Great. Stone.

Prince Alla – Stone
Freedom Sounds – no cat. # (B.B. 88 X-A & B.B. 88 X-B matrix)
Vinyl, 7", 45 RPM, Jamaica, 1976
info

As noisy as it is, this single is still one of the most treasured records buried in my crates- Stone by roots singer Prince Alla. I'll keep it short this time, but if you don't already know it and have even a slight interest in reggae or dub, please give this one a try.

Prince Alla's original on the A side is powerful. His always excellent vocals were at the height of their powers delivering the dread lyrics, a Rastaman's reminder of Nebuchadnezzar's dream and a warning to oppressors that Daniel's prophecy of a "great stone, come to mash down Rome" was on the way. The song was produced by Bertram Brown in 1976 for his Greenwich Farm based Freedom Sounds label. The Soul Syndicate band played the backing rhythm, as noteworthy as Alla's singing. It features a beautiful and memorable organ line that will stick with you as clearly as the vocal melody (performed, I believe, by the late, great Jamaican keyboardist Gladstone "Gladdy" Anderson, but possibly by Keith Sterling who also played as part of the Soul Syndicate during that period). Drummer Carlton "Santa" Davis lays down an unusual beat for a '70s roots reggae cut, from the distinctive opening fill to the throbbing, almost "four on the floor" kick drum. (Santa is another legend who played on more classics that you can count, but who's guaranteed weekly spins in this house if only because of his contribution to the mighty Stalag 17 rhythm and to Bunny Lee's "flying cymbals" style that I've mentioned before.)  

Ok, so Stone is a great song, but Great Stone, the dub version on the flipside of the single, is a whole other thing. King Tubby, the engineer and studio genius who pushed the "recording studio as instrument" ideas of dub into an art of their own, delivers a truly inspired mix on this cut. Tubby directly added sound effects of rolling thunder and explosions (made by physically hitting a spring reverb with the tape rolling?), but didn't just pile it on. Like the best dub, he gives us a taste of that organ line and Prince Alla's vocals, then peels them away leaving the bass and drums to consume all the additional space. The brilliant use of echo applied to Santa's drums winds up creating a double time beat that sounds like something electronic music producers 30 years later would have dreamt of pulling together. Somewhere around the one minute mark, Tubby seems to have invented drum and bass a good 20 years before Brits were dancing to it in clubs and the second half of the song launches into outer space, only pulled back into orbit as glimpses of the original song slide back into the mix.

In a total of about six and half minutes for both sides, Prince Alla delivers a classic that I've sung to myself for a couple decades now while King Tubby hits us with one of his most stunning dubs. 20 years after their original release, the sorely missed Blood & Fire record label issued two compilations that helped rescue these amazing songs from their drift to obscurity (info here and here). It's a damn shame that they haven't been kept in print since B&F closed its doors around 2006, don't hesitate to grab a copy if you get a chance. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this, one of my favorites. Hopefully recording this crackly 45 helps keep these sounds in circulation and inspiring some new ears. 

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Tracklist
A        Prince Alla    –    Stone
B        King Tubby's    –    Grate Stone

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And it's so low, don't you know? They can't get under FLAC (download zip file):

https://mega.nz/file/YXgWwabD#7tPlSDuT-3mk7MzX-WDk_BSTecuFlqKSpC2eKhyp0ew

Dread. dread stone just a come to mash down the MP3 (stream or download):

https://mega.nz/folder/ATwmACoa#N2N3JiGFxuMSB8qhtQ1V3g