VA - Lee Perry & Friends: Black Art From The Black Ark +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | Artist ..... : VA | | Album ...... : Lee Perry & Friends: Black Art From The Black Ark | | Year ....... : 2021 | | Label ...... : Pressure Sounds | | Cat.No ..... : PSCD 108 | | | +-------------------------------[Release Info]-------------------------------+ | | | Genre ...... : Reggae | | Tracks ..... : 18 | | Duration ... : 82:05 min | | Source ..... : CDDA | | Street Date : Jul-18-2021 | | URL ........ : www.discogs.com/release/19751272 | | | | Release Size : 144.1 MB | | Ripping Tool : EAC | | Encoder .... : Lame 3.100 -V0 | | Quality .... : VBRkbps / 44,1kHz / Joint-Stereo | | Rip Date ... : Sep-26-2021 | | | +--------------------------------[Track List]--------------------------------+ | | | 01. Junior Murvin - Roots Train 03:58 | | (Previously Unreleased Dubplate Mix) | | 02. Jimmy Riley - Woman Gotta Have Love 03:26 | | (Previously Unreleased Dubplate Mix) | | 03. The Upsetters - Set Up Yourself 03:42 | | 04. Henrick Nicholson - Brotherly Love (12" Mix) 05:05 | | 05. Junior Murvin - Let's Fall In Love 03:38 | | 06. Eric Donaldson - Say A Little Prayer (12" Mix) 08:04 | | 07. Jimmy Riley - I Never Had It So Good 02:39 | | 08. Junior Murvin - Mister Craven 03:09 | | 09. Lord Creator - Such Is Life (12" Mix) 04:50 | | 10. The Upsetters - Such Is Life Version 05:07 | | 11. Danny Clarke - Nuh Fi Run It Down 03:45 | | 12. The Upsetters - Nuh Fi Run It Down Version 04:29 | | 13. Lee Perry - What A Sin (Extended Mix) 06:58 | | 14. Bobby Ellis - Ska Baby 03:09 | | 15. The Upsetters - Ska Version 03:15 | | 16. The Upsetters - Beard Man Shuffle 07:13 | | 17. Bree Daniels - Oh Me Oh My 04:49 | | 18. The Upsetters - Oh Me Oh Dub 04:49 | | ----- | | Total: 82:05 | | | +-------------------------------[Release Notes]------------------------------+ | | | A quick internet search brings up some extraordinary footage of Lee | | 'Scratch' Perry producing a session at the Black Ark. Taken from the | | film "Roots Rock Reggae", directed by Jeremy Marre, the sequence shows | | Junior Murvin collaborating with members of the Congos and the | | Heptones on a song improvised on the spot for the film crew. Before | | the vocals are recorded, the Upsetters lay down the backing track. The | | musical director of the session is the afro-haired bass player, Boris | | Gardiner unusually it is he who counts in the band to start each take. | | After a long conversation with Boris a few years back, I asked Lee | | about his contribution to the Black Ark sound. | | | | Lee Perry: "Boris Gardiner was a good person just a humble person, and | | he's the best person I ever met in the music business so far. Boris is | | a very top musician, and with him you could put anything together, him | | do "Police And Thieves" and all that. You just tell him what you want | | and him can do it. A very great person." | | | | Boris is probably best remembered today for his huge international hit | | from 1986, the schmaltzy "I Want To Wake Up With You". Yet in the 60's | | and 70's he was one of Jamaica's top bass players and arrangers having | | an international hit with "Elizabethan Reggae", and creating a run of | | classic tunes at Studio One. | | | | Boris Gardiner: "I did at least seventy or eighty songs at Studio One, | | all in this one short period between January and April 1968. And we | | used to work four days per week, and we did four rhythms per day for | | 30 pounds a week -it was good money. I played on songs like "Feel Like | | Jumping", "Nanny Goat", "Baby Why" by the Cables, the whole ôHeptones | | On Top" album, and "Party Time". Lee Perry used to be at Studio One | | same time as me, kind of working around, so he know me from there. So | | he came and roped me into the group when the Black Ark studio was in | | progress. He built it right there at the back of his home. So Scratch | | called me and asked me to come and do some sessions around his studio. | | I was always ahead of my time as I can see it in the music in Jamaica. | | So the songs that I made you always hear chord progressions and | | changes. Sometimes I think it's as if I was born in the wrong country, | | because I just couldn't do a two chord tune ûheheh! To me it need more | | than two chords to give it some excitement, like it need some changes | | or something." | | | | After years of moving between Jamaica's competing facilities Perry had | | decided to build his own studio at the back of his house in Washington | | Gardens. | | | | Lee Perry: "The Black Ark make over a pile of shit ûmy pile and me put | | it under the Black Ark. I make the Black Ark over my shit piss, so the | | bass always go 'Poo Poo Poo Poo'! Errol Thompson put the machines in | | there and make the patch panel. So the studio was all waiting but only | | me could operate it. I didn't have the Soundcraft mixer then I did buy | | a lickle thing you call a Alice mixer. We didn't have anything | | professional, but the sound was in my head and I was going to get down | | what I hear in my head. And it's like a toy, a toy affair, that's the | | way music is. You see like when you buy a kid's toy, well you bring a | | joy to them, so is that way I see music. I donÆt see music like how | | other people see it, I see it just like a toy." | | | | Unusually, Lee decided to do everything himself, both producing and | | engineering.The film clip shows Lee fully relaxed as he simultaneously | | directs the musicians and adjusts his recording machines. | | | | Boris Gardiner: "To me Scratch always knew what he wanted. Out of all | | of them Scratch was a true producer, because he would be in the studio | | and he would listen and say change this or I donÆt like that, and he | | was his own engineer also, so he was always around there listening. So | | he knew what he wanted and how to try and get it from the start unlike | | Coxsone Dodd or Duke Reid who knew what they liked or didn't like only | | after they heard it. Scratch was in there with everybody, so he is | | really doing a full production as a true producer." | | | | Lee Perry: "I used to do them all by myself. Anybody in my studio | | could sit down in the visitor's chair and look, but me do everything - | | me have a chair that can move from here to there, a chair that have | | wheels. So I could be turning in any area or any direction, so I could | | have my hand over here and my hand over there. Heh heh." | | | | And at a time when 8 and 16 track recording had become the norm in | | most high end studios, Lee recorded everything to a semi-professional | | TEAC 4 track recorder, which he can be seen casually adjusting with a | | screwdriver in the film clip. He explained that since he would end up | | mixing down to a stereo (or two track) master, more tracks would just | | be a distraction. | | | | Lee Perry: "It was not a professional tape recorder, I was using those | | TEAC 4track set that they was trying like experiment to see what would | | happen. Well, I have it all set up. The first thing I'd think about, | | all right, is you have to mix everything back down to the 2 track | | stereo or 1track mono. Then you can press it and release it. So I knew | | what I wanted at the end and I balance it just like that in the studio | | with the instruments. Sometime when you put only four or five | | instrument in the studio, you have a better, cleaner record, you can | | hear what everybody play. And if you have maybe eight musician in the | | studio, it's more like a confusion, because everybody wants to play a | | different thing, yunno. If you is the producer and you can tell them | | what you want to hear it will be better. So I can put the bass and | | drum together on one track because me know exactly what me need. If | | you don't know, then you need more tracks so you can balance it later. | | So for the backing, I would just do the two tracks: the bass and drum | | and percussion track, that is one; and the guitar, organ and piano on | | another track, that is two. So you still have two more tracks if you | | want to do vocal that would be three. And if you want to do horns or a | | harmony vocal, you can do that on the fourth track. To me itÆs a waste | | of time, a waste of energy with a 24 track machine, waste of current | | and waste of money. Because it all have to come down to one or two | | tracks in the end." | | | | The early Black Ark sound was stripped down and minimal, often with | | only one or two musicians playing keyboard or guitar. Lee would also | | use extreme EQ to emphasize the bass and tops, and his hi-hat sound is | | instantly recognisable from the earliest days of the Ark. | | | | Lee Perry: "Well, I used to have an equaliser for the bass drum, and | | it's like for heaviness on the beat, and then I had another equaliser | | for the cymbal, to give it that 'Ssshhh ssshhh'. So we have different | | machine to send different instrument through that they can sound | | different. I managed to change the vibration of the music, because the | | music was just local music produced by rum drinkers and cannibals. So | | me turn on the music to a higher range." | | | | Boris Gardiner: "I think I always use a DI box to record bass at the | | Black Ark. Because bass want to fade into the other instruments' | | microphone, so we often plug it straight into the board and then Perry | | sets the EQ on the board and take it straight. Then we built a drum | | booth so the drums really sound separate too it give him more control" | | | | As the Black Ark evolved, Lee developed a richer collage of sound, | | built around 3 primary effects: the Mu-tron Bi-Phase phaser, a spring | | reverb and a Roland Space Echo. | | | | Boris Gardiner: "One thing about Scratch was that he always used his | | effects û that was his sound. He always phase the ska guitar, but you | | don't always know he's recording it like that until he play it back. | | So until he play it back you have no idea what it will sound like." | | | | Lee Perry: "I did have a phaser that I buy, and then when I'm in the | | studio, in the machine room, and phasing them the musicians don't hear | | it, what I am doing, until them come in the studio, and them hear the | | phasing. So we did it all live. And the musicians they won't even know | | what goes on! While the musicians are playing, I am doing the phasing. | | I take the musician from the earth into space, and bring them back | | before they could realize, and put them back on the planet earth. The | | phaser was making things different, like giving you a vision of space | | and creating a different brain a phasing brain. So that's where I take | | the music out of the local system and take it into space. The Space | | Echo also have something to do with the brain. You send out telepathic | | message and it return to you, so that's how the Roland Space Echo | | chamber come in - what you send comes back to you. And while you know | | you send the telegrams out, you are waiting for what is the reply of | | the telegrams coming back. So that's why the Space Echo go and come, | | rewinding the brain and forward winding the brain. I was also using a | | spring echo chamber, but just for drum, for the clash of the drum. And | | everything just fit in, like the thing I want to do it just come to me | | and come from nowhere, and then it appear and it happen." | | | | Boris Gardiner: "He loved to do things that nobody had done before him | | always try a new thing. And he was a good writer too you know. Perry | | bring in a drum machine sometimes and we use that on some songs for | | the Congos and everyone. Well I actually like playing with a drum | | machine cos a drum machine is always steady. Most drummers they either | | push forward or pull back ûthey call it the human touch, but I call it | | out of time! Hahaha. "Row Fisherman Row" was really the great hit with | | the Congos, but that is all real drums and percussion, it's just that | | Perry makes it sound almost like a machine with his echoes on the | | percussion. I played on "Police and Thieves" and that was a big hit | | too, maybe it was Sly Dunbar on that. One day Bob Marley came to him | | with a song on a tape and said "boy Perry I don't really like the bass | | and drum on this song here, if you can do anything to it then just | | change it and see if we can get something better". Well Perry had only | | 4track tape at his studio, but this was a 24track tape that Bob bring. | | So Perry called me and Mikey Boo and took us down to Joe Gibbs studio | | and started playing the rhythm and all that on the 24 track. So I was | | on bass and Mikey Boo was on drums and we listen and we listen, and | | then we dub it back over to make new drum and bass. Well that song | | became "Punky Reggae Party", so that shows you how Bob trusted Perry." | | | | Lee's other great innovation was adding layers of sound effects, | | sometimes live through an open mic, but often pre-recorded onto a | | cassette tape which he would add to the collage on mixdown. Because | | these effects - bells, cymbals, animal noises, dialogue from the TV û | | were not synched to the music, they would add a layer of randomness to | | the sound. | | | | Lee Perry: "You know cassette? I make cassette with sound track, and | | all those things with cymbal licking, flashing. In my Black Ark studio | | if you listen the cymbal was high like 'Ssshhh ssshhh'. But I did have | | them all recording on cassette, and while I was running the track and | | it was taking the musician from the studio, I was playing the cassette | | to balance with the drum cymbals and things like that, so them didn't | | have to play that because it was already on cassette playing. You | | could call that sampling. And I have this 'Mooooow', like the cow, | | running on the cassette, and it go onto the track that I wanted to | | sound like that. Somebody discover it in a toilet. You know when the | | toilet paper is finished and you have the roll, and the hole that come | | in the middle. Well you put it to your mouth and say 'Hoooooo', and it | | sound like a cow. You put it to your mouth and you imitating a cow and | | say 'Moooooo'. Heh heh heh. Yeah, sound sampling. Well somebody had to | | start it, and we was loving to do those things." | | | | Boris Gardiner: "Well the Black Ark did have a strong vibe, but, once | | everybody all there, most of those guys who smoke really like it, but | | those who didn't smoke didn't really like it, like myself. Scratch is | | a man who never joke fi draw him herbs, you know? Heheh. But I am not | | a smoker cos it's not good for my heart. I have a heart problem called | | tachycardia, an irregular beat of the heart. So it could be upsetting | | at times when there's so much smoking going on." | | | | By the late 70s the relaxed atmosphere at the Black Ark had soured, as | | Lee attempted to extricate himself from various outside pressures, and | | his behaviour became more erratic. | | | | Lee Perry: "What happened I did for myself not to be working with jinx | | and duppy called dread. And those duppies they think that me owe them | | favour. I open the door, and the duppies them find that me is the door | | opener, and then the duppies them take shape inna me yard and inna me | | house and they were a jinx. Jinx mean bad luck. So to get rid of them, | | me had to burn down the Black Ark studio fi get rid of jinx." | | | | Boris Gardiner: "Was Scratch crazy? Well some say now that he was just | | putting on an act. But I think, why did he put it on? After all the | | problems he was having and that sort of thing, and they were saying | | that he was getting off his head, and he start to act strange, well I | | just stopped going. I stopped working there. It wasn't a good | | atmosphere nobody could really enjoy that again. So I called it a day. | | It is sad after all the good work we did. But when you try to be smart | | and try to outsmart others, well it don't work out for long with you. | | He came and did a show here in Jamaica the other day, but I didn't | | really know Lee Perry as a singer.He won the Grammy not long ago but I | | find it surprising that he got a Grammy as a performer not a producer. | | He's been very lucky: now he is successful in a sense and some people | | love him cos he's a character, and they don't see nobody dressed like | | that. Hahahah!" | | | | Speaking to Lee in February 2021, via WhatsApp to Jamaica, he sounded | | relaxed and positive, with more praise for Boris and optimism for the | | future. | | | | Lee Perry: "Boris Gardiner was very good, very great in the brain. He | | really intelligent in music, and me and him work miracle together! And | | remember that there was no end to the Black Ark, the Black Ark will be | | coming back. The Black Ark keep on living and cannot die." | | | +----------------------------------------------------------------------------+