The Heptones

Generoso and Lily’s Bovine Ska and Rocksteady: Lee “Scratch” Perry’s Wizz-Dom Label 8-9-16

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wizz-dom label b

The Ethiopians Soar on Perry’s Wizz-dom Label

Hello Bovine Ska and Rocksteady Listeners!

We spent the bread that we would’ve used to buy food to get records for the August 9th, 2016 Generoso and Lily’s Bovine Ska and Rocksteady Radio Show, but please don’t let the guilt that you should feel influence you in any way to listen to the this week’s show! Midway through the show, we have a spotlight on Lee “Scratch” Perry’s Wizz-dom label (1972-1973) which is so good that we have almost forgotten how satisfying a square meal feels like when you get to eat one. Amazing cuts from The Heptones, Melodians, Junior Byles and of course, The Upsetters! As the Wizz-dom label is so thick with the reggae, we decided to start off this show the ska, beginning with Joe White’s festive 1965 cut for Duke Reid’s Treasure Isle label, Irene.    Our mento set featured the title cut from Percy Dixon’s Scandal In Montego Bay LP which was released on Sue in 1964.  After that set, we launched into a long set of rocksteady with a real rarity being The Minstrels 1968 tune for Coxsone on Studio One, Giving Up On Love.  We then went right into the Wizz-dom label spotlight.

We are thrilled to present a spotlight on a label from one of the most inventive producers, engineers, and all-around performers tonight….Lee Scratch Perry.  Over the course of his career, Perry founded many labels. Upsetters, Goodies, and Justice League are just a few, but this week we decided to focus in on the Wizz-dom label. Believed to be born in Kendal as Rainford Hugh Perry, Scratch got his recording first name from his mom’s nickname for him, Leeburn.  Perry’s path to music began in Negril. On moving to Negril from Clarendon, where Lee had built up a reputation as a great dancer, Lee worked on construction as a part of Jamaica’s development of the region as a tourist site.  During his days spent moving rocks on construction sites, the sounds of the shifting and the clashing of stones spoke to Lee and pointed him toward Kingston to make music. In the Kingston music scene, Lee wore many hats for Coxsone Dodd and Studio One writing and arranging songs and appearing in front of the microphone as a recording artist. After spending a lot of time with Coxsone, Perry moved over to Joe Gibbs before eventually venturing out and creating his iconic Upsetter label, giving him his own avenue to flourish as a producer and arranger.

At Wizz-dom, we see Scratch as the mastermind for all goings-on for the music being recorded and the distribution of his recordings.   In the early days of Wizz-dom, Pat Francis approached Scratch with “King of Kings,” and after recording it, Scratch felt that Francis would be a good salesman for Wizz-dom and the other labels he had, so Francis became a salesman for Scratch, a position he held for three years. We kicked off the spotlight with this track that started the Pat Francis and Scratch business relationship, King of Kings, a majestic track that set the tone for this Wizz-dom spotlight.

The Upsetters, the house band for Lee Scratch Perry productions, had three distinct line ups. By 1972, when the Wizz-dom label was launched, the Upsetters had a fluctuating lineup, but Perry would always insist on using the best musicians he could find for each recording.   By 1974, the band membership became more stable with Boris Gardiner on bass, Earl “Chinna” Smith on guitar,  Winston Wright & Keith Sterling on keyboards, and  Sly Dunbar or Benbow Creary on drums.

Enjoy the August 9th, 2016 Bovine Ska and Rocksteady

Generoso and Lily’s Bovine Ska and Rocksteady: The 20th Annual Anti-Valentine’s Day Show! 2-9-16

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daltons kiss

Well Daltons, Don’t Do It Then!

Hello Bovine Ska and Rocksteady Listeners!

A prized tradition during the almost twenty year run of Generoso And Lily’s Bovine Ska And Rocksteady from when it was started was the Annual Anti-Valentine’s Day. This is where I, Generoso, would play two hours of songs featuring sets dedicated to many maladies associated with love like the pain breaking up, revenge, sadness, rejection…Yep, you get the picture.  These sets would be combined with dire facts relating to love like the current divorce rate and the costs of such splits and stories, many sent in by listeners, that regale accounts of tragic relationships from blind dates to the end of thirty year marriages. Fun!

Why would I do this, a now happily married man take such an assault on the saccharin, greeting card created holiday that ruins couplings both young and old?  Well, you got part of the answer there but the other part consists of feelings held by the long term committed bachelor that I was prior to meeting my lifelong cohost Lily.  You see, I had seven relationships in my past life as a single end between the first and fourteenth of February with three ending on the very saint’s feast day. Coincidence, no I don’t think so as this “holiday” puts an unneeded pressure on relationships as the kind of gift/evening is contingent on the current duration/affection amount of the union.  For example, let’s say that you have been dating for two weeks when the dreaded Cupid Day occurs…What amount of buy in are you supposed to have? If you do too much, it may make a more sensible partner run from level jumping and not enough pageantry might convince the more romantic partner that they are not the intended apple of your eye.

Hence, Valentine’s Day is the giant foot stamping on the flower of budding romance.

The 2016 year’s Anti-Valentine’s Day Show selected sets based on the following moments of a doomed relationship in a chronological breakup order…The FOOL set which normally occurs during the Valentine’s Day preparation that leads to failure, the set that highlights the moments when you let that love GO, the music assembled for the times when you realize that they are GONE. The subsequent set of songs about HEARTACHES when you start to notice that your love is no longer sitting with you on the couch.  As you stare at the empty couch, you begin to feel SORRY for messing it all up which forces you to sadly REMEMBER all of the good times you had as opposed to moments like when she opened up your Valentine’s Day present and called you an asshole for getting her a set of car air fresheners because you thought that it would be funny to remind her that her car smell like an old man’s armpit (I thought she would think it was funny).

So, you can now profit from my years of pain and listen to a superbly curated Anti Valentine’s Day Radio Show that features top ska, rocksteady, and reggae by such artists as The Heptones, Alton Ellis, Bob Andy and many more in the comfort and safety of your own home via Mixcloud.

Please share the show on Facebook and Mixcloud.

Enjoy and screw Valentine’s Day

Love,
Generoso and Lily

 

 

 

Bovine Ska and Rocksteady 7/28/2015: Jamaica Covers Doo Wop

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heptones sea of love

The Heptones brilliant cover of the classic, “Sea Of Love”

For many years, Generoso and Lily have talked about collecting all of the Doo Wop covers we know of in  Jamaican music into a show. Generoso was born and raised in a Doo Wop center, and he carried over that love to Lily, so this show was built on a great love for American Doo Wop and the humming of melodies to try to match them to what we heard in Jamaican music. Consequently, as each show happened and a Doo Wop cover was identified, we would tag and label the tracks in the hope to eventually culminate all of the songs into one grand Doo Wop extravaganza.

Finally, this past week, our celebration of Jamaica’s Doo Wop covers occurred. Despite all of our efforts to collect tracks over the years, this show took a particularly unique amount of hunting, given that plenty of the covers did not have the same name as the original tracks. Thankfully, we uncovered plenty of gems and are thrilled to share them with you.

This Doo Wop show had plenty of highlights. In the first set, Prince Buster and his All Stars showed how to improve on the slightly offensive “Ling Ting Tong” by the Five Keys. Then, in the third set, one of our favorite discoveries appeared, a lesser known cover of Gene Chandler’s “Duke of Earl” by Cornell Campbell, which emphasized how much a doo wop track could be transformed and enhanced by a reggae rhythm and vocal styling. In the second hour, we also included a 4 song set of different versions of The Moonglows’ “Sincerely” from Dorothy Russell and Ken Parker, Owen Gray, and Joe Higgs.

Listen to this special Bovine Ska and Rocksteady from July 28, 2015 HERE. Enjoy!

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