ENTITY · SOUND SYSTEM

King Tubby's Hometown Hi-Fi

Well supported

Osbourne "King Tubby" Ruddock's sound system, run from Waterhouse and the room where dub was effectively invented. Tubby, an electronics engineer who built and maintained his own amplifiers, began cutting instrumental versions with parts dropping in and out, adding reverb and delay live at the controls — first as exclusive plates for his own dances, then as a form in its own right that reshaped record production worldwide.

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At a glance

Type: sound system →
Era: Rocksteady, reggae and dub →
Confidence: Well supported

Connections

In stories

Story · ProbableKing Tubby and the remix

How a Waterhouse engineer turned mixing into an instrument and previewed the remix age.

Story · ProbableThe Dub Revolution: How King Tubby and Lee Perry Turned the Mixing Desk Into an Instrument

In the studios of 1970s Kingston, engineers learned to dismantle a finished song and rebuild it as something stranger, launching the version, the remix and the idea of the producer as author.

Story · ProbableFrom Kingston to the Bronx: DJ Kool Herc and the Sound-System Roots of Hip-Hop

How a Jamaican teenager carried the logic of the dancehall sound system into a South Bronx rec room and helped set hip-hop in motion.

Story · Well supportedThe amp men of Kingston

From a 1947 shop-front amplifier to King Tubby's workshop, engineers built the sound system before anyone sang through it.