Full of Dubs: Delton Screechie x Sylvain Morris

If you take a singer that I’ve never heard of, have him release an album on an imprint (Moa Anbessa) I’m not familiar with, the likelihood of my checking out the disc is pretty low. But if Sylvain Morris and Winston Brown (the Professor) split time between King Tubby’s studio and that of Harry J during the recording process, I’m bound to be interested. Delton Screechie, apart from having a positively cool name that folks aren’t apt to forget, is one of the singers littering late ‘70s reggae that either just never really got a fair shot at fame or simply quit too soon.

This deejay apparently only had a few long players released with one being inna showcase style that also featured Kojak – another singer that didn’t really make a huge name for himself. But regardless of that, by late ’82 Screechie would be at the end of his recording career. The singer apparently went on to work some behind the boards dates up and into the ‘90s, none of which met with too much international success. Again, it’s just odd to see the production credits affixed to Suffering in the Ghetto while knowing that it didn’t really do a brisk business.

And while the majority of the work represented on the disc is at least listenable, Screechie does occasionally sing outta key -  making pretty much all of “Be Cool” difficult to listen to. This critique doesn’t mean that Screechie didn’t (or doesn’t currently) have a voice tailored for reagge. It’s just that on this particular track, no one let him know that he was off – where was Sylvain Morris on that one? But despite the singer’s ability to find the right key, the lyrics that he seeks to dispense are more than adequate for a conscious roots effort. He gets into what his mother taught him and the usual trappings of offerings of this nature.

Elsewhere on the disc, Screechie lauds the spread of reggae as on “Reggae Gone International.” Not overly deep in a lyrical sense, Screechie simply states over and over again how and why this music has made in roads all over the world – “You can rock to it/You can skank to it.” It’s not a heavy handed examination, but the track does lend ample dub backing to these slight vocals. Here too, though, the vocals represented on the track don’t reach much past ample, perhaps pointing to why Screechie’s languished in relative obscurity over time.

What does grant this disc a bit more entertainment value, again, is the production work that accompanies each track. Morris might not be the best known producer – of dub or otherwise – but his work certainly has its place amongst the biggest names in the genre. His work isn’t as sparse as the Scientist of Lee Perry. It, in fact, seems relatively full in comparison to those dub stalwarts. But Morris is able to basically steal the spotlight from the singer – even in the mix that this disc received, Screechie’s vocals are occasionally drowned out amidst the horn section that crops up every once in a while. That just all means that listeners should come for the singing, but stay for the dubs.