Search - Bill Laswell :: Trojan Dub Massive: Chapter One

Laswell+ old school= classic dub, psychonavigated

yajdubuddah | cheboygan,michigan usa | 05/29/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"for fans of the original music here dont be afraid these are not complete reworkings of these songs but a mer glimpse into what the future of recording has provided. Their is no bass playing of laswell or added members to the session, just laswells beautifle filtering echoeing and blipps ocassinally from time to time some more strong in others some almost unnoticable to those unfamiliar to the original. The songs sceem to go almost in order from oldest to newest or so as it sceems. Chapter 1 definetelly sceems to be older and deffinetelly has less of laswell's digital tough. The recording also are still verry original sounding verry raw but remastered as best as they can at turtle tone. In saying that i do prefer chapter 2 to 1 the songs are better flowed better technology more effects and more integrated style. And song 11 sounds ecatelly like laswell is playing bass. 14 on chapter 2 will also blow your mind. Their are also a lot more dub vocal bits, while chapter 2 is vurtually vocal less. i cant help it i enjoy what technology has brought us in the now, everything is so much clearer and digital effects and sound such as keyborads have become 100% more efficient and reliable. but i do always respect what the past has brought us but i dont live in the past i learn from it and strive foreward. dont be afraid of the future.

For a tiny island of three million people Jamaica has had a thoroughly disproportionate effect on the course of popular music around the world; dub, re-mixes, electronic effects and especially notable nowadays-rap music all began in Jamaica... (Chris Blackwell's introduction to Reggae Explosion: The Story of Jamaican Music)



Born out of the need to create a B side without doing more recording, dub arrived as version, effects added, vocals removed and delayed with bass and drums pushed hard to the front. The birth of an alien music, where the distinction between played instruments and sound effects collapse in a stream of sonic matter... the evolution continues, transported from the mighty Trojan catalog and re channeled by producer/musician Bill Laswell. TROJAN: DUB MASSIVE (CHAPTERS ONE and TWO) take on new dimensions in sound, mythic personages abound, with electronic effects pushed to the limit, detonated rhythms exploding into vapor space, haunted bass lines pulsing and swelling to the point of spilling out over the music, detailed layers of malfunctioning circuits flicker in waves of relentless attack, all elements fused and coiled for ascension, leaving the earth without leaving the roots... Ritual-Audio Culture... An African sci-fi myth-system, the soundtrack for interplanetary escape, postindustrial design at it's most dangerous. it's clearly Bill Laswell's presence that gives this project it's obvious differences- the size, the detail, the pure sonic impact of the sound-scape. A pioneer of re-mix culture and veteran of over seven hundred recording projects. he has been closely connected to the world of dub simulations from his beginning, creating his own dub sampling CD in the nineties (Sound Virus- Dub Tactic Manual). He has shared a close working relationship with Jamaican rhythm engine -Sly and Robbie for twenty years. he's created Yellowman's `Strong Me Strong', the first bass heavy Jamaican track to fully incorporate current (1983) studio technology and made Dub Meltdown with Root's Radic's drummer Style Scott for Brooklyn's Word Sound Imprint. He has worked with Chris Blackwell (Island, Bob Marley, U2) since the early eighties, together they created the AXIOM imprint through Island records in 1989.



Bill Laswell- the first and so far on the only producer/re-director to take on full length album reconstructions by major artist on major labels... MILES DAVIS: PANTHALASSA, BOB MARLEY: DREAMS OF FREEDOM, CARLOS SANTANNA: DIVINE LIGHT, with incoming-Sony classical mix-translation and HERBIE HANCOCK: TECHNOVOODUASTRAL BLACK SIMULATIONS. Endless re mixes and re-constructions have been realized, many baring the mark of dub. TROJAN DUB MASSIVE is an other worldly music, full of mystery and tension, surprise, dark and light, futuristic technologies/tribal culture, the ultimate science fiction soundtrack.



In fact science fiction as already recognized and incorporated dub's dark sensibility... example - ... As they worked, case gradually became aware of the music that pulsed constantly through the cluster. it was called dub, a sensuous mosaic cooked from the vast libraries of digitized pop; It was worship, Molly said and a sense of community.... (Neuromancer by William Gibson)



When the lost tribes gathered on the hilltop, where knowledge is born, they found others like them who had already heeded the call. It was the trembling of the ground that brought them all there, and entering upon the source, they bathed in the glory of the mighty sound...(The Book of Dub Chapter 2, verse 30-32).

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