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One index for everything published: records, stories, watchable media, community memories and places. 22 records match.

recording · Probable"Footprints" — T.O.K.

"Footprints" by T.O.K. is a mid-2000s vocal cut on the Drop Leaf riddim, often cited in the one-drop/dancehall crossover moment when harmony groups, roots themes and polished rhythm production overlapped.

riddim · Well supportedBruk Out

A dancehall move built on a sharp drop and release through the hips and knees — energetic, floor-facing and demanding. It travelled well beyond Jamaica through video and competition circuits, and is one of the steps most often taught in dancehall classes abroad, frequently without the context it came from.

person · Well supportedCarlton Barrett

Carlton Barrett (1950-1987) was the drummer of Bob Marley and the Wailers and, with his bassist brother Aston, formed one of reggae's most influential rhythm sections. Formerly with Lee "Scratch" Perry's Upsetters, he is credited with popularising the one drop drum pattern heard across Marley's Island-era albums including Natty Dread, Exodus and Rastaman Vibration. Source note: Carlton Barrett Wikipedia and The Wailers band history.

studio · Well supportedChannel One

The Hoo Kim brothers' studio on Maxfield Avenue, opened in 1972, and the home of the rockers sound: Sly Dunbar's militant drumming with the Revolutionaries as house band drove a harder, four-square feel that displaced the one drop as the dominant rhythm of the mid-1970s. Channel One's recuts of Studio One rhythms were both tribute and commercial rivalry, and its output — with the Mighty Diamonds, the Wailing Souls, Junior Byles and others — defined the sound of roots reggae's peak years.

riddim · ProbableDoctor's Darling Riddim

A 2004 modern one-drop riddim released in the Riddim Driven series, conceived by the Germaica team (Pierre 'Enuff' Baigorry and collaborators) and inspired by Sly & Robbie's 1982 'Night Nurse' groove. It became a widely voiced roots-flavoured rhythm of the mid-2000s.

person · Well supportedDon Corleon

Don Corleon is a Jamaican producer associated with major 2000s reggae and dancehall riddims including Drop Leaf, Seasons and related crossover productions, helping define the polished one-drop and dancehall sound of that decade.

riddim · Well supportedDrop Leaf riddim

The Drop Leaf riddim is a Don Corleon-associated one-drop/reggae rhythm from the mid-2000s with many vocal cuts, important to the period when roots-leaning singers and dancehall artists shared polished rhythm tracks for global audiences.

concept · Well supportedDrum-and-bass rhythm section

In most popular music the rhythm section supports the song; in Jamaican music it frequently is the song. Drum and bass are what a rhythm means when a producer sells one, what survives into the version, and what a dub mix keeps when everything else is dropped. This is the structural reason the same rhythm can carry fifty different records.

concept · Well supportedDub engineer as performer

Dub moved the engineer from behind the glass to the front of the record. Riding faders, dropping instruments out and pushing reverb and delay in real time is playing, not editing, and once King Tubby demonstrated it the mixing desk became an instrument that could be soloed. It is one of the few genuinely new performance roles the twentieth century produced.

concept · Well supportedDubplate on radio

The dubplate crossed from the dance to the airwaves: radio selectors playing custom-voiced specials and exclusive cuts to bring sound-system electricity to broadcast — station-name drops, artist salutes, one-off mixes nobody else can play. It kept specialist radio honest to the culture it covered, inside rules the dance never had.

person · Well supportedGentleman

German reggae singer born Tilmann Otto in Osnabrück in 1974 and raised in Cologne, who first visited Jamaica at 17; his 1999 debut Trodin On and 2002 breakthrough Journey to Jah made him one of Europe's most prominent reggae artists, with the 2005 single "Intoxication" built on Don Corleon's Drop Leaf riddim.

person · Well supportedKemar McGregor

Producer and former RJR selector (Kemar 'Flava' McGregor) who founded No Doubt Records in 2001 and cut a run of 2000s one-drop roots riddims; his production of Etana's 'I Am Not Afraid' lifted her album The Strong One onto the Billboard reggae chart.

riddim · Well supportedNight Nurse Riddim

A 1982 early-dancehall riddim from Gregory Isaacs's classic 'Night Nurse,' recorded at Tuff Gong with the Roots Radics and co-produced by Isaacs and bassist Errol 'Flabba' Holt for the Taxi/Tabou1 stable. Its laid-back groove has anchored numerous covers and recuts, from Sly & Robbie with Simply Red to a modern one-drop lineage.

label · Well supportedNo Doubt Records

Reggae label founded by producer Kemar 'Flava' McGregor in 2001, a prolific source of 2000s one-drop roots riddims voiced by contemporary reggae singers such as Etana.

instrument · Well supportedNyabinghi bass drum

The largest of the three Nyabinghi drums, struck with a padded beater to carry the ceremony's deep foundational pulse under the funde's steady heartbeat and the repeater's improvisation. Its boom is the sound Rastafari brought into the studio through Count Ossie, and reggae's one drop keeps its accent.

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