A shockingly brilliant collection of Lee Perry singles
db | portland, oregon | 12/19/1998
(5 out of 5 stars)
"This collection of singles from 1969 is a stunner. This collection contains A & B-sides--the first 50 "Upsetter" releases Perry put out through Trojan Records in the UK. Particularly shocking is that this collection represents less than 1/4 of his singles output over 3 years. The set contains a pretty thorough booklet that provides not only a "history" of Lee Perry, but also information on each of the tracks included in the set. These tracks are pretty upbeat by dub standards. There are some rude songs, a cover of "hello dolly" and a real strong 60s soul influence. Lots of harmonies--beautiful stuff."
Good stuff, but not the best
Scott McFarland (scottmcf@erols.com | Virginia, US | 08/31/1999
(4 out of 5 stars)
"If you're familiar with the Lee Perry releases in print already which covered this era, they did a good job of picking out the best stuff from this era. "The Upsetter Collection" picked out the best of the killer Upsetter instrumentals, and a lot of the better vocal numbers might be familiar to you already also ("Check Him Out" from the Upsetter Collection, "Pound Get A Blow" and "No Bread and Butter" from Shocks of Mighty). Which is not to say there's not some other great material on here. David Isaac's "Good Father" and Pat Satchmo's "Hello Dolly" are a nice couple of tracks for example. But I think Perry's recording technique was really starting to flourish during the next collection (Volume 2), and I would definitely recommend getting that collection first. Taken on its own merits (without regard to how much of this material the average Perry fan already has), this is a good collection with some nicely groovy instrumentals on it and a few classic tracks."
Track Listings (25) - Disc #1
