Tommy McCook in Jazz and Dub

Counted amongst the short lived Skatalites, Tommy McCook may have become an even stronger player after his foray in that band. But beginning as a teenager, McCook toured JA as a jazzbo, working out his chops for some vacationing foreigners. Regardless of his background and how he arrived at his talent isn’t the point. It’s what the tenor man was able to do with it that matters. And on the countless recordings that he took part in during his forty plus years of work serve as an outline to the development of not just this player, but the music industry in Jamaica. That could be said for a number of folks, but none remain as well known and respected as this man here.

Beginning in ’65 McCook became as important a part of Duke Reid’s Treasure Isle imprint as any other musician. It can’t be said that the lion’s share of credit has been set upon the sax player’s shoulders for figuring rock steady, but he surely was amidst the musical shift. But with the Upsetter in full force by the end of the decade a further aural distinction was soon to be arrived at. And again, McCook and Treasure Isle were primed to be a part of it.

Released through Pressure Sounds, Pleasure Dub marks the culmination of Errol Brown’s work at the Tuff Gong Studio. Taking the reigns after the passing of his uncle, the late, great Duke Reid, Brown apparently helmed a number of sessions utilizing the Supersonics and the group’s leader McCook. Spread out over a few other volumes, the Treasure Dub discs have remained an integral part of not just McCook’s history, but JA music’s. Collected here on Pleasure Dub are a slew of familiar tracks obscured just enough by echo and those chopped up vocals as to present some weird, interesting yet inviting puzzle to reassemble.

Over the discs eighteen tracks, a spate of classics get revisited. The whirring studio trickery on “Ride De Dub” sends it into an ethereal space where it can be imagined that all involved – players and producers – realized what was being attained during the sessions. At best it can be said that this offering sums up the general vibe of the disc – a sort of laid back swagger brought out time and again by the well placed horn arrangements and the steady one drop of those echoed drums.

McCook might only be a household name to those hipped to his work through the Skatalites, but the work that he was and is still associated with continues to be uncovered. For a man who achieved all he needed to in order to remain famous for decades by the time he was thirty, the subsequent efforts set to tape are an astounding reminder of what can be accomplished with the sheer will of one’s talent. No one in JA could have ever expected for this music to be reissued thirty to forty years after its initial release. But that’s what it’s come to. Your ears will thank you…cop it well.