in keb darges own words: i ve done many a compilation in my day, mostly based around the tunes i played at my long running deep funk nights in madame jo jos. that night is no longer on the go, possibly due to a growing lack of interest on my part, (sorry). in the last few years the lost & found: nights at the club have been my real passion, and indeed little ediths and andy smiths passion too. what a marvelous era this is for good music. we may still have pure stuff like dub step: pulling in large numbers of sheep, but an equal number of youngsters are being attracted to retro, or at least retro sounding music. people tell me it is because the youth are fed up with computerized music, or men with drug problems angrily shouting at them over a dull repetitive beat, but i know lots of teenagers who have bypassed this muck all together. must be the internet that is helping kill off the demand for empty music. you no longer need to go to a retro club night, or indeed search out rare records to be exposed to good music, the internet is full of the stuff. my fifteen year old daughter is a marc bolan fan who while researching the poor fellows influences discovered chuck berry, sun records, etc, etc. i dont really know or understand why so many are at last getting into the good stuff, but they are, and it is wonderful for the likes of me.

hugh ‘redman’ james is one of the greatest jamaican music producers of the late 1980s. raised in a musical household in the west kingston slum of hannah town, with his mother a sound system selector, redman gained his initial schooling in the music business from none other than king tubby, the legendary sound system owner and dub mixer that was responsible for voicing and mixing some of the greatest reggae of all time. after being immersed in sound system culture during his youth in the 1960s and 70s, redman began sitting in on sessions at king tubby’s studio, but migrated to hartford, connecticut in 1978 in search of steady employment. returning to jamaica a few years later, he established a popular sound system in kingston and began producing music with king tubby’s assistance in 1985, working with the roots radics during a time of great uncertainty in jamaican music, as the new dancehall style came to prominence, early work featured gregory isaacs, sugar minott and frankie paul, as well as rising stars such as little john and horace martin. then, following the computerisation of dancehall, redman began producing some of the most popular music of the day, crafting durable and complex rhythms with a broad team of players that included steely and clevie, augmented by members of the browne bunch and other players. redman helped establish a number of total unknowns in this era, including carl meeks, dave bailey and wayne palmer, and became a serious contender for king jammy’s crown. but the producer was ultimately frustrated by the dramatic changes to sweep jamaican music in the early 1990s, and subsequently retreated from the music industry redman international dancehall 1985-1989 compiles the best work from his glory days, with half of the twelve vocal tracks coming complete with corresponding dub versions.

4 cd box ! selected tracks by dr. lektroluv