ENTITY · SOUND SYSTEM
King Stur Gav Hi-Fi
Well supported
King Stur Gav Hi-Fi, co-founded by U-Roy, was a foundational sound system for late-1970s and 1980s deejay culture, with surviving live dance tapes serving as some of the best-documented recordings of that era's sound-system performance style.
Located in an area aligned with the JLP, the sound was implicitly seen as a JLP set; deejays associated with it, including Josie Wales and U-Roy himself, have been perceived as directly aligned with the party.
At a glance
- Type
- Sound system →
- Confidence
- Well supported
- Sources
- Dennis Howard, "Dancehall Political Patronage and Gun Violence," Jamaica Journal 33 (February 2010): 8-15.
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Debate & reception
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Who gets remembered: sound, selector or artist?
One side
Artist fame
The other
Sound-system labor memory
Sound-system history often celebrates headline artists, but selectors, operators, box men, tape sellers and local promoters made the scene work. This item flags a research balance problem rather than settling it.
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Compiled and researched by The Jamaica Music Atlas music desk. The sources that informed it are credited above.
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