V/A: Soul Jazz Records Presents Studio One Classics (2LP, blue vinyl) [SOUL JAZZ RECORDS]

Why you'll love it

This limited 2LP set on blue vinyl revisits one of Soul Jazz's best-loved compilations, marking 25 years of the label working with Studio One. It runs from The Wailers' "Simmer Down" to The Heptones, Horace Andy and Sugar Minott.

This edition

• 2LP set
• Blue vinyl
• Limited edition

About the album

If Jamaican music has a family home, it's 13 Brentford Road in Kingston, where Clement "Coxsone" Dodd ran Studio One. From the early 1960s onward his studio and label carried the island's sound through ska, rocksteady, roots reggae and into dancehall, and London's Soul Jazz Records has spent a quarter of a century bringing that archive to the rest of us under exclusive licence.

This set draws on more than four decades of recordings and sequences them tightly. A young Bob Marley leads The Wailers through "Simmer Down," Don Drummond's trombone and the studio's in-house players carry the instrumentals, The Heptones bring their sweet harmonies, Horace Andy floats in that unmistakable falsetto, and Sugar Minott and Prince Jazzbo carry the story on through the 70s. "Love Me Forever," "Rougher Yet," "Fever," "I'm Just a Guy" and "Confucious" are among the highlights, and "Rockfort Rock" and "Full Up" are the kind of riddims that have been versioned more times than anyone can count.

It works as a front door for newcomers and a well-sequenced party record for anyone who already knows the names. Soul Jazz's Pierce Smith produced the reissue, and Dodd's riddims are so endlessly recycled that hearing the originals feels a bit like meeting the grandparents of half your record collection.

Also at Kops: more Studio One on vinyl · browse Reggae & Caribbean

Tracklist

Listen

On Soul Jazz Records (cat# SJRLP96C2).