Click here to watch the trailer for Return Of The Rub-A-Dub Style!

Dub Club is an L.A. institution and now (after almost five years of filming) the documentary Return Of The Rub-A-Dub Style—which follows both the organizers of Dub Club and the long line of original reggae and dub stars they’ve brought to perform exclusive shows in L.A.—is about to release. Director Steve Henft (who has made videos for Primal Scream, Stone Roses, the Cure and more) and Dub Club mainstay Tom Chasteen speak before a special screening at tonight’s Dub Club. This interview by Nolan Knight.

What was the first record that hooked you into reggae and dub music?
Tom Chasteen (producer/Dub Club selector): The first thing that got me into reggae music was actually my parents. They went to Jamaica in the early seventies and brought back a bunch of records. They had the Harder They Come soundtrack and the Toots and the Maytals’ Funky Kingston album. Those were the first records to get me into reggae. The thing that got me into dub would probably be the Scientist albums. I bought those when I was a teenager—like Scientist Wins the World Cup, Scientist Versus the Space Invaders, a couple of those albums. That’s what really sold me on dub—listening to those. The word dub has a couple of different meanings. I guess the most frequent meaning of dub is—the Jamaican style—they’d make a 45, and on the A-side you’d have the vocal version of the song and on the B-side you’d have an instrumental of the same song but they would add a lot of effects to it—cutting the vocals in and out, making this psychedelic mix of it and that would be the ‘dub.’ That’s kind of the most concise explanation. Then rub-a-dub doesn’t have the same exact meaning. Rub-a-dub is more of this fixed style of Jamaican music that’s kind of in the era of the late sixties through the seventies into the mid-eighties. A slow and heavy kind of reggae that was really great for playing on these big outdoor sound systems and people toasting over.
The Dub Club has generated a huge response over the years—did it start off big or was it a gradual process?
TC: No, it started off pretty small. We have been doing it since 2000. It took a while to build. I would say the last five or six years it’s been a pretty big crowd—solid each week. It’s been a good crowd consistently for years and years. It took a while because I think there weren’t many other people doing this style of music. But we gradually found more and more people and then built from that following—people who liked the style of music and what we do. I think they appreciate that we bring in artists that are rarely seen or who haven’t been here before.
How did the documentary begin?
Steve Hanft (director): We started documenting the shows and then we realized that the Sound System shows in particular could be made into a film. We got excited about that but for me it was a new thing—even though it’s an old style of music that started in the sixties. For me, it was like, ‘Wow, people are rapping over beats back then?’ Basically, I was just excited about finding out about it. I think the first show we filmed was in 2004. We were shooting the rest of them up to a few months ago.
Were all the artists in the film readily available? Or did you have to go hunt some of them down in Jamaica?
SH: We definitely had to hunt those artists down for sure. Those guys at Dub Club—the selectors who book all the shows—they are digging so deep into the roots of reggae—getting the records, getting the artists. A lot of them came through one artist in particular—Tippa Lee, who’s actually a producer on the movie. He knows a lot of them. Tom would ask for some super old school artists and Tippa would know how to find them.
TC: In my experience, usually the artists were good to work with cause they really want to play and they are excited to come here and perform. A lot of these artists are great artists but they mainly play in Europe and they don’t play here very much. They still sound great. Usually they are just great to work with because they are excited that people still love their music. They’re excited that there is a young crowd here that knows their records.
SH: We really wanted an interview with Brigadier Jerry but he’s a real intense person. He was gonna do it and we went to the Twelve Tribes Church in Mount Washington—the Jamaican church were he is one of the founding members. And then he said, ‘No.’ [Laughs]
Can you tell us a little about the film’s soundtrack and where we can pick up a copy?
TC: It’s gonna come out in August and the DVD with the soundtrack will all be in one package together. A lot of the artists in the movie are on it but then there are others like Prince Jazzbo and Jimmy Riley—plus a lot of other great singers. We tracked the music here in L.A. but a lot of the vocals were recorded in Jamaica. It’s kind of just the tip of the iceberg. We have a lot of tracks that we’ve done over the years and they’re going to be out on Echodelic, which is our label. It’s kind of following the traditional Jamaican style where we have the Sound System—Echodelic Sound System—and Sound System kind of becomes the label, putting out its own records.
SH: [The DVD is] gonna come out right around the time of the screening. We’re in the process of building the DVD. The editing is done but we’re putting a lot of extras into it.
You was saying that the film will also be screened on the 15th—what does the club have in store for that night?
TC: We’re gonna screen the film at nine o’clock at the Echoplex and it will be free to come see the movie—free before nine-thirty. Then later that night we have a performance with Trinity, a classic seventies Jamaican DJ. We’re flying him in from Jamaica for that show. So we booked a performance with Trinity and Tippa Lee—and probably some other special guests will come out too.

RETURN OF THE RUB-A-DUB STYLE SCREENS WED., JULY 15, WITH TRINITY AND TIPPA LEE AT DUB CLUB AT THE ECHOPLEX, 1154 GLENDALE BLVD., ECHO PARK. SCREENING AT 9 PM / FREE BEFORE 9:30 PM / $10 AFTER / 21+. ATTHEECHO.COM. RETURN OF THE RUB-A-DUB STYLE DVD AND SOUNDTRACK WILL RELEASE THIS SUMMER ON ECHODELIC SOUND. MORE INFORMATION AT MYSPACE.COM/DUBCLUBLA.

Stream: The Heptones “Book Of Rules”

The Heptones’ Leroy Sibbles touched more than the majority of Studio One’s hit songs, whether in his own band or as the obfuscated group of studio musicians known variously as Sound Dimension or the Soul Investigators or as the man who played the bass on classics by the Abyssinians or Dennis Brown. He will be leading the Lions at Dub Club. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

When was the last time you visited L.A.?
Leroy Sibbles (bass/vocals): A long time man, a long time.
Did you get to visit Disneyland?
I’ve never been.
Do you want to go?
Oh yeah, man—any invitation—I’ll take you up, man! I want to go.
Is it true that the first time you ever met Toots of later Maytals fame he tried to sell you weed around the corner?
No, it’s not like that. He asked me to go buy a gram of weed for him—the other way around!
What was it like first meeting people like Toots and Jackie Mittoo and the Abyssianians and all the people who’d all becomes very famous later?
It was exciting ‘cause when you are young almost everything is exciting and new. After you grow up then you got to find stuff to really create new interest because you’ve seen it all. But growing up, everything is of high interest and plays a special part in your development, you know?
What’s the first moment in your musical career where you couldn’t believe what was happening to you?
It was the first time I heard my voice on the radio. The very first time. I was running around—I ran through Trench Town. I was like, ‘Hey, listen to that—that’s me there!’ That was the most exciting day of my life. Even to this day, nothing has ever topped that.
At Studio One, who was the best musician to spend an entire day with in the studio?
In the beginning, the most important person in the music at Studio One when I got there—the most important to me—was Jackie Mittoo. Oh yeah, he was super fantastic, man.
Didn’t he used to play two keyboards at once?
I forgot that he did that! He would do three things. A piano in one hand. A piano on the left hand and on the right hand he would be playing the melody of the song and on the foot pedal he would be playing the bass.
What kind of things did he teach you?
Almost like everything. Just being next to these guys and hearing them and watching them do their thing was a learning experience.
You were in the Studio One house band for so long—what songs do people know that you played on?
Oh yeah, man. We can start with ‘Satta Massa Ganna.’ ‘Declaration of Rights’ and ‘Pass The Dutchie’—that was originally another one called ‘Full Up.’ I did ‘Queen of the Minstrels.’ There was a group called the Mad Lads—they did a song called ‘Ten To One.’ All throughout the studio, I was recording for people who were out there on the streets. ‘Drifter,’ that was another big song. There’s so much songs, man—‘Freedom Blues.’ ‘Nanny Goat.’
How fast were you doing this?
Five songs per day. Every day—Monday to Friday. We had a lot of songs in there!
Did you get any credit?
No credit. I would say at least 60 to 65% of Studio One hit songs are mine. Albums too! Each album—remember No Man Is An Island by Dennis Brown? That’s one of the biggest. I played on that whole album. I played on John Holt’s Rob And Cheat You album. And a lot of the arrangements are mine. I was self taught. And I learned a lot from being around the studio there. I have a musical ear. I would say I’m born with that gift. If I hear something, I can figure music around it.
Would the musicians ever resist since you were so young?
After they saw what I could do, no. I think being the lead singer and lead arranger and vocalist they knew I had the talent. I was chosen by Jackie Mittoo. He picked me to come play this. I was 17 or 18—somewhere around there. They were all young guys—we were in the same age group. Fil Callendar on drums, Robbie Lyn on keyboards… After Jackie left, we were the guys left doing the stuff in the studio and they all looked up to me. I was the real roots guy down there. They were all midtown or uptown—I was the real roots guy, so I had the ideas. Because when Jackie Mittoo left—he was the arranger—and they went for Ernest Ranglin, and Ernest Ranglin came with jazz. It wasn’t roots—wasn’t what they were looking for! And they went for another guy Richard Ace—another jazz oriented kind of person and they couldn’t do it.
So they came to you?
I started laying some tracks for myself—for the Heptones. Earlier songs like ‘I Shall Be Released’ and another one that I did—‘Sweet Talking.’ No one really went and said, ‘Well, want you to do this.’ But I found myself in there at the controller picking the singers at the audition process and then Monday through Friday I would be there recording these people.
People off the street like you used to be?
People off the street would come in on Sunday and we’d listen to them and we’d lay something down if they had something going. Cornell Campbell, the Mad Lads—when I hear them I was like, ‘Yep, these are guys I want to work with.’ People like Burning Spear. They’d all come—right in the yard of the studio grounds!
How did you break it to them if it wasn’t going to work?
I tell them the truth. If I think you have something but you need to work on it some more. Or maybe the songs are good but they aren’t what we’re looking for so go write some other songs and come back. When Coxsone used to do auditions, he would hear some guy that he didn’t like and he would say, ‘Come back in six years time.’ Six years. You know he’s telling them don’t come back, you know. ‘Seven years!’
How did you know what you were looking for?
You could hear the guys who would. You got the ear for this thing. When the guy was approaching you, you knew it right away, man. There’s no easy answer. But if they have consistency and if they have the writing, you know—if it was what’s happening with the times, if they come with that, then that’s it. If he’s performing while he’s singing. If he was singing on four or five songs. Because there would be guys with only one song. And if he can’t sing another song, maybe he can’t fill that writing gap.
Who was somebody that you always wanted to work with that you never got a chance to?
Back then—it’s been a long time now. Back then I being a bass man, we used to do harmonies. We used to be covering so much material in the music, you know? I was arranging, writing, doing the horns—arranging the way the song should move. The only part that wasn’t so nice was not being able to get paid for what I was doing. Even getting recognized—even recognition because when these albums on the jacket, Coxsone would not put who the arranger was, or put himself sometimes. We the musicians should be getting credit. We should be the ones getting reimbursed. But no one told us the right way to go about this. It’s all messed up. I’ve been getting a small amount of royalty from the Island Record deal that we did. Yeah, right now with Atlantic, I’m still paid royalty. Every now and then I get a check and I’m grateful.
When you recorded with Lee Perry, he was wearing an astronaut suit—is that true?
A lie, man. He was so weird he could have wear it but he didn’t when I was around.

THE HEPTONES BACKED BY THE LIONS ON WED., JUNE 24, AT DUB CLUB AT THE ECHOPLEX, 1154 GLENDALE BLVD., ECHO PARK. 9PM / $10-$15 / 18+. ATTHEECHO.COM. LEROY SIBBLES AND THE LIONS WILL RELEASE THE ‘PICTURE’ 45 SOON. VISIT LEROY SIBBLES AT LEROYSIBBLES.COM, THE HEPTONES.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/THEHEPTONES.

Download: Extra Golden “Thank You Very Quickly”

(from Thank You Very Quickly out now on Thrill Jockey)

Extra Golden started when a graduate-studies project grew into a part-American-part-African benga band in Kenya and recently won notice for their particularly timely song “Obama,” which is about the president and not the beer. Their Thank You Very Quickly is out now on Thrill Jockey. This interview by Kevin Ferguson.

Was [drummer] Onyango Omari the first person to name their child after our president?
Ian Eagleson (Guitar, Vocals): Actually, I think that was a friend of his who did that. It’s very common over there to name a child after somebody meaningful. I know people who have named their kids after me!
I don’t know if so much they’re trying to give me respect, or I just happen to be a significant person in their lives. I’ve met people in Kenya who are named after some terrible people—they just happened to making a lot of news at the time. There are a lot of people in Kenya whose name means ‘damn it’ in English! I felt honored—especially since it’s our singer who named his son after me. It’s nice knowing there are a couple of people named Ian running around Kenya now.
Did you ever get to try the Obama beer?
Yeah! It was funny because it’s like a really cheap beer. It’s actually called ‘Senator Beer’ and the name is a coincidence. In 2004 when he was elected senator they started calling that beer Obama. I tried it—pretty good!
How much benga knowledge did you have when starting the band?
I went to Nairobi specifically to do research on benga music. One of the projects I got involved with was recording benga bands over there. I was pretty inexperienced at first. I was using a little laptop and recording them in nightclubs. I got interested in Kenya a long time ago, when I visited as a college student. As I got into graduate studies and followed through on it, it was the most prominent contemporary music there. I thought it was interesting because some of the things that were happening there were like the U.S. music. The guitar is very important there, just like it is to us over here. Also there’s just a lot going on with benga! I was coming up with a research project, and me being a guitarist, it was just fun to study it. That’s how I got interested in it. And the way our band got formed was just staking it a step further beyond just observing it and studying it. We’re trying to make ourselves a part of it.
Does that mean Extra Golden influenced other bands?
Our exposure to Kenya was kind of limited to begin with. I think it’s becoming more noticeable now, but I don’t know—I don’t think so. That style has a life of its own. It’s so much greater than us! Benga has its own trends. I think a lot of people have heard about us over there, and we have made an impact, I guess. It shows some people that there is interest in benga outside of Kenya. Some people think that it’s getting outmoded—there are newer genres based more on hip-hop and so on. But I think there’s still so much potential for people to get interested!
You and Alex own a label called Kanyo—what does that mean?
Kanyo in Luo means ‘there’ or ‘it’s there’—you hear people say it a lot in songs. It’s like if someone is playing a nice solo you say, ‘Kanyo! Kanyo! Kanyo!’ It’s just a cool word, too!
Isn’t it true that many African artists never financially benefit from many of the releases? Are you guys trying to combat that?
Yeah—I always wonder about that myself, especially when I see some new record come out. We were in touch with one musician whose record just got put out recently without any licensing or notice to him. It’s just that musicians are just always complaining about that stuff, and we’re trying to make sure that what we do is legitimate. It can be hard but if you work, you can figure a just and fair way to release albums. On our website we also do download for a couple of other labels, and I think those labels have done a good job in getting money to artists. So hopefully we’re not furthering parasite behavior! Some people argue that they’re not making money anyway, so why should they worry about it so much? But it’s just wrong to assume you can diffuse somebody’s record and not even consider that they’d want to have some say in it. Sometimes musicians in Africa don’t even have the rights to music they produce themselves—they sometimes get shafted by a producer who has rights to their music. I helped somebody in the U.S. get some licensing for some Kenyan musicians once and the musician and producer ended up arguing and nobody could establish who had the rights. The producer just decided to not do it.
What happened when half of Extra Golden was detained in Paris?
We were going to play in Austria and the Kenyan [band members] flew through France. They had to pass some kind of immigration check point, and the police started asking them what they were doing, what they were doing and how come they had no money? This was even though even though they had all the paper work and everything was legit. It was a nightmare! They were stuck there for like 14 hours or something. Eventually the police tried to get them deported, but in order for them to do that they had to get them to sign something. Because it was in French, they refused to sign it. At that point they became temporary refugees and ended up at a Red Cross office—there were people there that could help them. They were able to contact us in Austria, but it was tough! We thought they were doomed!
Have Omari, Bilongo and Jagwasi ended up in the states finally?
They’re not permanent residents—they have like year-long multiple-entry visas so they can come and go as long as they have a reason. They came out earlier this year and they’re here now. We have more things planned for later on this year—looks like they’ll be around for a while! Kenya—like everywhere else—is getting squeezed by the economy and everything. It’s a lot easier for them to make ends meets here rather than there.
Is Omari self-conscious about saying ‘thank you very quickly’?
Not at all! It’s funny—there are a lot of weird English phrases in Kenya that you would never hear here in the United States. We all say that all the time now!

EXTRA GOLDEN WITH THE MEDITATIONS, FOOL’S GOLD AND YOUSSOUPHA SIDIBE ON WED., MAY 13, AT THE ECHOPLEX, 1154 GLENDALE BLVD., ECHO PARK. 9 PM / $10 BEFORE 10PM / $15 AFTER / 21+. ATTHEECHO.COM. EXTRA GOLDEN’S THANK YOU VERY QUICKLY IS OUT NOW ON THRILL JOCKEY. VISIT EXTRA GOLDEN AT EXTRAGOLDEN.COM OR MYSPACE.COM/EXTRAGOLDEN.