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ENTITY · SOUND SYSTEM

Metro Downbeat

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Metro Downbeat was a London sound system founded in the late 1950s by Jamaican-born electrician Percival 'Metro' Miller, who named it in direct tribute to Sir Coxsone's Downbeat in Jamaica. One of the first Jamaican-style sound systems to operate in Britain, it wound down as a touring dance sound after Miller was injured in a 1969 altercation.

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Red Bull Music Academy Daily; BelDUB (Dub & Soundsystem Culture Belgium).

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Story · ProbableFoundation sounds before the famous three

Long before Coxsone, Duke Reid and Prince Buster became reggae's founding trinity, a wider field of 1950s operators built the culture — and its DIY engineering habit followed Jamaican emigrants to London.

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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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