Author Helmut Phillips

"Culture Dub & Medley Dub" are two wanted Dub Albums by Doctor Bird together with an amazing 25 bonuses, some of them extremely raredubs from the estate of the Treasure Isle label were packed onto a DoCD. All tracks were created after Sonia Pottinger bought the business from Duke Reid in 1974. They were mixed by Errol Brown, the Resident Engineer at Treasure Isle, whom Mrs. Pottinger took over. She hired Brown to produce Dubalbums that the duke had refused until then. After the success of the first "Treasure" and "Pleasure" Dub-LPs from Reid's back catalog, Mrs Pottinger wanted an album with versions of her own productions from 1968 to '71. In 1976 the LP “Medley Dub“, An album that - apart from a Japanese CD edition - was difficult to find for a long time. Most of the tracks on it are by the Melodians, including four medleys, two of which were made famous through voicings from Dennis Alcapone. To do this a Dub to Max Romeo's “Let The Power Fall For I”, the confusing “Swing & Dub“Means what was probably just a misprint. Because one Dub for the Melodians hit “Swing & Dime” is also available. The LP also contained Dubs on titles by Errol Dunkley and Ken Boothe. Doctor Bird has enriched the album with 15 rare single B-sides from the late 70s, some of which are characterized by harsh short reverb effects. Including versions of "Lick And Run" by Ruddy Thomas, "Stormy Weather" by Bobby Ellis, and "Wake Up Everybody", a soultune by Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes or Teddy Pendergrass, which OC Roberts covered in 1976 for Sonia Pottinger . Two years later, Errol Brown produced "Harder Than The Rest", the second album by Culture, who split from Joe Gibbs and signed a deal with Virgins sub-label Fontline. For the vocal trio as well as for Brown, the move to Treasure Isle turned out to be a stroke of luck. After completing the LP, he toured with them and began to make a name for himself as dubbender live engineer. Before that, despite the frontline deal, he had one of eight songs on the "Harder Than The Rest" album for Sonia Pottinger's label Dub Mixed LP released with two different covers. Doctor Bird chose the uninspired Jamaican high note variant, although the Afro motif of the English edition - with slaves, warriors and shamans - is one of the most expressive covers of the genre. After all, the drawing of the UK Sky Note label is photographed in the booklet, which is otherwise only partially convincing, as the liner notes offer more adulation than facts with barely legible mini letters. Data on the origins of the bonus tracks would have been more appropriate. Nevertheless, this collection, which comes up with 10 other single B-sides of the group on the second CD in addition to the Culture LP, is a cornucopia with a total of 43 mixes by an exceptional sound engineer who missed the due recognition at Treasure Isle, therefore closed in 1979 Tuff Gong switched and Bob Marley became a live engineer. (The text first appeared in RIDDIM 04/19)