Soul Jazz digs deep for a more than essential compilation and book on the roots of Dancehall. They have the knack of pulling together these deep cut compilations that perfectly slots in with a certain mood in the air. A few years ago, Big Apple Rappin’ arrived just as Jeff Chang’s roots of hip-hop book, ‘Can’t Stop Won’t Stop‘ and Buddy Esquire-like flyers stared popping up everywhere. Those flyers and others like it had been the initial jumping off point for The Boggs’ ˜Forts’ LP cover which I was in the middle of putting together when Big Apple Rappin’ came out. Now similarly, the Dancehall compilation and book have dropped while the stripped raw dance sounds of 80’s Jamaica have been holding a certain fascination. We cobbled together our ‘Undressed In Dresden’ video from a few youtube clips featuring Yellow Man, Cutty Ranks and Jossey Wales toasting. There’s something totally mental about these clips. It’s all so dark and dirty and the sounds are so vicious and obliterated and everyone’s so weirdly still. It’s punk and folk and you can feel the sweat in the room as the breathless voices race over the distorted rhythms playing out.



 
It’s actually surprising that Soul Jazz haven’t ever done a compilation quite like this before. Ska, Dub and Roots have all been stable reference points for the underground for some 30 years but somehow the sexed-up dance styles never quite broke through in the same way. Maybe it’s just the passing of time slowly slipping something into focus, but recently everyone from the likes of Santogold to LCD to The Bug have been all out appropriating and reinvigorating Dancehall beats so the time is definitely right to revisit the roots. And it doesn’t disappoint. The tracks are a healthy mix of Dancehall from late 70’s through to the early 90’s offering more than enough as a first time initiation or as a party mix.

We’re particularly fond of the ladies, Sister Nancy, Lady Ann. Listen to them and sample the rest of the tracks here.