I’m having a bit of a August clear-out in my warehouse, so I thought Igive you the chance
to get some tees for a price you can’t beat, that is £15.00in Europe and $20 elsewhere.
And that is P&P included! It’s a decent price and I suggest youto get together with your
friends and get a few a the same time…
Ah, I design and print them myself, so if you want to get them, that’llhave to be through me
or a handful of selected retail shop I supply

Some of the colour combinations will be available for a time-limitedperiod only.
Of course, it’s first come, first served: please note that the missingsizes are available
with a 10 days delay (it’s summer, it’s very hot and we’re lazy!)

Derrick Morgan
Orange print on Charcoal
M, XL

in £

in $

Lambretta Service Man
Black, red and green on White
S, L

in £

in $

Fire Corner
Red and yellow on Burgundy
S, M, XL

in £

in $

Mono-Stereo
Yellow on Brown
M, L, XL

in £

in $

Scorcher records
Navy on Yellow
S

in £

in $

Wear you to the ball
Yellow on Navy (more like a deep navy/blue-black)
S, M

in £

in $

Reggae Party
Red and yellow on Navy (lighter than above)
S, M

in £

Ken Boothe - Mr. Rocksteady
White and orange on Black
S, M, L, XL

in £

in $

There you go, my latest podcast…

http://soulbrew.podomatic.com/entry/2008-05-27T23_45_08-07_00

I’ve learnt my basic DJ skills there, maaaany moons ago ;-). So that’s why this interview!

1) Tell us about your first reggae (as in reggae/ska/rocksteady) record you remember listening to and the first one you bought.Why did you like it?

My first ever reggae single that I’ve ever heard!!!!!!!!!!!……there were several, from my dad’s little collection! Pat Kelly was the most played artist in my house, specially a track called ‘I’m not your guy’. ‘Prisoner of Love’ by Dave Barker was another….‘Red, Red Wine’ by Tony Tribe was played a lot…..my dad love it, being Italian, he loved his red wine and living in a West Indian area got to love his reggae too! I love the music because….I guess, I grew up listening to it at home! I remember buying ska,reggae singles for the first time in a jumble sale, there were several singles…..too many to mention. The first ska single I ever heard was on the John Peel Show, on Radio 1 in 1979, ‘Alcapone’ by Prince Buster and I still love it now!

2) What brought you to reggae?

As I mentioned before I grew up listening to the music at an early age and then Two-Tone came along, loved it and that just enhanced my interest in the more authentic Jamaican style ska/rocksteady/reggae from the 60’s.

3) Tell the people about Coast to Coast and why they should get there

Coast to Coast is a fantastic night, great people, brilliant atmosphere and the music is second to none! If you love ska and reggae….Coast to Coast is the place to be!!! Sorry no Two-Tone!!

4) The best time you had behind the decks

When I did Coast to Coast in Oslo it was awesome! When I Dj’d in Torino for a club night called ‘Soulful’ that was great too! When I Dj’d in Barcelona last year for the Reggae Soul Allnighter that was fantastic and just recently The Coast to Coast Xmas Party, my live guests were ‘Intensified ‘ and to my surprise DAVE BARKER got on stage and did 30min slot! It was completely out of the blue, unrehearsed and the atmosphere was electric, what a night!

5) Some anecdotes?
I remember going to a party 1973 with my parents. Full of Jamaican people! We were the only white people there! The blacks kids wanted to be my best friend because I was different! All the talk then was boxing…who’s the best Muhammed Ali? George Foreman? Us kids were talking about it outside the house, inside the reggae….reggae all night! The music was just like what my dad liked, so I know it was the sounds of 1969 but then they played something for the older folk, the place erupted, I know now it was ska now but I didn’t know at the time, I was only 7 years old, the atmosphere was fantastic, many very happy people! Such joy!

I remember, when I was 13 years old, I was well into ska, reggae and two-tone. I was going to a School Disco, I dressed up for the first time in something related to the music I was into, which I believe to be a rude boy at the time! Trulby Hat, Ben Sherman shirt, tonic suit, Brogues shoes, white socks and a Specials tie….he he…. I was nervous walking down the road, I felt like everyone was looking at me! When I got to the school everyone thought I looked really smart! Good memories!

6) Your current top 10

This is not really my Top 10, there is too many great records to choose from but they are as good as any!

1) South China Sea - The Skatalites
2) Diamond Baby - The Wailers
3) Pictureof Smoke - Jaclie Opel
4) Send Me - The Enchanters
5) Tribute Nerhu - The Skatalites
6) Man Fe Getta Beatin - The Wailers
7) Just A Mirage - Slim Smith
Shake It - Alton Ellis
9) Foey Man - George Dekker
10)Tonight - Alton Ellis

7) Future projects?

Check out my web site for details;
www.coasttocoast.org.uk

His passion for vintage sounds is unrivalled. He imported some King Tubby’s bass bins from Jamaica in order to get them restored and put back to working order… Here’s a brief introduction to what he’s doing now!

For over a decade Jeremy Collingwood has been collecting old Sound Systems boxes from JA & the UK, whilst also accumulating a series of period amplifiers to record the first 25 year of Sound systems.
The oldest box is from the 1950’s V Rocket Sound which is made from Jamaican hardwood. V Rocket was quiet Uptown and famed or audio quality – though from just the one box!
The WASP base bin is probably from the mid 1960’s and was part of another 1950’s period sound that also had it own Wasp & Hornet imprints.
There’s a pair of twin mid ranges boxes from Sir Harry’s Active Sound. These are painted hardwood and would have sat with a single 15” bass unit. I also have Sir Harry’s Horn – which is a fibre glass PA horn. The
capacitor that protects it from over load is the original one and was taken out of a fluorescent light!
King Tubby’s Hi-Fi bass bin is my pride & joy as it’s from King Tubby’s first set of boxes – probably from the early 1960’s and claimed to be the first box with a reflex design, as opposed to the old style straight
porting. Won in an eBay auction! Original it had a pair of 12” mid boxes with it. Tubby replaced the boxes in the mid-1970’s – as seen in DennisMorris photo’s from the time.

The UK Tip-A-Tone sound was rescued from rotting away in a lock up and is now back to its former glory. (see www.steppin.co.uk for images)

The Amplifiers
Traditional Sounds split the signal from the deck up into its Bass, Mid & Top parts and each signal was amplified separately and then fed to the appropriate boxes.
The Tip-A-Tone set came with its original 8 KT88 valve powered amp, which has its own small pre-amp in. It uses huge transformers, which means it has to be wheeled about. It delivers about 400 watts.
For the vintage set we use Lord Koos special built 100watts amp plus a series of guitar / PA amps from the likes of Sound City, Vortexion and Linear Conchord.
Downbeat Melody uses a 10 KT 88 amp built a few years back by a London based Jamaican electronics engineer, who has built Sound amps for decades.

I met reggae when I was a student in the mid & late 1970’s. Barrington Levy, Wailing Souls, Sugar Minott, Mighty Diamonds, Black Uhuru carried my sway then. My work with the catalogues of pre-1972 Bob Marley and Lee Perry’s cannon can be seen at www.traxonwax.net. Jeremy’s very happy to be working with Steve and actually getting all this old equipment repaired and improved and out there as working history. It’s been a long, demanding & expensive decade!
I enjoyed being part of Black History Season at London’s City Hall, by the Thames at Tower Bridge. Who would have thought those boxes would have ended up being played there?

Current deck favourites:
Super Tartans: Woman is a contradiction (Sunfire JA)
Cornell Campbell: Natural Facts (Trojan JA)
Alfred Brown: One Scotch, One Bourbon, One beer, (Muffat JA)
Fabulous Falcons: 2 Dub (Happy-Tone JA)
Bob Andy: Desperate Lover (Supreme JA)
Cool Sticky: Train To Soulsville (Amalgamated JA)
Jimmy Riley: Reggae Music (Full Moon JA)
The Upsetters: Chim Cherry (Dub plate)
Susan Cadogan: Do It Baby (Orchid JA)
The Upsetters: Jucky Skank (Dub Plate)

Let me introduce to you, Mr. Steve Rice, a man that lets the music do the talking!

About me;

Born in Brixton i grew up with a large West Indian influence aroud and
went to late night blues dances from an early age…i started buying
reggae seriously around 69 and spent a lot of time hanging out in Joe’s
record shop in the arcade in Brixton,Joe being Joe Mansano.I would hang
out all day and get food and cups of hot chocolate for him in return
for a shot at some of the pre release tunes he would get.When i was 15 i built a small system at home and soon afterwards teamed up with a pal and we became Sir Messenger sound, playing our own saturday night dances every week.We cut a few tunes for ourselves the only one to get released was the legendary Big Haire on Unity. Around 75 i lost interest in the scene.
Started back in 92 and have been playing in Bristol ever since…i met up with Jeremy a year or so ago via Chris Lane so now we run Downbeat Melody sound system between us.My current favourites on the turntable;

This is my song..Keith and Tex Move and Groove blank
Woman don’t make me cry…Tristan Palmer…Thompson sound
Didn’t i …Darondo Luv.n.Haight album
Moody ska …Tommy McCook…Discolite
Stop your lying…Castle sisters Muzik city
Love and only love…Fred Locks…Tribesman12″

Check him out at: www.stevericedj.com

You can also listen to Steve livehosting the Down Beat Melody show on Passion Radio Bristol.

Hear Steve play the best in Jamaican Music Mondays from 9am to 12 mid day (GMT). It’s most definitely a nice way to start the week!

Yep, that’s my last effort… Available both on Black print on Ash grey hooded sweat and Silver print on Black hooded sweatshirts. Sizes available are XS to XXL. Please note that these are slimfit sweats!

They will be available soon on eBay but in the meantime you can get them here for £23.99 P&P (Priority Mail to any destination). Payments are  securely handled by PayPal. Don’t hesitate to contact me for any questions you might have about this article.

Although I wasn’t able to attend the very first one, I made sure I check one out in May last year. I was impressed big time by the quality of the tunes played and the overall “sound”; too many a times I’ve heard djs playing their best records regardless the what was happening on the dancefloor. A dj is not a show off! I was also lucky enough to catch Jonah (hope it’s spelt correctly) playing some killer rocksteady tunes…

So I thought why not interview them? Well, the spokesman Mistah Brown came forward with the following answers!

- BTW who’s your toaster?? After listening to him chatting over What a fire?

That’ll probably be Champion from 80’s Soundsystem - Jamdown Rockers. He has his moments - see below…

- Introduce yourselves

They call me Mistah Brown. I’m co-founder of Tighten Up alongside Tim P.

- How did you first got involved with reggae?

I grew up with Reggae all around me. Tho my family hail from Antigua - Reggae was always the main feature at my uncle’s saturday blues parties or domino gatherings. I’m an old man so remember clearly when “Two Sevens Clashed” and Punk and Reggae came together in the fight against bigotry and ignorance back in the day and when Virgin were putting out quality Jamaican music aimed squarely at the rebelious youth market and when 2-Tone smashed it’s way into the national conciousness. I spent the late 70’s - early 80’s listening (and taping) David Rodigan’s “Roots Rockers” show on Capital Radio on saturday nites and Tony Williams’ on Radio London on Sunday afternoons. Reggae became the soundtrack to my youth and remains the music i’m most emotionally tied to now. That said, I’m pretty much stuck in the past - always around 20 years behind everyone else. When I was a kid I was really into Studio One - now I’m into my 40’s (just!) I’m finally getting my head round Digital Dancehall!!! I always get there in the end tho…

- A bit of background on Tighten Up, how it started, music policy, guests.

We started Tighten Up cos no-one was quite doing Reggae the way we wanted to do it or playing the music we thought should be getting heard. We started off mixing up Reggae, Ska, Rocksteady and 80’s Dancehall with Funk and Latin intially but realised quickly that this meant we had to make too many compromises as we’d never really reach an audience that truly loved Jamaican music. We didn’t want to be one of the many 100% Dynamite imitators - watering down our content for people who really don’t even like Reggae - so we moved instead to a 100% Jamaican playlist and never looked back. Our guests are a combination of mates, selectors & journalists we’ve admired for years as well as those who’ve approached us because of the nite’s reputation. My biggest thrill was getting home to find that I’d missed calls from Ranking Joe and Clive Chin!!! These people are legends to us so the fact that they even know who we are, let alone wanna work with us is amazing.

- How the Tighten Up idea was born

Tighten Up was born when, hundreds of miles apart, probably sometime in the 1970’s, me and Tim heard the first Reggae tune that made us go “Blimey! What was that!?!” For me it was probably Niney’s “Blood & Fire”. That tune still scares the crap outta me like I’m still 5 years old!!!

- Your best reggae gig, whether behind the decks, or at a concert/venue.

We played Paris a couple of years ago which was brilliant - rewinds on practically every tune - but the most electric gig we did, for me, was Dublin with Worries Outernational back in Oct last year! Every MC in the house grabbed the mic for a turn on the “Never Let Go” riddim (aka “The Answer”)!!! I swear, as I was doing the mixdown, every single punter in the place was pogo-ing with us as our MC Champion (formerly of Jamdown Rockers Soundsystem) whipped the crowd into a frenzy with one of his classic “all join in” lyrics. It was like being in a punk band or something - but with better music!

- Your Top10 records

(see following post)

- The most influential Reggae Artist

Probably Bob Marley - however for me Bob Andy and Dennis Brown are phenomenally important artists too. Plus you can’t argue with the body of work produced by people like Lee Perry and Coxsone Dodd!

- Future projects?

To keep on keepin’ on. We’ve been talking about touring Japan for years and it may happen yet…

Then a couple of years ago I was reading People Funny Boy and there you are! Mr. Chris Lane is in there, so I discover the fella went to JA well before it was fashionable to do so… He’s done a lot and he has seen a lot, so I decided to get in touch with him, with the help of Mr. Steve Rice. The following is a brief introduction to the man himself. Enjoy!!!

Chris Lane was born in London in January 1956 and started buying reggae records 13 years later when his family acquired their first record player. At 17 he was writing a regular column for the prestigious Blues & Soul> magazine and soon made his first month-long trip to Jamaica, spending his eighteenth birthday at the newly built Black Ark studio co-writing a song with Lee ’Scratch’ Perry and Bob Marley. He spent the rest of his time hanging around Kingston’s other studios conducting trail-blazing interviews with legendary reggae arists and producers such as Big Youth, Prince Buster, Bunny Wailer, Augustus Pablo, Derrick Harriott, Niney The Observer, Dennis Brown and Coxsone Dodd. Despite being recognised as the leading (if not the only) authority on reggae at the time, and going on to contribute articles and reviews to> Melody <Maker, New Musical Express, Let It Rock, Music Week, Black Music< and the first reggae fanzine Pressure Drop, he decided that his ambitions lay in other directions and in 1976 founded Dub Vendor (the specialist reggae retailer) with fellow reggae fan John MacGillivray. Although he left the company after a couple of years it wasn’t long before he re-entered the business as a producer, recording four tunes for Dave Hendley’s Cruise label.

In 1980 he renewed his partnership with John MacGillivray, this time as co-owner of Fashion Records, and continued to hone his skills as a producer, arranger, engineer and musician, often working with other labels and producers in addition to his Fashion production duties. During the early eighties he mixed a dub album (‘Natural Dub’) for Prince Lincoln & The Royal Rasses, acted as live sound engineer and producer for the renowned Night Doctor band, and later played guitar and percussion for Maxi Priest’s original Caution outfit, engineering their debut album (‘You’re Safe’) and mixing their first hit singles into the bargain. Chris also engineered and mixed for wide variety of other producers at Marc Angelo’s Studio and cut dub plates for London’s top sound systems in his own A-Class Dub Studio, occasionally compiling albums and writing sleeve notes for companies such as Trojan and Greensleeves, having stopped writing for magazines at the start of the eighties.

In the nineties he mostly concentrated on Fashion Records (and it’s associated labels - Fine Style, Top Notch, Jungle Fashion and Dub Organiser), producing, playing and engineering top quality music with many of reggae’s most respected artists and musicians - he has worked with Mykal Roze (of Black Uhuru), Junior Delgado, Johnny Clarke, Augustus Pablo, Glen Brown, Alton Ellis, Delroy Wilson, Pat Kelly, Cutty Ranks, Top Cat, General Levy, Smiley Culture, Mafia & Fluxy, Steely & Clevie and Sly Dunbar to name but a very few.

Chris gave up producing records in 2000, but still continues to assist in compilation projects for Trojan and Pressure Sounds (amongst others), supplying information and sleeve notes, posters and labels, original source discs and other archive material when needed. He has also recently had articles published in Record Collector and the respected French Natty Dread magazines, and occasionally deejays at highly regarded reggae revive clubs such as Pressure & Slide, Tighten Up and Coast To Coast as well as the Boogaloo <soul nights in South-East London.

COMPILATIONS
ORIGINAL ROCKERS - Augustus Pablo Greensleeves (Co-compiled, sleeve notes)
CLASSIC ROCKERS - Augustus Pablo Island (Sleeve notes)
CLASSIC ROCKERS Volume 2 - Augustus Pablo Rockers International (Compiled)
DUBBLE ATTACK - Glen Brown Productions Greensleeves (Compiled)
BOAT TO PROGRESS - Glen Brown Productions Greensleeves (Compiled)
CHECK THE WINNER - Glen Brown Productions Greensleeves (Compiled)
GEMS FROM TREASURE ISLE Trojan (Compiled, sleeve notes)
SONGS FOR MIDNIGHT LOVERS Derrick Harriott Trojan (Compiled, sleeve notes)
BEST OF BEVERLEY’S Trojan (Compiled, sleeve notes)
MELODICA MELODIES Trojan (Compiled, sleeve notes)
THE UPSETTER COLLECTION Trojan (Compiled, sleeve notes)
EVERYDAY SKANK - Big Youth Trojan (Co-compiled, sleeve notes)
LEE SCRATCH PERRY – THE WONDERMAN YEARS Trojan (Co-compiled, sleeve notes)
ORIGINAL JAMAICAN SOUND SYSTEM STYLE – Various R&B Artists EMI (Co-compiled, sleeve notes)
THE BIG GUNDOWN – Spaghetti Westerns & Reggae Trojan (Compilation, sleeve notes)
AQUARIUS ROCK – Herman Chin-Loy Productions >Pressure Sounds
REGGAE PRESSURE - Boss Sounds 1969 to 1970 Trojan (Compiled with Noel Hawks and Dave Hendley)

…also contributed information, images and original music sources for many others!

Tighten Up trademark MC Champian is there to check that Island 7″…
- Please Chris, introduce yourself…born in the Angel, Islington, London 13^th January 1956. Always lived in London, grew up in the West End (Marylebone) now residing in South East London.
- How did you first got involved with reggae?…. like most ordinary kids at the time, I got into reggae as a young skinhead in 1968/69. Apart from the ‘pop’ hits like Desmond Dekker and Johnny Nash, the first ‘real’ reggae tune I remember hearing was ‘Mama Look Deh’ (The Reggae Boys) – my best mate’s big brother bought it from the Muzik City in Kilburn and we all sat around playing it over and over again trying to work out what it was they were singing about!

At that time, we were all into soul and Motown as well as reggae…. If you went to a youth club or disco you’d hear everything all mixed up (pop records too!)… people try and rewrite history to say that only reggae was played in those days, but that’s just not true. The other thing was that you’d still be hearing records that were three, four or five years old being played, so if you were interested in music you would look for ska and rocksteady tunes as well as the latest Upsetters or Pioneers.

The music went with the clothes, it was all around us. The difference with me (and a very few others!) was that I didn’t stop liking reggae when everyone grew their hair (and started wearing flares!) in 1971/72….

- what was the first record you bought?…. my family didn’t have a record player until Christmas 1969, that’s when I went out and bought Tighten Up Vol. 2 and Motown Chartbusters Vol. 3….. In January (with my birthday money) I bought ‘Liquidator’, ‘Vampire’, ‘Reggae Pressure’ (Tony Blackburn used to play this on Radio 1!), Elizabethan Reggae’, etc. I had two paper rounds and a Saturday job, and all my money went on records and clothes (in that order).

- Tell us about your first trip to JA, how did that came about?… I had just started writing the reggae column for ‘Blues & Soul’ magazine, and when I interviewed Lee Perry (amongst others) in London, he said “anytime you came to Jamaica, you can stay at my house” – so I saved up some money (I was still at school then) and went in December 1973. I stayed for nearly a month, just when Scratch had started recording in his own Black Ark Studio in his back garden. It was a dream…. I was sitting around in a studio, or travelling into downtown Kingston, and meeting and interviewing (nearly) all of my musical heroes…..

- Lee “Scratch” Perry: Genius or Madman?… When I first met Scratch at Trojan’s office in London he struck me as a nice bloke… he was serious about his music, and obviously enjoyed what he did – he had a good sense of humour, just like on his records. When I stayed with him he was very kind, very hospitable, and he and his family made me feel very welcome… it was only a few years later that his slight ‘eccentricity’ became more pronounced and he started behaving strangely. I’m sure that having the studio at home put a lot of pressure on him, and this was what eventually changed him……

- Your best experience music-wise (can be a gig as a DJ or at
a concert)… I’ve never really been one for concerts – I’ve always preferred the records… but I have to say I enjoyed the 1970 Wembley Reggae Show (the one that is featured in the film ’Reggae’ by Horace Ove), James Brown’s 1972 show at the Rainbow, and the 1974 New Year’s Day show at the Carib, Kingston (featuring Big Youth, Dennis Brown, Leroy Smart , Augustus Pablo – not a bad line-up!!)

Deejaying is a thing I always enjoy, although I couldn’t do it too regularly… it’s more of a hobby for me than anything! Possibly the best times I’ve had deejaying are either at Coast to Coast and Tighten Up in London – both clubs have crowds that appreciate the music, so you can play records you like (within reason!) and get a good reaction…

- Your Top 10 records + a bit of description for each title….this is too difficult!!… and it will change every day!!……..(and this is just the Jamaican tunes!!)

1…. Queen Majesty – Techniques….. flawless reworking of the Impressions’ ‘Minstrel & Queen’, like so many reggae covers (‘You Don’t Care’, ‘Ten To One’, ‘Keep On Moving’, etc) actually improves on the original by adding a beat and a bassline!

2….. You Don’t Know – Bob Andy….. great rhythm, great melody, great lyrics, great singing – what more do you want? Easily as good as his marvellous Studio 1 material…..and there’s a lovely piano instrumental to it as well!

3…… Less Problem – Sound Dimension…. Possibly my favourite Studio 1 instrumental (and there are so many to choose from!), funky and cool at the same time.

4…… Park View – Ernest Ranglin….. Just ahead of ‘Straight Flush’, this is a fantastic guitar instrumental to Alton Ellis’s ‘I’ll Be Waiting’ (Studio 1 cut). I love jazz – particularly guitarists like Tal Farlow, Barney Kessel, Wes Montgomery, etc and I know that Ernie is a world-class jazz player – just listen to that break!!

5…… Real Cool – Tommy McCook …. I’ve always preferred Treasure Isle to Studio 1, and this gorgeous instrumental (and others like ‘Moody Ska’ and ‘Pink Champagne’) sums up the Treasure Isle sound to me – so cool, so relaxed, with a great solo from Tommy. I always imagine these tunes were recorded on a Sunday afternoon, about an hour after a good Sunday dinner!

6…. Flashing My Whip – U Roy…. Believe it or not, I didn’t particularly like U Roy when I first heard him – I just didn’t get him for some reason. Then I heard this at my local youth club, and it sort of unlocked the door for me – I bought this, borrowed my mate’s ‘Version Galore’ album, and all was revealed!! U Roy has been my favourite deejay since….. (In the same way, I didn’t like James Brown at first – then I heard and bought ‘It’s A New Day’ and all the other tunes (‘Sex Machine’, Ain’t It Funky Now’, ‘Soul Power’, etc) suddenly made sense!

7….. It’s Hard To Confess – Melodians…. Gorgeous rock-steady – brilliant original song (as far as I know!), beautiful singing, great rhythm from Lyn Taitt & the Jets…. Perfection! I love top quality rock-steady like this….’Looking For A Girl’ – Gaylads, ‘Tell Me Baby’ – Delano Stewart, ‘It Comes & Goes’ – Melodians, there’s hundreds of them….

8…. East Of The River Nile – Augustus Pablo…. The original rebel tune!! I bought this when it was a couple of months old in a supermarket that had thousands of very cheap reggae records, and I knew this was something very different straight away…. It’s a shame that in many ways he never really improved on this….

9…. French Connection – Upsetters… have to include something by Scratch as he was a big influence on me…. I always loved his instrumentals from the skinhead days (‘Dry Acid’, ‘Clint Eastwood’, ‘Cold Sweat’), and loved his own individual deejaying style, especially slightly later when he made tunes like this and ‘Bucky Skank’, ‘Cow Thief Skank’, ‘Jungle Lion’ and ‘Black Ipa’. I always looked at this tune as a return to his ’69 days, a great organ instrumental with a bit of talking, with the added bonus of a brilliant Tubby’s dub on the flipside.

10….. Jerk In Time – Wailers…. One of my favourite ska tunes (along with the B-side ‘Sweetest Rocker In Town’), and one of my favourite Wailers tunes (even if Bob isn’t on it!)… great song, and a lovely organ solo, apparently from Richard Ace.

- The most influential Reggae Artist … I suppose I‘ve got to say Bob Marley, not only because he’s recognised and idolised all over the world, but because he wrote so many fantastic songs and sung them with such conviction. He really does deserve all the credit he has been given - my only complaint would be that too many people don’t look beyond Bob to all the other great singers and songwriters……

I think I should also mention King Tubby - although not a singer, songwriter or a musician, his experiments with remixing songs led to modern dance music as we know it…. And even though he didn’t actually ‘invent’ dub single-handedly (there were other engineers doing the same thing, ie Errol Thompson, Sid Bucknor, Andy Capp, Sylvan Morris, etc) he was certainly at the forefront of a radical musical development.

- Djs Anecdotes…. I probably don’t deejay enough to have many good anecdotes – I remember at Coast To Coast being asked if I had any music from ‘Grease’ (and originally thought they said from ‘Greece’ – I said no, it’s all from Jamaica and America!) – then I realised they wanted to hear a bit of John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John…. Not quite the thing at a reggae & soul night!

- Future projects? ….. nothing special lined up – if I am asked to deejay somewhere I usually do it if I fancy it, and I still help people compile albums (I often supply original records, label scans, posters, information, etc.)

Now I don’t make records I can enjoy music more – I don’t have that pressure on me to make a living out of it! I’m happy with my life, I’ve got a fantastic family and a good job so I can really enjoy having music as a hobby… it’s much better that way!