Brothers

Junior Delgado (DEB Music)

An enormous amount of vintage reggae music is currently being re-released and this seems unlikely to stop. This is indeed welcome news for fans and artists alike. But even the most avid reggae fan might be forgiven for thinking, just once in a while, that there's simply too much to choose from. So, suffering from reissue fatigue? Bewildered by the sheer amount of music out there? Then buy this album if you buy nothing else.

Junior Delgado's Brothers is a genuine gem from the vaults that reggae fans will overlook at their peril.

Badda Music, who are engaged in an extensive reissue programme of music from the DEB and D-Roy labels, have found the master tapes of the very first album, catalogue no. BEBLP01, produced by DEB Music back in 1977. So, not only is Brothers the very first album on the DEB label but the very first Junior Delgado album, recorded when Junior Delgado was just 19 years old.

Where to start with the delights on Brothers? The great Sly & Robbie in fine style? The incredible array of musicians involved? 22 are credited all told on the sleeve notes. Apart from Sly & Robbie themselves. they include Earl 'Chinna' Smith, Lloyd Parks, Cedric 'Im' Brooks, Ansel Collins, Winston Wright, 'Bubbler' Waul, too many to list in this review. The drum and bass mix is sparse and crisp, despite the talent that must have crowded these tiny studios to the door. Studio- or rather the Joe Gibbs, Channel One and Harry J studios all mentioned here- must definitely have been kinda cloudy for these sessions. All told, this is a dark and doomy slice of prime 1977 drum and bass.

The opening track is Magic At Night. Previously unreleased, for me this is the stand out tune and makes the album worth buying on the strength of this alone. Over a moody, insistent Robbie Shakespeare bassline and ethereal organ licks, gravel-voiced Delgado offers his girl some unmissable night magic in uncharacteristically sweet and beguiling tones. For those who know Junior Delgado only as a man with a voice that can split rocks, this tune will be a real revelation.

The Half is Delgado's own version of the Dennis Brown foundation tune, originally released as a DEB 7". Delgado sets his own stamp on the wistful and plaintive original, giving it an edgy and direct militancy all of his own. While Delgado and Brown actually duet elsewhere on this album, for me it is this tune that most evokes the untimely deaths of both men, Dennis Brown at 49 and Delgado himself at 47.

Don't Study Wrong is present in two versions on this album, the second featuring Dennis Brown himself. The Sly and Robbie powerhouse is much to the fore here, propelling both vocals along in steppers style. Love Won't Come Easy is of course the old Heptones classic revisited, here in deep and doomy style on the same Studio One Frozen Soul rhythm.

Tonight is another classic, this time the Keith & Tex rocksteady anthem given an uptempo driving shot in the arm in inimitable style from the Sly & Robbie rhythm section. Hot on its heels comes the version, Tonight Dub. This thunderous drum & bass lick from Prince Jammy boasts an echoed spoken introduction from the man himself. Those who know his classic dub album from the same period, Jammies In Lion Dub Style, will know how this one runs.

Armed Robbery came out as a 7" on the JA Crazy Joe label and in the UK on DEB in 1978 and therefore the year after this album was made. However the album track is a very different mix to the single, without the guitar intro and rather intrusive falsetto organ. Altogether a sparser and leaner affair than the 45, the album also boasts a brusque 'one,two..' spoken intro which further emphasises its rough and ready stance.

Together is for me the other real stand out track on this album. It features Dennis Brown over the classic Studio One Real Rock rhythm, complete with those jagged Jackie Mittoo organ riffs that come out at you like a left right combination. Dennis Brown exhorts his listeners to walk with Jah, stop the fussing and fighting, brothers, and heed his advice that it's time to unite, singing out his righteous anti violence lyric is sung in exuberant semi improvised style, beginning and ending on the word' 'brothers'.

So it is altogether fitting that Brothers, the dub cut to the above cut to the above, should end the album and provide its title. Fitting too that the only fragment of the D. Brown vocal to make it through to the dub is the word 'brothers' emerging imtermittently in the mix together with some moody background harmonising. It's hard not to believe, listening to this indispensabke album nearly thirty years after it was made, that the brothers are not the two vocalists commemorated here, Dennis Brown and Junior Delgado themselves.

Check http://www.baddamusic.com for further details of their release programme.

Geoff Parker (December 2006)