Remixology: Tracing the Dub Diaspora

by Paul Sullivan

Dub is the avant-garde verso of reggae, created by manipulating and reshaping recordings using studio strategies and techniques. While dub was one of the first forms of popular music to turn the idea of song inside out, it is far from being fully explored. Tracing the evolution of dub, Remixology travels from Kingston, Jamaica, across the globe, following dub’s influence on the development of the MC, the birth of sound system culture, and the postwar Jamaican diaspora.
 

Starting in 1970s Kingston, Paul Sullivan examines the origins of dub as a genre, approach, and attitude. He stops off in London, Berlin, Toronto, Bristol, and New York, exploring those places where dub had the most impact and investigates its effect on postpunk, dub-techno, jungle, and the dubstep. Along the way, Sullivan speaks with a host of international musicians, DJs, and luminaries of the dub world, from DJ Spooky, Adrian Sherwood, Channel, and Roy to Shut Up and Dance and Roots Manuva. Wide-ranging and lucid, Remixology sheds new light on the dub-born notions of remix and reinterpretation that set the stage for the music of the twenty-first century.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction

264 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Aloke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very thorough history of dub’s many permutations. The discography is probably worth the price alone. The writing isn’t great but does the job.

For reggae and dub fans also check out this playlist I made from the discography in the book Exodus: Heirs and Pioneers, Rastafaria Return to Ethiopia (and check out my review of this book too!)

Repatriation Reggae:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0Ds...

[Travis Miller · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like many music history books, this one often feels like a laundry list of musicians, labels, and venues – but it did give me a deeper understanding for the overall shape of the incredibly diverse and influential phenomenon that we call "dub".

Of course, it covers the genre's origins in Kingston in the 1960s and 70s. It goes on to explore dub's various offshoots – its interactions with hip-hop in NYC, the distinctively British scene that arose in Bristol and London (including its crossover with white punk rock), the various genres that it influenced via the UK acid house scene (UK garage; grime; trip-hop; dubstep), the birth of dub techno in Berlin, and Canadian dub poetry (which I knew almost nothing about before).

If nothing else, it's a good way to find artists to check out. A worthwhile read, if you're into the genre. (Is it even a genre, though? As this history demonstrates, the term "dub" – like the related term "ambient" – is more of a spirit than a single, clearly definable sound.)

[Stevejreviews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dub just may be the music world’s greatest accident. In 1968, Kingston, Jamaica sound system operator Ruddy Redwood went to cut a one-off dubplate and engineer Byron Smith accidentally left the vocal track. However, Redwood kept the dubplate and played it at his next dance, with his deejay toasting over the rhythm and it was, of course, a wild success. But this book is not a history of Jamaican dub. Not even close. Rather, it is a history of the reverberations and explorations that followed. You can read my review in its' entirety at allmusicbooksdotcom, but this is an excellent and detailed account of the various “versions” of dub. This book will likely send you, as it did me, to the time/space continuum that is the internet, searching for sound clips to further inform and enhance the trip. Enjoy.

[Foivos · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book for the genre's fans. As previously mentioned, worth it mainly for the discography, rather than for the story telling.