The Front Line series of reggae recordings from Virgin Records had a short, but remarkable, life of a couple of years at the end of Seventies, when the music was at its peak. This blogger first heard some of the Front Line albums in the very early 90s, including amazing recordings by such figures as U-Roy and I-Roy. But, then there's the dub material and it was great to find a few years back the great compilation series put out by Virgin of two-disc sets presenting some of the greatest examples of dub available, including 40 Heavyweight Dub Sounds, issued in 2014, and packed with mind-blowing excursions into the studio wizardry of that storied era.
There are so many great reggae performers on this set, including U-Roy, Linton Kwesi Johnson (Poet and the Roots), The Gladiators, The Twinkle Brothers, Prince Far I, Culture, The Mighty Diamonds, Gregory Isaacs, and Johnny Clarke, AND, crucially, for the dub element, such remarkable musicians like drummer Sly Dunbar and his bassist partner Robbie Shakespeare and guitarists, keyboardists, horn players and drummers and percussionists who were part of "stables" of prominent studio players on the scene. Some of the tunes here were recorded by these musicians and released under such names as "The Aggrovators" and "The Revolutionaries" while two were by Dunbar. This is a treasure trove of prime dub from 1975 to 1980 released in just two or so years by Virgin and is a great complement to the 37 Classic Roots Cuts that will be highlighted here in the future.
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