Fire! The Federal musical director walks it like he talks it. Blazing horns and jazzy brilliance all round.

Routinely passed over, King Edwards ska is for the gods, so a phase of Dub Store reissues is a mouth-watering prospect.
This opening salvo is low-slung, moody, trombone-led fire.

The leader usually goes by the diminutive Ron, reserving Ran and Rad for his Pantomine sides. He was an Alpha Boys alumnus, a Soul Brother after Don D’s departure, and an Upsetter for Blackboard Jungle.

Wayne and Larry Douglas’ flip is the A-side of the original Rio 45, from 1965: a stomper illumined with sweet lyrics about suffering, gratitude, and fidelity.

Prince Buster rumpus.

Trump-card trumpet version of Joyride, aka Riding West.

Dynamite, previously unissued rocksteady version of the monumental Skatalites scorcher from a few years earlier.

Rollicking, mid-sixties, post-Skatalites ska thriller, led by Bobby Ellis and Roland Alphonso, with slightly different soloing to the original release.
Backed with a charming, forsaken, rare Summertairs: ‘I love you, Errol… come back today… but not too late… Errol, my dear.’

Scorcher. Ska at the threshold of rocksteady. Mittoo and Dizzy Moore do it to it.

With a sweet Hamlins on the flip.

A jewel-strewn glimpse of the couple of years it took this group to invent reggae, as the Studio One house-band from 1967 till the decade turned.
Mittoo and Robbie Lynn, Cedric, Horsemouth, Eric Frater (wielding a ‘Sound Dimension’ echo and delay), Sibbles, Ernest Ranglin and full crew.
Funkier than a mosquito’s tweeter.

A masterful, sublime cover of the Young Holt by the newly-formed Sound Dimension; backed with Roy Richards’ classic harmonica version of Summertime.