Strategy: Noise Tape Reggae
Entr'acte

Our favourite community librarian returns with a 7-inch exercise in experimental dub science but, with the two tracks flying past at 45 rpm, the visit's over fast. Paul Dickow recorded the material in June 2008 in Portland, Oregon (Cascadia) by “using re-purposed reggae mix tapes in cassette loops and miscellaneous analogue electronics.” Regardless of production details, no one would guess the tracks originated from Portland when they sound so reminiscent of material laid down at Lee Perry's Black Ark Studios in Kingston, Jamaica during the ‘70s (for the record, Noise Tape Reggae was mastered and cut by Rashad Becker at D&M, Berlin). Anything but a narcotized skank, “Repurposed Dub” races to some unknown destination, its driving bass and drum rhythms violently pushing through an echo-soaked mix so drenched in echo it's like swimming through glue. The flip side's “Taper's Rock Dub” rolls out at a less breathless pace but barrels forth with a like-minded intensity when blurry sheets of distorted sound blow across the track's bass-heavy rumble.

March 2009