: Prince Jammy - producer at King Tubby's;
Owner of the sound: K. Gordon - (Fatman).
How did you first start moving around sounds?
Fatman: "Bwoy, just thieving out of my house, going to dances and getting beaten from a youth. That's how I really started out."
Where?
Fatman: "Jamaica."
What sounds?
Fatman: "Is a whole heap of different sound. Different sounds from all them times there, like Coxsone sound, Duke Reid sound, Blackbeard sound, all different type of sound. I didn't have no special sound to go and listen, because I couldn't go in the dance. I could only listen to them outside."
When did you come to England?
Fatman:" '63."
Why?
Fatman: "I grow with my aunt and she was over here, so she decide to send for me. I didn't really want to come but, you know, she get pretty strong about itso I have to come here then."
You always live North London?
Fatman: "Always in North London over since, yes."
Tell us something about Sir Fanso.
Fatman: "When I come to North London, after I was staying home for a couple of weeks, I start going out now and trying to find a sound to go and listen to. The first sound I come across was Sir Fanso. So I started to listen to that sound and start getting in with them, and then I start going around with the people.
"Used to play in places like Grays Hall and the Sunset, Grays Hall in Seven Sisters Road, Tollington Park Ballroom and all the town halls and thing like that, but Fanso normally used to rule Finsbury Park and Tottenham."
How about Stoke Newington parts? Who was the...
Fatman: "Well yeah, we used to play in Stoke Newington area as well. Fanso used to play Stoke Newington area, but we never used to play a lot in that area like how we used to play in Finsbury Park and Tottenham."
Who would be the ruling sound in Stokie at that time?
Fatman: "Stoke Newington. In them time. Well, ever since I come is always Chicken the Thunderstorm, when it comes to house dance is always Chicken the Thunderstorm I hear about from ever since in Stoke Newington, and Shelley, Count Shelley."
Is Chicken the Thunderstorm the same Chicken Hi-Fi who still plays out in Nl6?
Fatman: "Yes, is the same Chicken. I think him should be a fowl by now.
"Yeah Sir Fanso, as everybody. knows, if you mention Fanso, Fanso was a great sound in them times, was ever forward. That's why we really stick with Fanso, because all the rest of sound in them times them never putting over what Fanso really putting over."
What sort of music were you dealing with?
"Roots music, reggae music same way. Them days was just a breakout from bluebeat really, and Fanso used to play everything; the sort of people -him play for, well it used to younger generation."
What artists did he play?
Fatman: "Artist like wha', Slim Smith, and all them artist like Alton Ellis."
Ribs: "We used to have them on soft wax. We never had dub in them days. Soft wax.
What was soft wax?
Fatman: "Same thing what them refer as dub. In that time we used to call it soft wax,"
Ribs: "Them used to have wha', Justin Hinds, Alton Ellis, all them artists there he had them on wax. Ken Boothe, all them man there."
So he used to check mostly for Treasure Isle music?
Fatman: "Yeah, him used to play a lot of Treasure Isle music, and Studio 1."
From where did he get them?
Fatman: "He used to get them direct from Jamaica."
Ribs: "They were from the studio them, you know, and the producer them."
So he operated in a similar way as you now with Prince Jammy?
Fatman: "Yeah, the same thing."
You became DJ with the sound, Fatman, the mike man.
Fatman: "Yeah. Well them times when I know Fanso, he wasn't really carrying a mike man often times 'till I really started, and then mike in them days was different from what it is now. The style what I have was the style like what U Roy and King Stitch..."
So how would you toast a sound? What would you say? Give a demonstration, as if you was at a dance.
Fatman: "Bwoy, that's why I was referring to these people. If you can remember how these people used to sound, you know, you can really picture me then. I was really hard in a them time. Like it was a little skaville, you know what I mean?"
Ribs: "Hoo-tch-tch, hoo-tch-tch, hoo-tch-tch..."
Fatman: "Just a little skaville."
How long were you with the sound?
Fatman: "About six, seven years."
Then he went home, right?
Fatman: "Who? Fanso went home? Yeah, he went home, went back to Jamaica. Carry his sound as well and played out in Jamaica."
How did that leave you?
Fatman: "It leave me stranded, walking up and down trying to find a sound to listen to. I listen to a lot of sound them time: I couldn't find anything to please me, suit me, 'cause coming like say them a play... everything was backward!
"The last sound I go out and listen to before I decide to build my sound was Sir Dees sound playing out in Tottenham, and I stand up the night and listen, and it coming like the music the man of Dees did play is music what Sir Fanso did stop play longtime. I just come out and go home a my yard and I decide say I'm gonna build a sound.
When was that?
Fatman: "It was about '74.
You use the names Wild Bells and Imperial Downbeat for while.
Fatman: "Yeah that time the name me really promote with was Wild Bells, but we didn't use that name for long until I come with Imperial Downbeat. The reason why I didn't use Wild Bells, at the same time a guy named Eddie he started a sound as well, and he give the sound name Bells. So saying Wild Bells and Bells, it could come in like it was the same talk. So I just switch and say Imperial. Imperial Downbeat."
How long were you Imperial Downbeat?
Fatman: "From I was away I was always Imperial Downbeat, but when the sound start getting popular the people them... the sound start getting popular and I start getting bigger. The people them named me, the people them named me Fatman. It was the people them did.
"So we just got to make the name of the. sound Fatman Hi-Fi. That's how the name Fatman come about. So is really the people, that's what I'm say. Hornsey, Finsbury Park and them set of people really start off the name Fatman, which I never really care whether the man call me fat man, or maga man, or what."
Where did these Hornsey people come to hear you play?
Fatman: "To listen the sound? We really used to play in house dance, house dance was the craze at those time, and town halls and places like that."
Always this same area!
Fatman: "Yeah, always the same Finsbury Park, Tottenham, Hornsey."
You maintain a teenage following over the years that establishes Fatman Hi-Fi as the patron sound of North London youth from time. You do say once, though, that you build your reputation in the early days playing to an older type of crowd.
Fatman: "Those were the times when we really just. . . those were the time when the people name me, that was the time when they call me Fatman, you see, and we were playing in house. When we break away now is when we start playing places like say
Bluesville in Wood Green. We started in Bluesville, then it was pure youngsters going to Bluesville, you see, so them break away from the sound. The bigger folks them break away from the sound and it's just younger ones them started coming now, and Bluesville was packed until we left. We left Bluesville, we went to Red Lion in Leytonstone. There it was pack out as well, and went on there for quite a while, until we left there and go back to Wood Green again, down in Nightingale pub."
Why did you keep leaving these places?
Fatman: "Well, they just keep closing down."
"Come make we step it go to Clapton Common, come make we step it go to Dalston Junction, and then we gone a Stoke Newington, ca' that there time we gone down to. Tottenham, man say. I said when night come, when night come, when night come a me fe have some fun, me go a Cubies, me go a Phebes, me go a All Nations, me go a Ball Hal, me go a Four Aces."
Ranking Dread: 'Loving Dem / 'Loving Devotion'
Why do they keep closing down?
Fatman: "Well I don't know. Up to now we don't find out the reason why, but wherever reggae music is, from them time until now, you always find out as soon as you get say over 200 people inside the hall, you find out say it run for a little while, and then you just hear say you can't come back.
"From ever since that been going on, and is still going on now. I mean, you can name the clubs them on one hand which is going from say in the 60s. Other clubs where you get, a funky club or a pop club or any other different club, you'll find that they're still going on, or a jazz club and all them things; but wherever you used to have reggae music, they never continue. As soon as the kids them start coming out, closed door.
"Most of the time them blame it on noise, most of the time them blame it on the youths them, say is bus problem, they won't pay fare and all them things. I mean you get kids coming from school that don't want to pay fare, why don't they close all the schools? You get guys coming from football, them rave up everywhere and things like that, and police all over the street you know. You never used to get them things from guys coming away from my sound."
Maybe they're frightened of the music.
Fatman: "Well, they might be frightened of the music, you know, beca'... they must be frightened of the music, because whoever is closing down the clubs, the don't come here. That's a good way of putting it, they might be frightened of the music.
"You really have a strong heart to really face reggae music and the type of sound wha' we really play. 'Cause the sound wha' we really play, if your heart weak, you come inside you drop. Just drop."
You used to play youth groups at 10p a head.
Fatman: Yeah. We used to play for Pastor Morris club. When Pastor Morris used to run a youth club in West Green Road we used to play for him there. He used to charge 10 pence a head, but we were only playing to keep the youths them off the street, you see, we didn't really play to say make anything out of it. Is just something for the club, that 10p would go to the club and things like that.
"But even although we was playing for nothing still, that only went on for awhile and then they close it down again. Them have to move I."
You keep finding new places, however, in which to play.
Fatman: "Yeah."
Playing country seems to be a big thing with your sound at present.
Fatman: "Yeah."
Why is that? Why have you moved to the country?
Fatman: "We don't really move to the country, but people want to hear us everywhere, that's why we don't even settle in London at one spot. We can't stay one place, because if we are one place everyone keeps phoning in and say, well then Fatman I want you here so, I want you there so, I want you everywhere you know. So it's best for us to go all over the place and spread the good sound of reggae music all around, than stay in one place with it."
What do you consider to be the role of your sound? You remember the fair that visits Tottenham recently, installs itself on that plot of Broad Lane wasteland for a few weeks before making tracks, does it not in a way resemble Fatman Hi-Fi, how you come to a place, string up and entertain folk for awhile like the same travelling people of the funfair or circus?'
Fatman: "No-o. We don't see weself as a circus. We see weself as a mobile radio station for reggae music. It's the only way for the people them who really want to come and listen reggae music. It's the only place them gonna hear it is to go and listen to a sound system, because them nah hear it upon no radio station."
They can hear it in the record shop.
Fatman: "In the record shop! But if them don't come to the sound system and listen, them have to come and listen what the sound is playing and what the deejays, that's why we have deejays, the selector play the record and the deejays put it over to the people and tell them what record's been played, you see, so them take down that now and then them go to the record shop.
"You won't find nobody going into a record shop and standing up and listening, they haven't got the time. Suppose they have to go in there and stand up all day and listen to hear the record that they want? Because you know there's hundreds of different
labels. It would be really hard for a man to go into a record shop and just stand up and listen 'til him hear a record him want to buy."
Sound systems when they started didn't see themselves as a radio station for reggae music, however. They were not playing reggae for a start, they was playing American music, right?
Fatman: "Sound systems?"
Yes.
Fatman: "From ever since I know sound system, is always reggae music them play. There again, you might be seeing a different sight of sound, because you have sound system and you have disco. Disco is where you play soul music and things like that. But from ever since, all the whole sound man them what me hear from this country go right back to Jamaica is just reggae music, or bluebeat or ska. Is not none of them no play them sort of music there."
"...invite Count Suckle from Paddington, Jim Dandy from Brixton, Duke Neville and Duke Sonny from Birmingham, and Bishop the High Priest and Count Busty the Black Prince from Brixton, asking them if them can come play fe him Easter Monday night..."
Laurel Aitken: 'Woppi King'
Talking about American music people like Louis Jordan and Fats Domino. Before bluebeat.
Fatman: "You're going back from the days of blues, rhythm and blues. Well, rhythm and blues kind of come in with the same views with ska music. Them days you never used to have reggae, so them days them man there used to mix them type of music then along with Dodd's (Studio 1). That's how them used to play those music. They didn't have a wide range of music like we have now in reggae music to play, so the art was to play a bit of shufflers them."
It is singular the different paths the two musics have taken considering they both come from rhythm and blues: soul, or rather disco, and reggae.
Fatman: "Yeah, they all travel along the same line."
But they go off in different directions.
Fatman: "Right. Even the people that go to listen them go off in different directions, because the man them who go and listen soul music they won't come and listen to reggae music, and who listen reggae music they won't go and listen soul music.
"You hang about a club well in Manor House you hear them say, bwoy is a soul club that, you won't find reggae people going there. Likewise, the soul people won't come to the reggae thing.
"It come in even on radio station. If you hear, them have a three and half hour of reggae music, and you have that feller deejay, him play is pure soul, him won't even play a reggae music. So that's how it is in the dance hall now."
Why do you think that is?
Fatman: "Well, I don't know, is probably them themselves. Because some people might say is just punks go and listen to soul music, and then the soul people them might say bwoy is just pure Rasta go and listen to reggae music, so they don't want to go there, them don't want to mix. It's not really the music itself, but probably is just the people."
Would you like to see yourself playing Wembley Stadium say, and 100,000 people there?
Fatman (feelingly): "Yeah man."
Ribs: "Buckingham Palace."
Fatman: "We're not drawing a line from nowhere man. We want to play in all the top places. We want to see our reggae fans come to places like that. That's where we would really like to see reggae music. Everywhere. Comes a time when we would really like to say we can drive our van and go and tour all the continent and just play reggae music."
Ribs: "Outernational."
Fatman: "Comes time when we won't just be driving up to Birmingham or Manchester or Wolverhampton or wherever. We will be heading the ferry, you know. Man say, where you a go this week Fatman? We say, bwoy Paris we a go. Them way there."
chicodub
ecos:
Segunda-feira, Abril 11, 2005
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The big sound system splashdown
Vou reproduzir aqui no blog (parceladamente, depois vcs vão entender o porquê) uma matéria sobre sound systems que saiu numa edição de 80 da NME. Coisa fina.
Where Reggae really begins - in tune to the sound system.
Here is the heart of the music: groups of youth, each with their different philosophies, who travel the country or simply nice up their own areas. To hear it at peak potency you need to be tapped into the wires, the handbills that announce the upcoming sound spectaculars, station underground news. If you can manage you'll travel to check out your favourite sound as you might your local football, domino or darts team. This is their story. All systems go!
STILL sweating after 45 minutes of sinew stretching football, Colin, his baseball cap on back to front, sits patiently on the edge of the table in the youth club he frequents. 17 years old and unemployed, he originates from Jamaica but hails from Harlesden, and when it comes to raving he "don´t business".
Any weekend will find him on the move in searching a party, anywhere from Harlesden to Harrow, Kensal Rise to Paddington. He prefers UK lovers rock to the majority of music from Jamaica.
Opposite him sits Paul, similarly attired in a nylon anorak, complete with go-faster stripes down the sleeves arid a red baseball hat: sticksman chic. Also of Jamaican extraction, he talks rapidly as his accent shifts with the smoothness of a Rolls Royce gearbox from a London twang to "yard" talk and back again, concentrating his raving activities in the Ladbroke Grove and Hammersmith area, Paul mostly deals in lovers, but if it is going to be dub then it has to be the heaviest.
What are the raving possibilities for black youth on a weekend?
P: "Not much really, only parties."
C: "On Saturdays."
What about clubs?
P: "Phew, there´s hardly any clubs open on a Saturday. All Nations, Bali Hai. But the clubs of today are too violent."
C: "Bad boys clubs."
What kind of violence?
P: "It depends. If you dress up hard with jewellery and things and there´s a gang of boys from another area, they´ll drape you up for it. They´d kill a man for his jewellery."
What about blues dances?
P: "Blues ain´t really for the gal them."
C: "Yeah, and I went to a blues where it was 20p for a cup of water and five for ice."
P: "Sticksman Hi-Fi did play at a blues, 50p to get in and not so steep on the drinks. When the old people have blues it´s out of order. They have a big 70p for a rum and black and thing.
"I´ve been to a couple of nice blues though, where they played pure lovers. At one there was two sounds playing but one was playing dub and the people never check it, so everybody left and went into the room where they were playing lovers rock."
So what about this situation with the lovers rock versus dub scene?
C: "A party is nothing without girls and the girls check for lovers."
How do you rate the smaller party sounds?
P: "They´re alright, but it depends what kind of music they´re playing and how they mix it."
C: "You can´t start a party by playing lovers, so you play a little dub and a little soul."
P: "Yeah, liven up the party and then buss the lovers when everybody get tired and hot."
C: "Then you go into revival, that´s what´s coming up now, old lovers music. Sounds like "Jealously', "Caught You In A Lie"."
P: "The dub sounds can´t do that. They can´t go into revival, say a whole heaps of cuts to "Nice Up The Dance". That would be their revival, to dub and dub and dub to death."
C: "The party sounds, they look promotion from the girls. Like Sweet Harmony, they´re a hard party sound, and every time they play out girls come from all over."
P: "Or Sticksman Hi-Fi from Acton, me a tell yuh."
"You feeling sweet so move your feet, at the club; a special groove you won't feel blue, at the club; and the beat goes on and on, at the club. What would life be without the club? How could we live without the dub. The Phebes, the Cubies, you're bound to rock. Said what would life be like without the club?"
Victor Romeo Evans: 'At The Club'
What about the town hall dances with the top sounds?
P: "That's for the Ras Tafari them, for the dub man them. I only bother with them if it's big like Shaka. That's the only time I go. They don't play lovers 'cause they're entertaining Rasta them. They're not entertaining the yout' them, maybe the rasta yout' but them nah entertain me.
C: "I was chatting to this Rasta guy and he was telling me how dub gives him the vibes to dance. Lovers ain't got no vibes for him. Rastaman is the kind of person who'll dance by himself and feel high.
P: "I met this toaster in Greensleeves (Shepherds Bush) the other day, he toasts with Barrington Levy. . . and he tells me say he is a Rasta, but when he goes to parties he doesn´t want to hear dub, just lovers so he can rub gal.
"People don´t go into big halls like Acton Town Hall and rub; before they did, ´cause before people used to set their mind on it as one music (reggae). Lovers wasn´t so hot then, but you used to have soft music and that´s when Shaka and Bassa (Moa Anbessa) used to play it. People used to rub then, but now the sounds are just into dub."
Shaka plays nothing but dub from the moment he strings up to when he signs off.
P: "Cause Shaka's the warrior. He´s showing people how hard he is."
C: "To them, weight is the most important thing. If the bass comes out heavier than the other one they claim they´re the winner."
So you´re not interested in that side of sound?
C: "No."
P: "Only if I feel for a little jump up and down. Like last Friday I did go down Phebes and did hear Shaka thump two rhythm, and when I got a little bored I just went upstairs to the lovers."
What about the big sounds? Do you reckon they´ve got a future?
C: "No".
P: "There´s only one sound that´s got a future and that´s Shaka, ´cause he´s the one that´s making the rhythm.
chicodub
ecos:
Terça-feira, Abril 05, 2005
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E a seção clipping continua....
Cem vezes engomado
Para comemorar a centésima edição da festa Goma, no 00, na Gávea, Maurício Valladares receberá Calbuque e Chico Dub para embalos jamaicanos. R$35 (R$ 20 de bônus no bar). Se não der pra ir na festa, nada de lágrimas: o Mauval DJ pode ser ouvido toda segunda, à meia noite, com seu "Ronca Ronca", na Rádio Cidade. E mais: ainda neste semestre o Mauval fotógrafo lança um livro com suas muitas fotos dos Paralamas.
coluna da inês amorim, na megazine, globo
Mostrando a cara
O estilista Ocimar Versolato - que teve a sociedade desfeita com a empresária Sônia Habib, na semana passada - foi esfriar a cabeça na boate Fosfobox, sábado. O designer chegou à casa acompanhado pelo amigo Ney Matogrosso e preferiu ficar tomando drinques no Fosfobar com o dono do espaço, Cabbet Araújo. Como a pista de dança estava intransitável com a festa Speedz e a house dos DJ Bruno LT e Chico Dub, Ocimar foi embora e Ney encarou o balaco.
coluna da heloísa tolipan, do jb
Bom, saiu também uma notinha na Veja Rio falando da 100º Goma, mas aí já é demais.
chicodub
ecos:
Segunda-feira, Abril 04, 2005
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100º Goma
tirei do site do maurício valladares
por falar em festa, sábado que vem (dia 9) a festa GOMA vai ao ar pela centésima vez!
após dois anos de abrigo no 00 (planetário da gávea), chego a essa marca cascuda tocando o que há de mais "escuro" no som planetário: chic, dillinger, aretha, clementina, parliament, sly, gerson king combo, rappin' hood, chuck D, marley, curtis mayfield, originais do samba, prince, grandmaster flash, fela, dr. alimantado + outros nem tanto: clash, LCD, madonna, D2, madness, groove armada, beastie boys...
a edição especial de sábado contará com os DJalmas convidados calbuque e chico DUB!
chicodub
ecos:
Sexta-feira, Abril 01, 2005
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Biza
BBC se desculpa por pedir entrevista a Bob Marley
A British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) pediu desculpas nesta sexta-feira por solicitar uma entrevista ao cantor de reggae Bob Marley 24 anos após sua morte.
A emissora pública britânica admitiu estar constrangida com o engano, que surgiu com um e-mail enviado à Fundação Bob Marley.
"Evidentemente, estamos muito constrangidos pelo fato de não termos nos dado conta de que a carta enviada à Fundação Marley não reconheceu que Bob Marley não está mais entre nós," disse um comunicado da BBC.
A Fundação Bob Marley não pôde ser contatada de imediato para dar seu comentário, mas, segundo a BBC, ela tratou o engano com bom humor.
"A Fundação Bob Marley tratou o engano com muito bom humor, e a BBC já pediu desculpas pelo erro."
De acordo com a emissora, o erro aconteceu com uma carta padronizada que a BBC enviou a centenas de "ícones e músicos" para convidá-los a participar de uma série de programas no canal digital BBC-3.
O convite aconteceu após o sucesso do documentário The Story of Bohemian Rhapsody, sobre uma faixa clássica do grupo de rock Queen, também no BBC-3.
Uma porta-voz da BBC afirmou que o comunicado não foi uma brincadeira de 1º de abril. "Foi um engano real... justamente nesta sexta-feira", disse ela.
Bob Marley morreu em 1981, de câncer, quando tinha apenas 36 anos. O 60º aniversário de seu nascimento, que aconteceu na Jamaica, foi comemorado este ano em Addis Abeba, num evento que teve a participação de mais de 200 mil etíopes seguidores da crença rastafari, popularizada por Marley.
A idéia era que o programa do BBC-3 focalizasse um dos grandes sucessos de Bob Marley, No Woman, No Cry.
Reuters
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