CD REVIEW: VARIOUS ARTISTS, JONNY GREENWOOD IS THE CONTROLLER
Apr 17, 2007 2:22 PM Bill Murphy (Writer)
Radiohead guitarist gets in touch with version roots
With so many dub and reggae reissues flooding the bins on both sides of the Atlantic, very often what separates the wheat from the chaff is the funky obscurity of the tracks in question. Jonny Greenwood—well-known to readers here as lead guitarist for Radiohead (and brother to bassist Colin Greenwood)—confesses "panic at not feeling qualified" to assemble a compilation for the famed Trojan label, but he needn't have worried.
Greenwood should be commended for his discerning ear, especially for such choices as Lee "Scratch" Perry's "Black Panta" (which opened the 1973 breakthrough classic Blackboard Jungle Dub) and Johnny Clarke's obscure "Ruffer Version" (mixed in 1976 by King Tubby). The same holds true for his taste in the soul-influenced rock-steady numbers—Desmond Dekker's "Beautiful and Dangerous" and Delroy Wilson's "This Life Makes Me Wonder" among them—that he sprinkles throughout this kaleidoscopic snapshot of some of the quirkiest nuggets from Jamaica's 4-track studio heyday.
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