From Joanna Sent Thu, Mar 18th 1999, 01:54
Rule 1) if bill laswell plays bass on it, don't buy it. No matter how good the other people are on the CD, it will suck. If it's a whole CD by Bill Laswell, it will be atrocious. (note: many things that look like they are by Laswell are only produced/compiled by him - these are sometimes oK) Wow! Bill Laswell has done MANY albums of MANY different genres and although he has quite a lot of 'cut-outs', overall, I am impressed with his work. Have you ever heard "Oscillations" - jungle/d n'b (Sub Rosa) w/ Ninj? Or even "Dub Creations" (AXIOM) which features Jah Wobble and many different artists? >Rule 2) The Mad Professor is only good at remixes. He may be the >absolute top of the pops at it (he is) but don't buy his LPs. With the abundance of Mad Professor CDs out there, its hard to pick the winners but I have always really dug Mad Professor "It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, Professor" (ARIWA) {trk 12 - Fast Forward Into Dub has the vocals that The Orb sampled in The Blue Room}; "Mazaruni" (ARIWA) - very Ragga! and "Rupununi Safari" (ARIWA) - features Douggie Digital and the Juggler (nice jungle!). I spoke with him at the Lee Perry show in Boston, he is a very polite and a personable man, which is very cool - especially when the talk is mostly business. Rule 4) Lee Perry is at this point completely worthless. Get the boxset, maybe some older LPs, but music like Technomajikal makes me ill. Anything he did solo after the early 90's is quite awful. Of the "newest" albums, Lee Perry "Super Ape In a Jungle" - has some good ragga tracks. >Rule 5) There are several schools of dub reggae, one of which originated >in Jamaica in the 60s, another of which in the UK in the 90s. Decide what >you like (there are of course other styles) - there are records in both >that are very good. Hell Yeah! It all started in Jamaica. Lee Perry "Upsetter In Dub" (HB 77) (Heartbeat Records) is a must for anyone who wants to revisit the roots of dub. Another great dub album is Dub Specialist "17 Dub Shots From Studio One" (HB 142) (Heartbeat Records) Check out the site...has nice audio clips of the album. http://www.rounder.com/heartbeat DUB - it's where re-mixing started. Petufina