Soundsystem/Soundclash Tapes

S/D Sounclash tapes - new answers

Huh, I thought there were people here into ragga/dancehall. Though I can see soundclashes as having a fairly limited or specialized audience. Found some great realplayer clips of early dancehall live sets, the Stur Mars 1986 in particular is outstanding:
http://www.jubierock.com/jubie.php?link=dvds

I haven't delved very deeply into live dancehall sets, but one classic recording that's easy to get and very good is the A Dee-Jay Explosion in a Dance Hall Style on Heartbeat.

From the write up: "Twenty-one track bonanza of live dancehall DJing, recorded at a live, Heartbeat-sponsored DJ session, held at Kingston's famous Skateland venue in 1981. Features all the top DJs of the time, including Brigadier Jerry, Eek-A-Mouse, Yellowman, Michigan and Smiley, Ranking Toyan, Sister Nancy, and others. The first album to capture the live vibes of an authentic sound system dance."

Thanks arch, I was not aware of that recording. I don't doubt that it is the first sound system dance recorded, most of the tapes I see go back to '84 at the earliest. The ones I'm really interested in are the mid-80s to mid 90s where you get the crossover from foundation riddims to digital riddims. Lots of clashes are sampled in early ragga jungle tracks (and even people like Squarepusher) so I like coming across the sources of these samples along the way. Sometimes the yelling during the dub fi dubs can get annoying but it's also one of the things that make them interesting.

This site has good descriptions of individual clash tapes (if you click on the years on the left hand side)
http://www.supersonic-sound.de/yrdtapes/index.htm
Nice to see a lot of the early sound systems are still going today like Stone Love, Black Kat, Poison Dart, etc.

Actually scratch that "first album" thing above. Unless they just mean properly released album. That link I posted has recordings of Jah Love Musik clashes from late 70s and there's even a Tubbys from '75!