Soul Jazz

Notes: This book celebrates over 100 years of photography in the Caribbean. From calypso kings to Vodou priests, revolutionaries to dictators, colonialism to independence, slave trade to tourist paradise - the many uses and abuses of the Caribbean are vividly captured here.

The image of the Caribbean is as much a creation of the outsider as it is the complex identity of its people, a melting pot of races created out of the participants of the 400 year slave trade - enforced Africans, indigenous Caribbeans and their colonisers - French, Spanish, Dutch, English.

From luscious and beautiful backdrop of tourism and hedonist retreat, to colonial outpost and revolutionary threat within North America's backyard, the complex identity of the Caribbean stands at the intersection of tourism, the detritus of the slave trade, the decline of colonialism and the region's tropicality.

The regions politics span an almost constantly changing path of ideas, radicalism and revolutionaries - from Castro's Cuba and Michael Manley's Jamaica, to the violent right-wing dictatorships of Haiti's Francois 'Papa Doc' Duvalier and the Dominican Republic's Rafael Trujillo.

The hundreds of fascinating and unique photographs featured here illustrate more than one hundred years of Caribbean history, culture and industry as well as the subsequent diaspora of its people to America, England, Canada and elsewhere.

Introduction by Paul Gilroy. Edited by Stuart Baker.

Paul Gilroy is the author of There Ain't No Black in the Union Jack: The Cultural Politics of Race and Nation (1987), The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness (1993), Black Britain - A Photographic History (2004) amongst others.

Stuart Baker is the editor of a number of photography and design books all of which deal with culture and identity including Punk 45 (with Jon Savage), Dancehall (with Beth Lesser), Kanaval: Vodou, Politics and Revolution on the Streets of Haiti (with Leah Gordon), Voguing (with Chantal Regnault), Bossa Nova, Freedom, Rhythm & Sound (both with Gilles Peterson) and more. He is also the founder of Soul Jazz Records.collection.

Review: Jamal Moss, aka Hieroglyphic Being, returns this time under the alias Africans with Mainframes. With fellow Chicagoan Noleian Reusse they have been releasing music under the name Africans with Mainframes for over 15 years now. The KMT LP is the debut album from the group, a collage of apocalyptic Chicago acid meets industrial and transcendental post-house machine funk. Both intense and unique, the album of forward-thinking, experimental, boundary-pushing Afro-futurist electronic music shows why Hieroglyphic Being is regarded as one of the most serious purveyors of experimental electronic music today.

Review: Jamal Moss, aka Hieroglyphic Being, returns this time under the alias Africans with Mainframes. With fellow Chicagoan Noleian Reusse they have been releasing music under the name Africans with Mainframes for over 15 years now. The KMT LP is the debut album from the group, a collage of apocalyptic Chicago acid meets industrial and transcendental post-house machine funk. Both intense and unique, the album of forward-thinking, experimental, boundary-pushing Afro-futurist electronic music shows why Hieroglyphic Being is regarded as one of the most serious purveyors of experimental electronic music today.

Review: Amazing new acid 12" from Soul Jazz Records featuring infamous Rimini-based DJ/Playboy Nick Glider and San Franciscan electronica wunderkind Kit Clayton. This is a new version of 'Opal Rush' released earlier this year with two stunning remixes (now with added vocals) from renegade electronic wizard Kit Clayton. Managing to appeal to both the new school and old school DJs alike this is the closest thing to brand new Chicago acid.

Notes: Soul Jazz Records are proud to present this amazing collection of sleeves from the deepest, deepest jazz music ever - compiled by Gilles Peterson and Stuart Baker (Soul Jazz Records).

This is a unique collection of cover artwork of revolutionary jazz music between 1965-83. Martin Luther King, Malcolm X and the civil rights movement of the 1960s loom large as self-determination, economic power and musical freedom led to jazz artists finding new paths - both musical and economic.

Years before the D-I-Y cultural revolution of punk, Sun Ra, John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, Don Cherry, Ornette Coleman, the Art Ensemble of Chicago and others 'took control' of their own work by recording, releasing and distributing their own music themselves.

The record sleeves of this era are as iconic and historically unique as the music itself and a striking reflection of the time; pre-desktop publishing, pre-internet these small-run (sometimes as low as 500 copies), self-made sleeves are graphically bold and radical.

'Freedom, Rhythm and Sound' is the first ever collection of this fascinating goldmine of album art, which represents the first wave of inspired independent production within popular music.

'Freedom, Rhythm and Sound' includes a large introduction contextualising the music and artwork as well as features on many of the people involved. Alongside the musicians mentioned above these include Rashied Ali, Steve Reid, Mary Lou Williams, Horace Tapscott, Lloyd McNeil, Tribe, The Last Poets, The Pharoahs, Philip Cohran, Black Artists Group and many others.

Review: Asha is undoubtedly one of the most rare spiritual jazz albums around. It was originally self-released by its creator, Flautist Lloyd McNeill, back in 1969. Only 500 copies were ever pressed, and although Soul Jazz first put out a reissue on their Universal Sound sub-label in 2011, copies of that now change hands for large sums of money. It remains a beguiling and hugely atmospheric set, with McNeill's alternately haunting and jaunty flute solos wrapping themselves around a variety of deep and rich jazz grooves. Highlights are plentiful, from the poignant piano figures and breezy flutes of "Two Thirds Pressure", to the charming up-tempo strut of "Effervescence".

Review: Soul Jazz presents a limited edition 12" featuring "Sub Island", taken from the current "Box Of Dub" LP. Skream comes correct with this release.

Notes: Get down with the get down! Fantastic new season colours in Soul Jazz Records' classic 12" Record Bags (holds about 30 LPs). Fantastic for DJing, impressing your stylish friends or just 'carrying stuff'.

Notes: Get down with the get down! Fantastic new season colours in Soul Jazz Records' classic 12" Record Bags (holds about 30 LPs). Fantastic for DJing, impressing your stylish friends or just 'carrying stuff'.

Notes: Get down with the get down! Fantastic new season colours in Soul Jazz Records' classic 7" Record Bags. Fantastic for DJing, impressing your stylish friends or just 'carrying stuff'.

Review: 'Mojo Rocksteady Beat' is the new compilation of classic recordings from The Sound Dimenison, the funkiest group in the history of Reggae.
The Sound Dimension have recorded some of the most important songs in Reggae music; songs such as 'Real Rock', 'Drum Song', 'Heavy Rock',
'Rockfort Rock', and 'In Cold Blood' - all classic songs that have become the 'foundation' of Reggae music, endlessly versioned and re-versioned
by Jamaican artists since the time they were first recorded.
As the in-house band at Studio One in the late 1960s, The Sound Dimension also played alongside everyone from The Heptones, and Alton Ellis,
to Ken Boothe, Marcia Griffiths and more. Similar to their US counterparts, The Funk Brothers at Motown, and Booker T and The MGs at Stax,
The Sound Dimension recorded, on a daily basis, incredibly catchy and funky tunes matched by a seamless musicality.
Featuring musicians of the calibre of Ernest Ranglin, Jackie Mittoo, Eric Frater, Leroy Sibbles, Don Drummond Jnr, Deadley Headley and more,
the Sound Dimension existed from around 1967 to 1970 and all the recordings featured here were originally released during this period. For a band
with a fluid line-up, they had an amazingly consistent sound, laying down classic rhythms for the singers of the day at Studio One as well as stretching
out with their own recordings. Check out the amazing trombone of Vin Gordon, rightly re-named 'Don Drummond Jnr' by Sir Coxsone, honouring both
the musical abilities of the young Gordon, and that of his forerunner in the Skatalites and ex-Alpha Boys teacher. His sparring partner on horns would
usually be Deadly Headley Bennett.
The Sound Dimension featured a unique combination of musicians from different backgrounds, such as those from the original jazz big bands on the
island or players from the north coast hotel music circuit; listen to 'Park View' and hear the two unique styles of Eric 'Rickenbacker' Frater, with his
fuzz-box lead guitar, dueling with the jazz virtuosity of fellow guitarist Ernest Ranglin. After Jackie Mittoo officially emigrated to Canada in 1968
(although often continuing to return for sessions), keyboard duties were also supplied by the equally funky Richard Ace or Robbie Lyn, all against the
rhythmic bass-lines of the Heptones' own Leroy Sibbles.
None of this can explain the importance of this music. The melodies to their classic songs are a thousand times better known than the musicians who
originally created them. Played and re-played by every house band for every producer on the island, these iconic rhythms became the basis for dancehall
and laid the foundations for the future of Jamaican music. This album can be seen as a companion to the earlier Sound Dimension release 'Jamaica Soul
Shake' and together these two albums make a unique and definitive document of a seriously important set of recordings.

Review: "Studio One Dub 2" is the latest instalment from Soul Jazz Records. It is a journey into the mighty vaults of the legendary Studio One Records. This is an amazing slab of dub featuring loads of rare and classic dub versions of Studio One's foundation tracks. This album collects together some of the finest dubs alongside super-rare dub outings and classics.

Review: Amongst Nigerian soul and disco collectors, Tee Mac's Night Illusion has long been regarded as one of the great "lost albums". It was originally privately pressed and released on the enigmatic producer's own label in 1980, with only 1,000 copies in existence. It's perhaps unsurprising that Soul Jazz Records has chosen to reissue it, serving it up on CD for the first time. It's a cracking set, all told, with Marjorie Barnes' superb vocals riding rhythm tracks that variously touch on horn-heavy reggae, sumptuous disco-soul, Blaxploitation style funk, and, of course, authentic Nigerian Afro-disco. Despite the record's obscure roots, it's brilliant produced, and actually superior sound and vibe wise to many American-produced disco and soul albums of the period.

Review: On the face of it, New York's ballroom and vogueing scene is possibly not the most obvious inspiration for the deluxe Soul Jazz compilation treatment. Musically, it was never a fixed thing, reflecting instead the sounds that dominated New York City's gay club scene over two decades. On this three-disc retrospective, the scene's origins can clearly be seen in the high number of glamorous disco cuts on show - First Choice, Cheryl Lynn, Tom Moulton's immaculate version of MFSB's "Love Is The Message" etc - with later developments represented by tough, almost tribal house cuts (Junior Vasquez, Armand Van Helden etc) and delightfully angular dancefloor classics (Nitro Deluxe, Raze etc). The included detailed sleeve notes joyfully join the dots and put the movement into context. Highly recommended.