Dubblestandart
- In Dub (Echo Beach)
CD/DL
Out Now
Austrian Dub band, Dubblestandart release their fourteenth
studio album.
When I met my wife, a fan of Ska, I soon expressed my
fondness of Dub. She asked me to
describe its sound and aside from telling her it was lots of echoes and bass, I
struggled. To me, Dub is a feeling, a
place you go to, something immeasurable to which I constantly drift away and
relax. It is like no other musical
genre.
Formed in 1988 by Paul Zasky,
Dubblestandart are renowned for their self-named brand of 21st Century Dub
popularised in their live performances in their own right and as backing to the
likes of Lee 'Scratch' Perry and Ari Up.
They have also worked in the studio with Sly & Robbie, Dub Syndicate
and Mark Stewart so they know their stuff!
In Dub contains fifteen tracks featuring artists as ranging
from Marcia Griffiths to David Lynch and with six dub remixes from the legend
that is Adrian Sherwood. It's an album
where vocals are used sparingly, Griffiths and Ari for instance appear almost
as soundbytes in near instrumental pieces and the music is often minimised to
singles instruments and effects.
Stand out track by far is the previously unreleased version
of Max Romeo's Chase The Devil. Probably
most popular for its sampling in Out Of Space by The Prodigy, Lee Perry
provides vocals in a way that only he can do.
He also features on Chrome Optimism alongside David Lynch and a sample
of Jean Michel Jarre's Oxygene Part 4 telling us that 'Hell is very low and
Heaven is very high'. You've got to love
him.
There is also
some very clever track sequencing from the wonderful skank of Slow Motion to
the delicate piano in Logics Of Liberation.
It's not all chilled dub either, dance orientated tracks like Golden
Life and I'm A Warrior serve to keep the album surprising and fresh throughout.
Limited to
just 999 copies, it's an album for every dub fan to savour and one for newbies
to the musical style to acquaint themselves to new songs that the Jamaican
pioneers would approve of.
9/10
No comments:
Post a Comment