Title
Artist
Label
Format
Date

 Dub Like Dirt 1975 - 1977
King Tubby & Friends
Blood & Fire
CD
12-05-1999

Track list
  1. Tubby Get Smart
  2. Guidance Dub
  3. Chapter Of Money
  4. Bag A Wire Dub
  5. Dub Ites Green & Gold
  6. Stealing Version
  7. Beat Them In Dub
  8. Thunder Rock
  9. How Long Dub
  10. Dub Investigation
  11. Sly Want Dub
  12. Everybody Needs Dub
  13. Horn For I
  14. Six Million Dollar Version
  15. Dub Is My Occupation
  16. Fatter Dub
Rating : from 5 (excellent) to 1 (poor)
Vocals : - Backing : 5 Production : 5 Sound quality : 4/5 Sleeve : 5
Dub Like Dirt is the latest release of the esteemed reissue label Blood & Fire and collects 16 dub tracks from the vaults of veteran producer Bunny 'Striker' Lee. All tracks were recorded in the period 1975 - 1977 and mixed by the likes of King Tubby, Philip Smart, Pat Kelly and Prince Jammy. The band -The Aggrovators- included fine musicians such as Sly Dunbar, Santa Davis (drums), Robbie Shakespeare, Lloyd Parks (bass), Chinna Smith, Bo Pee, Tony Chin (guitar), Ansell Collins, Jackie Mittoo, Winston Wright, Tarzan Nelson, Ossie Hibbert (keyboards), Bobby Ellis, Vin Gordon (horns), Skully, Sticky, Barnabas (percussion).
Guidance Dub and Chapter of Money are the dubs to the Horace Andy songs 'Guiding Star' -originally done by The Heptones at Studio One- and 'Money Money'. Tubby Get Smart is the dub piece to Leroy Smart's 'Get Smart'. Johnny Clarke's version of The Mighty Diamonds' classic 'Them Never Love Poor Marcus' gets the the Tubby treatment on Bag A Wire Dub.
Reggae veteran John Holt recorded several versions of 'Stealing' and Johnny Clarke's version is used here by Philip Smart to produce an echo and reverb drenched dub track, Stealing Version. The loop of 'Stealing' resurfaced in 1998 and provided the basis for several excellent Xterminator cuts (Mikey General, Luciano).
One of the best Pat Kelly's songs -How Long- provides the basis for How Long Dub mixed by the vocalist himself in 1976. Six Million Dollar Man is an instrumental dubbed up by Prince Jammy. It's a version of Dennis Alcapone's 'Six million Dollar Man', itself a reworking of Alton Ellis' Studio One' hit 'Breaking Up'.
The disc closes with a Prince Jammy dub to Jackie Mittoo's 1976 version of his 'Ram Jam' instrumental. The original vocal cut -Fatty Fatty- was done by The Heptones for Coxsone Dodd at Studio One.
The set is presented in the usual fine style with some pictures of Bunny Lee and a cover shot of his tape storage system. Dub Like Dirt is pure class..riddim galore !