He may be white and British but Dave Rodigan played a crucial role in spreading the word of British reggae.I recall his shows on Radio london (ignoring Tony Williams) and he educated me in things reggae.
This CD highlights some defining tracks which eventually bought about the term Lover's Rock.Anyone with a slight interest in reggae will recognise the likes of Ruddy Thomes,Horace Andy,Barry Biggs,The Tamlins and Louisa marks.All these artists deserved international hits with the tracks on offer here.Sadly,as always, reggae has not often attracted mainstream airplay unless the record has a gimmicky hook. This set also demonstrates how the likes of Dennis Bovell added British influences on reggae music production and then the likes of Sugar Minnott took them back to Jamaica.
A great choice of cuts and a great intro to Lover's Rock.
Before the world even had a chance to hear the Modern Lovers, Jonathan Richman had already moved on. Richman founded the group in 1970 with bandmates who would go on to acts like the Cars and the Talking Heads, and in the early '70s, they recorded some truly electric demos that would help define a sound later understood as punk. These recordings wouldn't see wide-scale release until long after the first iteration of the band broke up, and by the time of Jonathan Richman & the Modern Lovers, Richman had dropped the angst and anxiety of his proto-punk beginnings in favor of a far friendlier, quieter, and more innocent style. Ironically, the 1976 debut album of Richman's revamped, gentler Modern Lovers arrived just one month before the proper release of the earlier version of the band's recordings, emphasizing how drastic of a change had occurred. While the raw excitement of the early pre-punk Modern Lovers was groundbreaking, there's an equally revelatory quality in the softness and vulnerability of what followed.
The flamboyant multicultural Swedish dance-pop group Army of Lovers formed in 1987, the brainchild of composer and producer Alexander Bard. Five years earlier Bard first emerged as a member of the short-lived trio Baard, best known for the single "Life in a Goldfish Bowl." In 1985 – in drag, no less – he led Barbie, a band also comprised of hairdresser Jean-Pierre Barda (alias Farouk), Yazmina Chantal, and model Camilla Henemark (aka Katanga); two years later, Bard, Barda, and Henemark (now performing under the name La Camilla) founded Army of Lovers, taking the name in honor of the 1970s cult movie Armee der Liebenden…
Stan Getz, Horace Silver, Jimmy Smith, Lee Morgan, Hank Mobley, Stanley Turrentine, Dexter Gordon and Earl Klugh.
Lovers Rock, the title of Sade's first album of the 21st century, could be taken on many levels. Never before has the singer infused more mainstream rock elements (prominent strummed guitars) into her music as evidenced by the first single, "By Your Side." That's not to say that she has eschewed her own tried-and-true brand of smoky, dusky ballads. The singer/songwriter is reunited with co-producer Mike Pela and musician/songwriters Andrew Hale, Stuart Matthewman, and Paul S. Denman; and Lovers Rock finds them all in fine form. "Somebody Already Broke My Heart," "Every Word," and "Lovers Rock" are vintage Sade.