Hi, I’m Adrian Sherwood. I am a music producer and I’ve run record labels all my adult life, as well as producing bands in the studio, and live. Eventually I put out a couple of records in my own name. I’ve been very, very fortunate as I have worked with lots of great artists from different backgrounds, but my main and first love is Jamaican music. I love the tonality and the equalisation, and the space that you find in a great production.

The first albums I was aware of as dubs were King Tubby Meets The Upsetter At The Grass Roots Of Dub and Ital Dub, both released in 1974. I was in secondary school and would go to a market stall in Wycombe run by my friend Joe, who we bought the records off.

Initially, with the two sides of records from Jamaican producers, one side would be a raw instrumental, which I found quite boring. I felt a bit cheated because I wanted to hear another song on the B-side. And then great people like Lee Perry and King Tubby started making the B-sides adventurous — they were the dubs that sounded exciting. There was a movement moving away from all the fun, rude reggae records and it started moving towards roots and culture. The dubs got more adventurous and they started using it as an album concept.

Producers started making instrumental albums — Augustus Pablo being one of the main players, and Lee Perry made albums like Blackboard Jungle (1973); these are really adventurous instrumental records. A dub is where elements are taken out and reverbs added, as well as delays and sound effects. They were really good because there weren’t lots of voices shouting at you; you could sit at home and have cups of tea or smoke weed or whatever. When these great records emerged, myself and a few friends would sit around listening to these wonderful instrumentals.

Jamaica went into a black consciousness movement and in the UK a lot of fans — i.e. the anti-fascist skinheads — related to the music. That’s where Madness and The Specials came in, making upbeat happy stuff; they suddenly filled the vacuum. The music also appealed to the Smokey Bears!