I can’t help it, ultimately I’m a radio guy, and I just cant stop myself linking things. I had to summon all my boundaries of taste and decency not to stick the two tracks entitled ‘The Don’ together in one post, but I did resist. Those who know me well, will realise I’m fighting a losing battle there, and inevitably this blog will go the way of all the other foolishness I surround myself with.
Undoubtedly the record shopping highlight of my most excellent recent trip to NYC was Deadly Dragon tucked away inconspicuously at 102 Forsyth in the midst of the churning bowels of Chinatown. They’ve nailed how shopping for reggae used to be (before the interwebs and all that) with 45’s stacked from roof to ceiling, and only enough room inbetween that your larger girthed selector might be getting claustrophobic vibes. Untypically the labelling and sorting is exemplary, meaning you can head straight for your own personal ‘danger zones’ and literally feel your wallet taking a Jenny Craig crash course. Trust they have some tunes, real tunes, 1000s of ’em.
The trip to Forsyth was on the overly optimistic wishlist of a very busy trip but checking Deadly Dragon Soundsystem selector Queen Majesty, who dropped a suitably afternooned, but nonetheless scorching set, after The Naked And Famous played at Fort Fader, convinced me the trip needed to be made at any cost. With less than an hour free to rifle through the boxes and gaze in wonderment, the cost was mercifully minimal, though there was one expensive impulse purchase and a Dr Alimantado 7″ that I never knew existed, that I simply couldn’t leave behind. Those gems (and all I can say about the Alimantado is LEO SAYER cover, frighteningly brilliant or frightening and brilliant depending on your viewpoint) will be posted up sometime soon. Before that, I think yet another arm of the olfactory octopus that is Deadly Dragon needs attention, and that is their re-issue label which is hammering out classy 7″s and what have you, in limited numbers, with merciless quality control and professorial dig-ology.
Riding a sandpaper lick of ‘Sleng Teng’ Metromedia DJ Peter Metro gives it some geography lesson as he recounts his complete and utter ‘Donlyness’, and a trip to London which I think where he may have encountered UK/JA honky oddity Dominic (the next in what will be a long line of promises, will be posting up a wicked dub to a Dominic track based on ‘Watermelon Man’ with Tackheadian involvement at some point when I dig it out and digitize). Presumably he is ‘the lickle white man’ who ‘want to test mi intelligence by ask mi questions’, fortunately as Metro demonstrates he’s hot on every topic that ends with ‘an’ from capital cities right through to aliens and erosion. The track is taken from Metro’s last real notable album ‘The D.J. Don’ on Tristan Palma and Ossie Thomas’s Black Solidarity label.There’s a fearsome Tubby’s dub on the flip too but I’m not posting that because Deadly Dragon only pressed 500 of these suckers, and you’d be a sucker and a blower if you didn’t stretch out and pick one up while you can.
Score it with a click or two, and they have plenty more Metro-matical music for purchase too.
PETER METRO – THE DON
I dont know much, well anything, about Wayne Junior to be honest but what more do you need to know other than the level vibes and siren lunacy of ‘Police And Bad Boys’.You’re killing us Deadly Dragon, long may you continue to do so!
Cop it here
WAYNE JUNIOR – POLICE & BAD BOY
And by way of a bonus, a warm up for the next post and a little bit of a Sleng Teng overload here’s one we prepared earlier. It kind of fits in with the NYC vibe because when Joost ‘Dutchieman’ Langeveld and myself were holed up Big Apple studio style in the LES and Soho, early to mid 90’s, banging out tracks for the first and third Unitone HiFi albums we just possibly might have … ahem.. interpolated some trace elements of Hirini Melbourne and Richard Nunns incredible Maori music album ‘Te Ku Te Whe’ into our sonic stew. When there was talk of remixing it, we were in like Flynn, and that kind of kicked us into doing remixes and tunes again which we’d been talking about for a while. Of course, no-one mentioned not cutting up the vocals to us (until it was waaaay too late), and so we went at them like Dr Nick on a P bender. It’s not the first time we’ve summoned up the powers of the mighty Sleng Teng and raised our glasses to King Jammy, Noel Davey, Bobby Digital ( I have him on cassette talking about that fateful day at Jammy’s, somewhere from 1993, I’ll try and dig it out sometime) et al, I suspect it wont be the last, it’s like Riddim Play-Doh that demands constant re-invention.
Is havailable from right ear
HIRINI MELBOURNE & RICHARD NUNNS – TUMATAKOKIRI (UNITONE HIFI REMIX)
Finally this is a pick-up from Palms Out Sounds (who have said very nice things about Round Trip Mars and even gave us our own post so we love ’em very much) and it’s quite cute …. or quite cut, if you prefer.
KING JAMMY – UNDER MI SLENG TENG (SCHLACHTHOFTHEBRONX REMIX)
Consider yourself sleng tenged or your teng slenged….