Jammy’s mix!

I copied this from the wiki-god: After earning money from building amplifiers and repairing electrical equipment from his mother’s house in Waterhouse in the late 1960s, he started his own sound system. He also built equipment for other local systems. After leaving Jamaica to work in Canada for a few years in the early 1970s, he returned to Kingston in 1976 and set up his own studio at his in-laws’ home in Waterhouse, and released a couple of Yabby You productions. When Phillip Smart left King Tubby’s team to work in New York, Jammy replaced him, getting to work with …

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dub-platters especial..

I had this Idea once. Well I get lots of ideas, but this one I actually did. As I was going through stacks and stacks of records, I’m constantly making piles of possible themed mixes. I had this one stack of records that had really great B-Sides, so here was the Idea: pick a mix just for the b-sides (which in 70s reggae is usually some type of dub/instrumental of the A-side) and then record a second mix of the A-sides in the same order. It was interesting to hear what the A-side mix was because I really only choose …

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Dangerous summer 80s mix..

I love 80s reggae. When I was 19 I moved to California for the summer. I would go to the flea market in Oakland where this rasta dude sold mix tapes of 80s hits. 90s dancehall was just starting to kick in, driven by the shift from weed to crack in Kingston, and I just wasn’t into it. That shit gives me a headache. When they toned it down a bit by the late 90s dancehall got good again, but there is a whole chunk in there that is 99% awful. But 80s? So good. I discovered Tenor Saw at …

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crank angle/bad tempo riddim…

If you don’t know.. sometimes in Jamaica, dudes will all use the same track and do different versions. this rhythm is called either Bad Tempo or Crank Angle. Not sure where the names come from. I believe the first song by Anthony Red Rose was the original track, but I’m not positive on that. All I do know is I love all these songs. Be sure to check out the Gregory Isaacs track at the end.. so nice. Crankangle Mix by King Shade on Mixcloud crank angle zip! (35 mb)

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mj’s mix of radical reggae 45s

Back when I had a writing job that took about 10 minutes a day to do what they expected, and payed really well, I spent the rest of my time ebaying reggae 45’s. Sometimes I would buy whole lots of records off one collector. Somehow I ended up with a pile of singles that someone had written “J B” in marker on every side of every record. I figured it would be fun to piece back together JB’s mix, so I recorded only JB records for this one. Unfortunately JB wasn’t that memorable of a name and I somehow mislabeled …

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joe gibbs mix

Joe Gibbs was a Jamaican producer in the 60s and 70s. He recorded all the greats like Cornell Cambell, Black Uhuru, Culture, Big Youth, and every other name from the 70s you can think of. One of his biggest hit was Uptown Top Ranking by Althia and Donna. A song you have most definitely heard if you’ve spent any amount of time listening to Jamaican music. You can read more about him on the wiki thing here. I made this mix a few years ago off of 45s that he produced.. enjoy! Listen here or download the zip for the …

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big youth…

If you don’t know the dude.. Big Youth was a DJ in Jamaica in the 70s. Back when DJ meant the guy on the mic, talking over the records, not the one playing them like today. Besides having the raddest grill in existence, he is also one of my favorite of the 70s DJs. He is still around, but the best stuff is from back then. I started collecting Big Youth 45s years ago until I amassed a big pile of them. This is a mix from some of my favorites. You can download the zip link to your computer …

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greasy vs ape…

I have this friend Matt whose last name really is Greasy, except I think it’s spelled “Griesse”. He makes amazing furniture, invented this trippy toy called The Groovetube that turns your TV into a pixelated colorfest, and has the most amazing collection of funk 45s. That’s really the tip of the iceberg with Griesse stories,I didn’t even include the self-sufficient commune he’s building, or the fact that his dad has a huge Yosemite Sam mustache and rides a three-wheeled chopper. A while back Matt went on a tear recording 45s and scanning the labels which he gave to me as …

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