Mojo Rocksteady Beat: Soul Jazz Presents
Mojo Rocksteady Beat: Soul Jazz Presents
Customer Review: A vast improvement over volume I but still with reservations…….
This is basically Volume 2 of Soul Jazz’s “Jamaica Soul Shake” compilation concentrating on the seminal Studio One house-band, ‘The Sound Dimension’ that was extant in the ‘67-’70 time period. Volume 1 was a distinctly underwhelming experience due to too few really classic tracks (”Baby Face”, “Full Up”, “Bitter Blood”) being diluted by too many middling to poor tracks, particularly in the second half where things really took a turn for the worse. Volume 2 I am glad to say is a massive improvement with numerous all-time classics (”Rockfort Rock”, “Real Rock”, “Heavy Rock”, “Park View”, “Drum Song”, etc) being interspersed with strong “filler” tracks which whilst not all deathless classics (though there ARE a few; eg. “Ironside”, “Mojo Rocksteady”) are strong. I’d say there are only one or two genuinely subpar tracks on this CD as opposed to ten or so on Volume 1 (yes, it was that bad!). Well that’s the upside, what about the downside? Well it has to be said that the REAL top drawer tracks on this CD have almost all been issued by Soul Jazz before which means that almost a quarter of this CD has been regurgitated from earlier releases. This is pretty disappointing considering the depth of the Studio One catalogue and gives a misleading impression of having to ’scrape the barrel’ or ‘pad out’ themed compilations of this type. I simply think that Soul Jazz’s sequence of themed Studio One compilations might have run their course, at least for a time since fatigue has definitely set in, and in future they should concentrate on single artist compilations for the numerous classic acts that have been under-anthologised in their compilations in favour of sometimes “rare for rarity’s sake” artists. Just a few of the classic acts that have barely had a look-in in Soul Jazz’s Studio One compilations include “The Gladiators”, “The Wailing Souls”, “Horace Andy”, “Larry Marshall” and to a lesser extent the great “Alton Ellis” all of which could easily fill out a 70 minute CD with top-notch material without breaking a sweat.
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I’ve been listening to blues pretty much since I was born, in ‘77, and playing guitar in blues bands since I was 15. My father is also a blues muso, and more recently a blues DJ Read more..
