[Jah Son]

Hey all. There is an article about Tapes (UK- Jahtari) in the Inpress street press today. For anyone out of Melbourne with an interest here are the words for you to read.

ROLL PLAYER by Bob Baker Fish

Digital dub producer Tapes, aka Jackson Bailey, is a hard man to pin down. His promotional photographs often show him hiding behind a wall of gear with his face obscured. His musical output is similarly obscured behind a wall of tape hiss, a result of his obsession with working with the medium of cassette. As Tapes, Bailey produces a heady blend of digital dub, inspired by digital reggae’s pioneering producers, Prince Jammy and the later works of King Tubby, infused with a healthy dose of 8-bit/C-64 flavoured blips, filtered through a love of 1960s experimental synthesizer music from the vaults of BBCs Radiophonic Workshop, then finally mastered to cassette. This approach to his music fits Tapes squarely at home on Leipzig based digital laptop reggae net-label Jahtari, who’s output of vital, and mostly free to download, digital dub has kept listeners with an ear for inventive sounds happy for the last half a decade.

Jahtari have recently released the second Tapes EP, a 12” titled Hissing Theatricals, which has been described by online store Boomkat as “sounding like Mordant Music versioning a classic Tubbys as heard by moles under the streets of Kingston.” His first release Compuriddims, available as a free download from Jahtari.org (as well as on cassette, of course) has also been garnering favourable reviews. Tapes’ music is heavy on the bottom end, as all good dub/reggae should be, but differs from much new reggae and dub in it’s variety of external influences that inform its outcome. Under layers of tape hiss, Tapes creates a densely layered soundscape, equally referencing early 80s digital dancehall reggae as well as musique concrete and other esoteric sounds. The cover artwork for Compuriddims was fittingly created by Jimmy Cauty from renegade subversive music and art group The KLF.

When asked about his usage of cassette as a medium, Bailey suggests that it is in no way an attempt to rebel against current computer based recording practices. He states that he "is probably more of a tech-slave than your average man," and he does in fact use Max MSP. Cassettes for Bailey are more than important, more a way of life. He states " I don't see anything particularly rebellious about it, it's strange."

Instead he places a medical model on his fetish. "It's out of necessity," he offers, "I mean, I'm obsessed. I get sick if i don't listen to a tape pretty much everyday ."

Bailey also runs the, not surprisingly, cassette label C8 Singles, releasing limited edition tapes of a variety of digital/dub/dubstep/etc artists. This combination of old and new technology works despite being, as Bailey freely acknowledges, strange.

An expat New Zealander, now residing and working in the UK, Tapes recently dropped through Australia to play a handful of shows with International Observer, his father Tom Bailey’s renowned dub outfit. Tom Bailey is perhaps best known for his work as a member of 80’s synth pop outfit The Thompson Twins, so Jackson was exposed quite early to the wonders of the analogue synthesizer.

Tapes will be performing a showcase set at Basement Sessions, run by Melbourne’s bass heavy stalwarts, Heartical HiFi Outernational. This will be anything but your run of the mill show. Tapes performs live on two cassette decks, which by this point should come as little surprise, playing a mixture of his own productions, classic digital dub and reggae, as well as a swag of dubplates by Jahtari artists. Add to this the weight of the Heartical HiFi soundsystem, Melbourne’s premier dub and reggae soundsystem, a monster delivering the biggest bass drop in Australia, which was custom built by Stryka D to fill a gap in Melbourne’s reggae scene, then you have a fascinating combination of old school hiss and new school funk.

Yet this is what modern dub production is all about, strange techniques and one of the biggest most bass heavy sound systems Melbourne has to offer. Bailey of course says that he’s “looking forward to it, with bells on!” How can you argue.

TAPES plays BASEMENT SESSIONS at The Night Owl (33 Elizabeth St, City) on FRIDAY 15th JANUARY.



http://jahtari.org/artists/tapes.htm

[Dub Club Melbourne.]

Jahson and Bob Baker, great article.