King Tubby – Loving Memory Dub (Fuel 2000)
Reviewed by Sadie O., 11/26/05
70’s analog dub remixes by one of the great masters of the genre. Way too little information (such as what groups recorded the songs originally), but the couple of paragraphs on Tubby’s technique are pretty interesting. King Tubby, like the possibly better known Lee “Scratch” Perry, simply twisted knobs on the board to create any number of effects and layering. These are the cuts that inspired not only all the dub that came after, but the hip hop production as well. Enormously fun stuff. That said, it all sounds much the same (fine for sound system dances!), so it’s hard to pick best tracks. No FCCs, try 6, 15, 16 – 18 if you’re really feeling loony.
1. 4:04 midtempo, starts with toasting, then on to very spare dub with vocals floating in and out.
2. 3:48 downtempo, echo-y, rubbery, bloopy, crazy. No vocals.
3. 3:43 drum start, to midtempo bounce with horns. No vocals.
4. 3:24 underwater dub w/ vocals, cool guitar and great drums.
5. 3:07 starts out sounding like a normal reggae instrumental, then everything gradually goes weird.
6. 2:58 **bits of the tune of “Cherry Oh Baby” float through the soup. Lots of fast but mutated high-hat and tom. Murky bubble. Whooo!
7. 3:10 midtempo, ethereal horns and sweet vocals, plunky bass.
8. 3:24 rock steady! Uptempo, swingy, whacked out vocals.
9. 2:49 barreling intro, midtempo, almost entirely drum and bass with a spot of keyboard.
10. 3:21 backwards talking intro! Same crazy kinda dub.
11. 2:26 slow start, midtempo bubble, sweet vocals.
12. 4:52 crazy fast electronica intro, into rather laid back horn groove, space noises and compressed drums. Odd ending.
13. 4:05 spoken intro, spare dub with vocals and bass.
14. 3:39 keyboards and horns, lots of drum and bass, no vocals.
15. 3:32 **sweet vocal harmonies, nice bouncy riddim, pleasant. Just the thing for relaxing with that spliff!
16. 2:54 **uptempo bubble with lots of instruments/vocals coming in and out of mix, rubber band bass.
17. 3:34 reprocessed gunshots, indecipherable singing (“Dem Never Love Poor Marcus”). Would fit in well with experimental/ electronica – some crazy-ass noises in this one.
18. 5:15 **even weirder noises – segues well from previous song if that’s watcha wanna do. Turns into fast handdrumming and back to slow skank – totally fractured and fragmented. Who needs pot when you’ve got this stuff?