#strangedub

#TGTfeature 006: Dr. StrangeDub [Echo Chamber (KFAI), Around The World In Dub: Minnesota, USA] Hopefully you’ve had ample time to appreciate the diverse creativity of emcee and singer MAS1A, as #TGTfeature 006 switches frequencies to speak with veteran reggae radio host Dr. StrangeDub! He’s been a personal inspiration to me since I’ve gotten involved with KGNU community radio here in Colorado, so it’s a real honor to interview him. This and forthcoming #TGTfeature articles will highlight dedicated musical talents by featuring their recent work as well as an in-depth interview. Known for his passionate support of dub, reggae, and all related genres on the Echo Chamber show, Dr. StrangeDub (Michael Rose) has been a DJ at KFAI-FM (Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Minnesota, USA) since 1996. Pictured above with Lee "Scratch" Perry, the good doctor has plenty of knowledge to share on the joys and importance of non-commercial radio, on how digital music has affected his role, and on the challenges of compiling for his ongoing Around The World In Dub series. A bit about Dr. StrangeDub: - Host of the famed Echo Chamber – which pounds and soothes the brain with the heaviest dubs, the most conscious roots, and funkiest club beats on the planet - Has released eight full-length and free-to-download Paris Around The World In Dub compilations on Dan Dada Records. He’s currently at work on volumes 9 & 10, producers take note! - In addition to radio and dubwise music, passions include home-brewing beer, cooking, gardening, the Green Bay Packers... and of course his children and family. Besides 20+ years of radio, the doctor has been a software engineer for over 30 years

TGT: How did you first get into reggae-related music, and why has it become such an important part of your life? DS: Well, unlike any kid growing up today in most parts of the world, I had no exposure to reggae music whatsoever – other than Eric Clapton’s cover of “I Shot the Sheriff” – until the age of 17 or 18. I was a senior in high school I believe when Peter Tosh was on tour with the Rolling Stones and one of the concerts was broadcast on the King Biscuit Flour Hour. I was hanging out getting high at a friend’s apartment and we awaited hearing the Stones live. Then, this music came on, this firebrand of Rastafari came on and started singing… and I was like – what the heck is this music? I put down the bong and said ‘I got to run home and get a cassette recording this!’ Or something on that order… so I did, and I was hooked. At least on Peter Tosh. So I went off to college having heard a bit of Peter Tosh live, Tosh & Mick on SNL performing “Walk and Don’t Look Back,” and old Eric C. doing “I Shot the Sheriff” on 461 Ocean Boulevard. And for a while, my reggae exposure didn’t expand much. But a couple things changed that in short order: first one was meeting my great friend Craig Krueger who turned me on to Bob Marley & the Wailers, Burning Spear, and a couple others… maybe Third World? Craig might remember. But it was his Wailers collection that made me a reggae fan. The second big thing in the college years was discovering dub! I started a bit of a reggae collection shopping at this store Flat, Black, & Circular (where I bought Black Uhuru since the lead singer had MY name), and one day with just a couple dollars in my pocket I bought this album in a very cheap sleeve titled King Tubby meets the Upsetter – at the Grassroots of Dub. This one here:

I put this slab of heavy vinyl on the turntable and this weird inside-out music came on. This seemed to sound nothing at all like the Wailers, or Black Uhuru, or Spear, or any reggae I had heard. Was there something really messed up in the recording of this? And who’s this guy King Tubby? Not the singer, probably, as there’s not much in the way of vocals on here. Is he the bandleader? Remember no Google at this time. I started asking around. And reading the zines. Not sure exactly when or where I was told that he was an engineer. What he did was to take existing music – or the separate recorded tracks that compose a song – and mess with it. What he created was called “dub”, which was short for dubplate. His one-off mixes were being used as the b-sides of vinyl “dubplates” where the original song was the a-side. It would be many years later that I came to see how riddims can be infinitely recycled in Jamaica! Can’t forget the other big exposure that came from my college years. And that would be discovering or being turned on to artists like The Clash (thanks again to Craig), and Jah Wobble, and Holger Czukay & Can, and Kraftwerk, Eno, and Joy Division. You know what I’m saying – those artists that came from a Rock & Punk background who experimented with electronics, and recording techniques, found sounds, and dub. Jah Wobble’s “Bedroom” album was big! Of course side six of “Sandinista”! TGT: Having just celebrated 20 years on air, the Echo Chamber radio show continually covers the whole dub/reggae spectrum. How do you and Baby Swiss collaborate to maintain such a diverse mix of music week in and week out?

DS: Right now, and for the past 10 years, I have and receive more music than I can possibly digest. Maybe this wouldn’t have happened if things hadn’t gone so much digital and web based. Sure, I’d still have a ton of vinyl, but I would have Terabytes of music! But, back in ’96 when I jumped into radio broadcasting, I was a record/CD store hound. I searched the bins like all DJs, and made my annual spring trip to Chicago to visit my pal (and Echo Chamber co-founder) Terry C. and buy music. Of course I also started emailing record labels and distributors… and artists direct. Nowadays, I am on a member of a number of music promotion companies/sites like Distiller, and Fatdrop, RDX (RadioDirectX), Riddimstream, and many more. Also, many artists or their management contact me directly in email, or Facebook, and send me music in email or through DropBox, WeTransfer, or whatever. As for collaboration, it’s mostly just word of mouth while we are on the air. Sometimes we share stuff through email. Of course, we both burn many CD-R copies of music we want to share with each other. The only time we talk about an upcoming playlist for a show is when we do a special theme program. Like when we do our “Fistful of Dub – Dread Western” special. Or the late July “Lunar Lunatics” outer space special. Or the “Magic Dub Carpet Ride” dubwise journey to the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent. I’ve run into Swiss (Elmar Romain) a few times at record shops (not sure the last time, as it’s been years), but we’ve never gone record shopping together once! TGT: What do you enjoy about live radio work, especially compared to performing as a DJ? DS: Well, first off, I’ve only done the live DJ thing a handful of times. I want to move in that direction, especially as I begin to wind down the 9-to-5 employment thing, but I am a seasoned radio DJ, and a newbie club DJ! One of the things I love about radio is that there is no face-to-face audience, so I can drag my ass into the station no matter what I look like or feel like. Then, I can play whatever I like. I am not doing what a club DJ does at all – at least not as far as the aim of the endeavor. He or she is aiming to get a club dancing! Or, if it’s a really late-night chill club scene, the aim may be to have a lot of guys and ladies enjoying each other’s company… And you know what that means. They don’t have those darkened VIP corners with the bottle service in clubs for nothing… Broadcasting radio out over the airwaves, and especially the internet has a different aim entirely. Sure… some of that dancing and lovemaking may be going on with the radio blaring out some choice Dub. But it’s not that face-to-face aim for the radio DJ as it is for the club DJ. Or at least the good club DJs! The overlap between the club and the radio is of course the toys and techniques… and the selection of music. And some nights on the radio I am more of the old school “selector,” whereas on other nights I’m a wannabe King Tubby or Lee Perry, messing with the controls, overlapping the tunes, and dropping in the found sounds and other sound bites. So I can learn a new mixing board, or come up to speed on some mixing software without too much trouble. And I am pretty comfortable in a small club on a small stage mixing things up much like I do on the radio. Would like to more of this as I said earlier. But, I have no plans to become one of these live mixing wizards like so many club DJs. Of course they usually deal with high BPM levels…whereas I’m much more into downbeat, chilled out music. I think of myself as a selector first, and messing with the mix as a secondary bit. And on the radio, some artists actually get offended if the DJ “messes with” their recording very much. TGT: You’ve obviously had a long-running relationship with KFAI. How did you initially get involved in non-commercial radio, and why is it still so important and relevant? DS: This one all goes back to my friendship with Terry C. (aka TurnTableTerrorist at WLUW-FM) and our long-running home-brewing hobby. We began home-brewing back in 1991 after we became friends at work. And, each time we brewed, we inevitably talked about “how much fun it would be to have our own radio show.” Terry told me about a neighbor of his who volunteered on Saturday mornings at a public station (KBEM-FM) doing a bluegrass program. The neighbor suggested we just show up sometime when a station has an open-house and volunteer. So… finally, after talking about it for four to five years, we volunteered at KFAI-FM community station. We signed on to work two hours per week sorting and cataloguing new CDs in the music library. After just a couple months the station offered a free “become a DJ” class. So, over a six-week span we learned all about radio board programming and running the equipment. Given it was 1996, we even had a class on splicing reel-to-reel tape! Of course, we also learned about the seven dirty words and other FCC regulations. For the exam, each of us had to do our own mock radio show (something like 10 minutes) to show we were competent. When the class was over we each got our FCC radio-programming license. TGT: The Echo Chamber has also released the 8-volume (so far) Around The World In Dub series, all on Dan Dada Records. Featuring dozens of artists, including dub heavyweights like Dubmatix and Vibronics, the entire series is free-to-download. How did this project come about?

Echo Chamber - Around The World In Dub Vol 7 & 8 by Dan Dada Records