The dub album as its own art form

Third instalment (1977-78) of producer Joe Gibbs and engineer Errol Thompson's African Dub All-Mighty series, mixed at Gibbs' newly equipped Retirement Crescent studio; its dense, effects-laden mixes are regarded as some of the most adventurous dub production of the era.

Lee "Scratch" Perry's studio behind his home at Washington Gardens, Kingston, built in 1973 and running until its destruction by fire in 1979. Working with modest four-track equipment, Perry produced a sound nobody has convincingly reproduced — layered, saturated, drenched in echo and unexpected noise — on records for Max Romeo, Junior Murvin, the Congos and The Heptones, and on his own productions. The Black Ark years are the strongest argument that the studio itself, and not only the players, is an instrument in Jamaican music.

Errol "ET" Thompson (1948-2004) was a pioneering Jamaican recording engineer central to 1970s reggae and dub. He first made his name upgrading and running the board at Randy's Studio 17, engineering early sessions for Augustus Pablo, Lee "Scratch" Perry and the Wailers, before partnering with producer Joe Gibbs as half of "the Mighty Two." Backed by the house band the Professionals, the pair produced dozens of chart-toppers, and Thompson mixed all four volumes of the acclaimed African Dub All-Mighty series.

Landmark 1976 dub album crediting Augustus Pablo and King Tubby: Pablo's melodica-led sessions with Carlton Barrett, Robbie Shakespeare, Aston Barrett and Earl "Chinna" Smith were cut at Randy's Studio 17, then remixed into dub by King Tubby. Widely cited as the recording that proved dub could stand as its own art form; its title track later appeared on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs.

Horace Swaby (1954-1999), who took a cheap melodica and made it the most recognisable lead instrument in Jamaican music. The minor-key sound he built was called Far East — spare, haunted and unlike anything else on the island — and "Java" and "East of the River Nile" defined it. His meeting with King Tubby produced King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown, one of the records dub is usually explained by, and he ran the Rockers International label and shop on Orange Street.

Super Ape, recorded at Black Ark in 1976, pushed dub into a fully psychedelic, effects-drenched idiom and is routinely ranked among the greatest dub albums ever made.

Joel "Joe Gibbs" Gibson (1942-2008) was a Jamaican producer active from the mid-1960s, first producing rocksteady hits for acts like the Pioneers, the Heptones and the Ethiopians before international success with Nicky Thomas's "Love of the Common People" (1970). Working with engineer Errol Thompson as "the Mighty Two" and backed by house band the Professionals, he issued scores of hits for Dennis Brown, Big Youth, Culture, Prince Far I and others. His African Dub All-Mighty series (1975-1979) became landmark dub albums.

Osbourne Ruddock (1941-1989), the Waterhouse electronics engineer who invented dub. He built and repaired amplifiers, ran his own Hometown Hi-Fi sound, and began cutting versions with parts dropping in and out, drenched in reverb and delay worked live at the controls — first as exclusive plates for his own dances, then as a form in its own right. He trained Scientist, Prince Jammy and others, and his approach to the mixing desk as an instrument reshaped record production worldwide. He was shot dead outside his home in 1989.

1973 dub set credited to the Upsetters, issued in Jamaica in a pressing of only a few hundred copies as Upsetters 14 Dub Blackboard Jungle; mixed by King Tubby for producer Lee "Scratch" Perry, who had no studio of his own yet. Frequently cited among the very first dub albums and the first mixed in stereo.

Rainford Hugh Perry (1936-2021), producer, singer and studio visionary — the most idiosyncratic figure in Jamaican music. He came up through Coxsone's Studio One and Joe Gibbs before going out on his own as Upsetter, producing The Wailers' hardest early work and the Upsetters' instrumentals. From 1973 he built the Black Ark behind his house and made records there — for Max Romeo, Junior Murvin, The Congos and The Heptones — whose layered, echo-drenched sound has never been convincingly copied. He burned the studio down in 1979 and spent the following decades working abroad as reggae's most celebrated eccentric.

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.

How the B-side and the mixing desk became instruments.

How a Waterhouse repairman turned a mixing desk into an instrument and became the uncredited composer of dub.

The carpenters and engineers who built the sound get little of the credit the record labels keep.