Gregory Isaacs & Roots Radics

[Dave K]

well, i think the revolutionaries were gregory's "backing band" on most of the 70s stuff.
or in other words: mainly sly & robbie.

i cannot even recall a single roots radics backing for gregory at the moment.

The Radics back him for almost all of "the Lonely Lover", totally on his next LP, "More Gregory", and then onwards for other releases. And of course they did a few tours with Gregory.

The Radics "sound" was basically an emulation of the "Gregory one-drop" sound that Sly & Robbie applied to "Cool Ruler" and "Soon Forward". Sly & Robby were the studio dons at the time, and when Tosh took them on tour extensively in 78 and 79, it left an opening that the Radics filled. But that classic "one drop" sound they are famous for was basically "The Gregory Sound" that Sly & Robby had created.

After Sly & Robby returned, the spent much less time working for other producers (Germain, Phang, Clive Jarrett and Gussie come to mind as the only ones they worked with regularly), and starting focusing on their own Taxi label.

[jb welda]

not so sure about lonely lover (i thought that was more like sly and robbie) but pretty much from then on it was radics: night nurse, out deh etc plus radics were his backup band in live gigs from back before that, from the time after they were prince fari's backing outfit (the arabs) at least. from what i know i think they originally formed to back fari and came from the morwells basically. that would include style scott, bingi bunny, flabba holt and probably blacka morwell (morris wellington). just going by memory though.

radics surpass sly and robbie everytime imo.

one love
jah bill

[Dave K]

Hail Jah B

"Lonely Lover" has a couple backed by S&R ("Poor & Clean" is one, plus another track listed in the credits....it may be "Happy Anniversary", but I don't have the LP in front of me to check) but the rest is most definitely Radics.

The first incarnation of Radics actually didn't have Style Scott, "Santa" Davis was the drummer. Style joined later, when Santa was scooped up by Tosh for Word, Sound & Power. Sowell Radics was the lead guitarist until he moved to England, and then Dwight Pinkney took the lead guitar spot.

I definitely prefer the sound of the early Radics with Santa playing....for my ears, he and Lloyd Knibb are the best drummers to ever come out of JA. Listen to Santa's fills, he never repeats the same phrase exactly the same, whereas Style Scott, while steady like a metronome, is equally predictable.

[jb welda]

thanks dave but we disagree on a couple things: first of all i never cared for santa davis' style, too plodding to my ears, whereas style keeps things moving nicely. im also not really sure about that santa davis part...can you point out an album featuring radics with him on drums? i know after style quit they (re)hired santa and mentioned something about him being the original drummer but i dont recall him being listed as drummer for radics anywhere. dont mean its not true, i just never noticed it.

about lonely lover, from the sound of it i always thought it was radics but then im pretty sure it says sly and robbie on the cover for drum and bass credits.

but right here on roots archive heres what it says:

Backing Band : The Roots Radics
Drums : Sly Dunbar
Bass : Robbie Shakespeare

kind of funny, that. i dont recall the "backing band" part on the cover but maybe i should dig it out and look.


one love
jah bill

[DonBanyan]

well, i think the revolutionaries were gregory's "backing band" on most of the 70s stuff.
or in other words: mainly sly & robbie.

i cannot even recall a single roots radics backing for gregory at the moment.

Gregory did continue playing past the 70's. Night Nurse, Out Deh, and half of More Gregory are the Radics.

DB

[Chaz]

"More Greogory" and "Night Nurse" are both Radics backed.

[Dave K]

thanks dave but we disagree on a couple things: first of all i never cared for santa davis' style, too plodding to my ears, whereas style keeps things moving nicely. im also not really sure about that santa davis part...can you point out an album featuring radics with him on drums? i know after style quit they (re)hired santa and mentioned something about him being the original drummer but i dont recall him being listed as drummer for radics anywhere. dont mean its not true, i just never noticed it.

Morning Bill

A couple of examples of The Radics early works to check with Santa on drums are Barrington Levy's "Dance Pon The Corner / Shaolin Temple " LPs, Flick Wilson's "School Days", and Michael Prophet's " Gunman", just to name a few.

Once Santa joined Tosh's band ('81, or maybe '82, I don't recall) Style took his place on the drumkit permanantly.

Re Prince Far-I: Santa played drums on the first set of Far-I tracks, and Far-I wanted him to go to England to tour. But after hearing what the pay was, he said he would rather stay home. But he recommended Style Scott to Far-I as a replacement, who was at the time just coming up, and hanging around Channel One a lot. He got the name "Style" because he was adept at copying Sly's drum fills. The nickname wasn't really complimentary at first.

Personally I check Santa as being on an entirely different level than Style, but I realize opinions vary when it comes to personal taste.

[Inyaki]

I love Santa's drumming, but Style's too...I can tell easily on Radics tracks who is the drummer by the rolls, the tuning of the drums and certail personal trademarks.

Santa was the original drummer with Radics (from 78-79), but there seems to be a period when both were playing at the same time during 80-81 (Style was in England quite often and Santa in California?), whoever was available would do the session. In some albums you can hear the 2 drummers.
Sly was with Peter Tosh till 82, by them Style had being doing Radics sessions for 2 years with Radics in Jamaica (and even London) under different names, as many as Santa.

Interesting calling Style's - Radics style "one drop"....cause to me is the opposite ( well, some people started a few years ago to call "one drop" to ANYTHING that is not Dancehall!!...but somebody as knowledgable as Dave K can add a true first hand and historical perspective.....Is that the way the called it in Jamaica in the early 80s when you were there?)

All the drummers I work with call this particular drumming style differently...when I need to explain to a drummer the feel, mostly I call it "Radics"! (everybody knows what you mean)
Is actually like a slow funk (kickdrum on the one plus snare on the two instead of rimshot)...I think Sly was the first one to do it in Reggae on record. But Santa did it too with Soul Syndicate, a kind of slow-funk-one drop (with the kick on the 1 and also on the 2, with the snare drop!)

But Style to me is the master...lethal hits!
He is a much better all-round drummer than most people believe and can play many styles. Same as Radics. They are famous for the minimalistic ultra heavyweight riddims (that some people on this forum considers the "end of the Roots era")...but the are much more than that to me.
Well, I really rate them:)

[vtov]

Radics sound can vary depending on producer and session (as for any band). Junjo dropped some of the heaviest mixes.

[seanmd]

i cannot even recall a single roots radics backing for gregory at the moment.

Tracks like Tune In were definitely backed by the roots radics.