You heard it first here!!!
TAXI + Silent River + TABOU1 are proud to announce the release of “FORWARD”, the newest album by Bitty McLean, the sweetest voice in the Reggae industry.
Guess what, it’s a scorcher.
The riddims were recorded with Sly & Robbie and the TAXI Gang. Over the years, whenever I had the opportunity, I would fly down to Kingston and book a few days Gussie Clarke’s Anchor Studio to work with Sly & Robbie, Mikey Chung, Dougie Bryan, Robbie Lyn and Sticky.
Usually, we would record instrumentals reminiscent of the Rockers and RubADub period, which I love best, but with a fresh, contemporary twist. From time to time, we would also record dancehall and other stuff, because these musicians can play anything (we did a funk album, a rock song, an Algerian Rai-influenced beat, etc…). While these instrumentals were all good enough to be released as such (check out the album “Usual Suspects” for instance), I always emailed MP3s of the ruff mixes to Bitty: knowing how good his songwriting skills are, Robbie, Sly and I knew he would come up with something wicked. And invariably, Bitty would write superb new songs to the riddims.
Before I move on, I want to take a minute to thank the Powers That Be for letting me have the joy of working with Bitty McLean. We met in 2005, our first release was a hit, “The Real Thing”, which prompted us to fly down to Kingston to record the “Movin’ On” album with Sly & Robbie, which we put out in 2006. Since then, we’ve been on the road, we have put out more cracking albums. I’ve produced a number of really nice things, worked with legends, but uniting Bitty McLean with Sly & Robbie is my proudest achievement.
The creative process would then continue with Robbie Shakespeare crafting new bass lines to fit with Bitty’s songs. Once that drum and bass foundation, the riddim guitar, the shuffle (on piano or organ) and the vocals were recorded, Bitty and Stepper would embellish each song with organ, synths and sax parts. We often asked the incomparable Robbie Lyn to add his flavor to the arrangements. Robbie Lyn’s sound is “phat” to say the least, his Reggae skank is tall and broad and he’s no slouch on the synths, organs, Fender Rhodes, he can play wicked bass parts (more on Robbie Lyn soon, as this man deserves an article for himself). That’s how we did “Love Restart”, which came out in 2018.
Tapping into that inexhaustible well of experience and talent is a super awe inspiring experience. We learn so much from these quasi-mythological figures, and they are such cool persons, literally gentle giants! I mean, between 1976 and 1984, Jamaican music reached peaks of creativity and quality that have yet to be matched. Bands like Sly & Robbie, the Aggrovators and a bit later, the Roots Radics, worked mostly at Channel One, and to a lesser degree at Joe Gibbs, Harry J, Dynamics… Working in “third world” conditions compared to American or English recording studios and their seemingly infinite resources, the Jamaicans created “that” HUGE sound, “that” attitude, “those” rhythm patterns, that have been the envy of the musical world since then and have never been replicated elsewhere. And it’s not for lack of trying, as witnessed by the myriad groups in Europe, the US or Japan that have toiled painstakingly to recreate “that” sound…
Why use copycat bands from Europe when you work with and learn from the original founders of “that” sound??? As long as they are available, let’s work with the originators: they have “it” in them, it’s not something they learned by watching Youtube tutorials, listening to 45 year-old records or reading music scores. No, it’s in their soul, their DNA, they live and breathe this music. When he got taught how to play bass by Aston “Familyman” Barrett, Robbie practiced so hard for days on end that his fingers bled and that his finger prints got half erased. Sly started at the age of 14. They know music, they are music.
The Reggae Spirit lives in them. I once asked Robbie Shakespeare how he was able to find the perfect bass line every time. He replied that before recording a bass part, he would take a second or two and connect with the Lord, and then just play what he was told to play. I find that definition of inspiration absolutely wonderful (as in full of wonder). He was beautiful to watch in the studio: he would sing the bass line he was playing, check this video: he is about 10 million miles away from planet Earth, cruising in a parallel universe of notes, sounds, rhythm.
FORWARD is filled of ear candy (dang, how does Bitty pull off such harmonies!?!?), but it is also HEAVY AS LEAD, no scratch that, HEAVY AS URANIUM (the heaviest element found in nature). Bitty and I wanted FORWARD to represent Sly & Robbie’s signature sound: raw, tuff and HUGE.
Having said that, Sly & Robbie didn’t want to recreate something that came out 40 years ago like some of those “new” artists that are content to sample their productions from the 80s (without crediting them, by the way, cheeky cheeky). Always striving to explore new territories, Sly & Robbie gave us a contemporary TAXI sound. Bitty did a pretty good mixing job, to say the least. Not only is he the best Reggae singer of his generation, he is also a world class engineer (by the way, he started his career in the music industry as a sound engineering).
You don’t believe me? Please do yourself a favor and check out “Glass House” and “Where is your love” and its dub companion “Where is your dub” and let me know which current Reggae release competes on the drum and bass front…
… awkward silence …
… Yeah, that’s what I thought: no matter how hard they try, nobody, anywhere, anyhow, can top Sly & Robbie. No contemporary Reggae act matches the “umph” factor that Sly & Robbie bring to the table on FORWARD, period. They sound thin, make that skinny, compared to the Riddim Twins’ deluge of huge sound.
Robert Warren Dale Shakespeare departed Earth on December 8, 2021 after a year long battle. That day, I lost a fantastic musical partner and mentor, but also and more importantly, a dear, dear friend. That distressed me so much I didn’t have the heart to produce music. It took a few months to mentally get it back together.
So in 2022, we put a Soul music project on the back burner because we felt it was essential to record an album in memory of Robbie. We curated riddims among those we had in the vaults, Sly sent a few more. Bitty and I wanted this album to be the absolute best possible so as to be worthy of all the love, the guidance, the friendship that was bestowed upon us by Robbie. Robbie would have never let us release a half-assed, or even a sad and depressed album, and FORWARD is anything but that. It is an ode to wholesome love and upright righteousness, in other words “uprighteousness” that we hope the notoriously demanding Robbie can appreciate where he is right now.
Anyway, enough literature, here is some music: click on the link to listen to excerpts
FORWARD will come out in February 2023:
- the “regular” edition will feature 12 tracks on all streaming and download platforms
- A deluxe edition with a couple of bonus dub tracks will be available exclusively on our TaxiTabou1 Bandcamp store https://taxitabou1.bandcamp.com/
- an NFT edition offering NFTs containing extended discomix versions of all songs as well as a lathe cut vinyl EP will be available on the http://www.tabou1.com NFT platform due to open in the first quarter of 2023 (more on that later)
- Later in 2023, we plan to release a vinyl LP
Before I close, Bitty and I wish to pay tribute to a few magnificent fallen soldiers that we were uber-blessed to work with and hang out with. Robbie Shakespeare, our dear friend, of course comes to mind, but let’s not ever forget Uzzaiah “Sticky” Thompson, who would bring the most delicious mangos, Noel “Skully” Sims, who always had jokes galore, the humble yet imperial Michael “Mao” Chung and the inimitable Darryl Thompson. Thank you for the hours of joy.
Guillaume Bougard Reggae Musings 