| BASS
CULTURE is LKJ's third (and some would say
last) collection of spoken poems over
stricktly heavyweight Roots Reggae DUB
music. Again, eight crucial riddims
especially created to accompany Linton's
deep voice.
LKJ can be regarded as the godfather of
DUB Poetry. Where ones like Mutabaruka and
Oku Onuora took the genre further and
expressed their faith as Rastafarians, LKJ
is not a Rasta. He's not anti-Rasta, either.
He is a born Jamaican, who came to the UK in
the 1960's. There he joined the Black
Panthers and started working with a group of
musicians called Rasta Love. In the 1970's,
he released a collection of poems and a
movie with the title Dread Beat an' Blood,
which also became the title of his debute
album.
LKJ deals with consciousness. His poems
are about some thing. About being Black in
Britain. In the time when the poetry was
written and the music released, the
situation was -and still is- very tense in
Europe and the UK when it comes to racism
and discrimination.
That's why LKJ should be heard. Although
his poetry is intelectual, you do not have
to be a professor in order to overstand just
what LKJ is saying. He is telling it like it
is, and even after 25+ years, there's still
not one single word obsolete.
The same thing can be said about the
music as well.
Together with Dennis Bovell, LKJ has set
the standard for DUB poetry. Dread Beat an'
Blood, Forces of Vicktry and now this third
one called BASS CULTURE are all high quality
recordings and the music is striktly
heavyweight Roots Reggae.
If you care for crucial Reggae, if you
want your collection to have crucial
releases that had an impact, you just can't
afford not to have at least one LKJ
album.
One final detail, which may be
interesting to know: it was LKJ who got the
webmaster of this website into Reggae, back
in the early 1980's. So it is obvious, the
Dubroom highly and deeply recommends Linton
Kwesie Johnson, especially his first albums.
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