all quiet on this front

Little to report over the last few days and so it continues. I picked up the new double viny; a;bum release from SoulJazz Records. It's titled 'Mojo Rocksteady Beat' and its by Sound Dimension. For those of you not versed in the way of the reggae music, Sound Dimension , were the Studio 1 backing band and featured some of reggaes heavyweights of the period. Amongst its ranks were Jackie Mittoo (can't believe he has a MySpace) and Ernest Ranglin (or this guy). Between the lot of them they produced some of reggaes' most famous riddims, a lot of which are still being used today. Upon listening to the album its surprising how many of them I have as versions by other reggae artists. The album is great, perfect rocksteady reggae that everyone can enjoy except for those people who 'don't get' reggae. Well those people can bugger off if they're not getting it. They're probably busy buying tickets for Eric Clapton and talking about tracker mortgages. If on the other hand you have even the slightest leaning towards reggae music then you should take the leap and buy this. If you don't own any reggae you could do much worse than to buy this as your sonic equivalent of the 'Lonely Planet Guide to Jamaica'.

I also found a peculiar 10" on the 'Funky Forty Fives' label. That's a stupid name if they're doing releases on 10" but that's another topic altogether. It features 'Soul Bossa Nova' the hugely recognisable Quincy Jones (winner of no less than 27 Grammys, nearly as many as The Chiefatins ;0) tune that's been sampled to death. You might not know what its called but you've heard this record before. On the b-side is Green Onions by Booker T & The MG's (1 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award) who like Sound Dimension above were actually a studio band. In their case they used to do a lot of the backing recordings for the Stax label. This version doesn't sound exactly like the original version and it doesn't say that its actually by Booker T on the vinyl so I'm a little suspect about that. Anyhow, they're both top tunes and it throws in Peggy Lee's version of 'Dock of the Bay' for good measure.