Monday, December 7, 2009

jah stitch in time, black lamb time

Ably backed by the Aggrovators, and recorded at King Tubby's Studio in Kingston, Jamaica; this diamond studded needlepoint from Melbourne James was recorded sometime between 1975 and 1977.

It neither appears on Stitch's 1976 Third World LP release, "No Dread Can't Dead" or 1977's,"Watch Your Step Youth Man" on the same label, but can be found on the 1999 CD retrospective on Culture Press - which began operating out of Buckinghamshire, England circa 1984, compiling a series of out of print releases; originally on vinyl - and more recently on the Don Letts' 2002 EMI compilation, "Dread Meets Punk Rockers Uptown".

Produced by Bunny Lee.
Engineered by King Tubby and Prince Jammy.

JAH STITCH: BLACK HARMONY KILLER from "The Killer" CD (Culture Press) 1999 (Jamaica / UK)

5 comments:

Your driver said...

Just the way I like it.

Ramone666 said...

Stricktly rockers... great stuff.

ib said...

If I'd been forced to lay a wager on it, I'd have sworn you both would approve.

I have no idea whether this story is apocryphal - and it might also be clouded by my own memory - but I remember reading that before Paul Simonon joined the Clash he failed a number of auditions allegedly because he was unable to "keep time".

2/4, 3/4 time, that is. His natural bent was to play 4/4 rhythm with the emphasis on beat one or three ("one drop") as a result of his soaking up the Studio One sound.

Well. Maybe. Like Ed Banger, "I ain't been to no music school."

Add Jah Stitch to that list of influences. The often unsteady collision between Roots and Rock n' Roll is a joy to recall.

anto said...

i heard john peel play pablos barbwire disaster one night many yrs ago and was hooked. i sued to tape the shows in total then tape-to-tape copy the bits l liked. you can imagine the difficulties in finding/affording this music back then. Tubs is the dub organiser

ib said...

Tubs is da man, alright. I did that home taping thing with Peel, too. The same low-fi modus operandi.

C-30; C-60; C-90 GO!