mattersfullpac

[mattersfullpac]

Mad professor the dubs that time forgot rar programs

And of course they’ve got the various stereotypes – and I guess rightly so because London was like the biggest reggae market for years. Then you have the lovers rock crowd – if it’s not a smooth type of lovers rock like say Aswad Roots Rocking then don’t come giving them nothing else. Yeah if it’s not a Blood Dunza or a song that Shaka would play then forget it.

You could call it dub but it doesn’t matter – if it’s not their dub – like a tune like say Johnny Clarke the one that goes “all over the world”… Now the dub crowd – if it’s not a certain way they ain’t taking it. You have the roots crowd and you have the dub crowd. London is also a market that has got people who are fiercely defensive about what they like – fiercely pigeon holed. The German audience seemed to know both the old and the new stuff. The London crowd did not know the new album – they only danced to the old stuff. I had already seen the same tour in Germany. I saw Morgan Heritage play in London this summer when Beres didn’t make it. It’s been a generation of that – so it’s not surprising that so many bands are playing reggae. Nothing to do with what’s on the radio – but from ’89-90 you’d go to festivals and hear Chase the Devil, 54-46, and obscure reggae tracks that never even made the national charts. For years I have been going to festivals – even in England – and the main diet has been reggae.

They really think it’s finished – because they are misled by the UK media which is leading them up a totally different road than the real one. I think you have a better idea than most people in England.īecause one thing I have a problem coming to terms with when I talk to the people in England – especially young black Londoners – is their ignorance on the international clout of reggae. PROFESSOR: I’m going to start by interviewing you (laughs) – you must have a good insight into the true international clout of reggae right? However, things did not go to plan when the Professor turned the tables and began questioning us! Fraser prefers vintage electronic equipment to computers and is a great lover of the sweet sounds of soul music – having based Ariwa on Berry Gordy’s Motown.Īngus Taylor spoke to reggae’s tenured Professor at Sardinia Reggae Festival about his revamped studio and his plans for 2014 – including his long awaited album with Luciano, Deliverance, due for release in late February. In 20 he fulfilled a lifelong dream to hold his Back To Africa Festival in Gambia.Īlthough he is usually associated with heavy digital dub – this is misleading.

As the recording industry has become less profitable he has travelled further and further physically with his live mixing extravaganza the Mad Professor’s Dub Show: bringing his distinctive take on reggae to every corner of the globe. His sonic journeys have spanned roots and dub, lovers rock, and in recent years, forays into the links between reggae and the South American music of his past and the South London dubstep. As both imprint and space took off, he began to record visiting Jamaican artists such as Johnny Clarke, Mikey Dread and most notably Lee Scratch Perry – with whom he maintained a close musical and business relationship until the end of the 20th century.Īriwa has lasted longer still, outputting thousands of releases (never mind the billions of unreleased tapes stashed at the fourth incarnation of his Ariwa studio near Croydon). He then soldered his interest in electronics to his love of the capital’s reggae music when he started up his first home studio in 1979: voicing and mixing pop, rock and reggae acts six days a week and devoting Sunday to producing his own creations for his Ariwa label. He built his first crystal radio aged nine in Guyana before relocating to London in 1970 where he assembled a twelve channel mixing console from scratch in his teens. He has been a producer, engineer, artist, remixer, label owner, tour manager, festival promoter, musicologist, entrepreneur – in fact, he’s done pretty much everything bar spending time in a laboratory or being committed to an institution for the psychologically infirm. Neil Fraser aka The Mad Professor has taken on many roles in his four decade career. Interview: Reasoning with Mad Professor in Sardinia