I have just re-listened to it, perhaps after 46-odd years, and realised what a gorgeous, joyful record it is. It is absolutely wonderful!
But, I have to say, it was a bit weird buying at the time. It was hardly played on Radio One and it seemed odd. Just unusual.
It was, I learn now, the first “dub” record to hit the charts. It made Number 9 in the UK charts in 1974.
Here’s a little bit of what it says about the record on The Register:
In late 1974, out of nowhere, the first dub hit anywhere in the world leapt into the UK Top Ten.
Upon its release that autumn, Rupie Edwards’ innovatory Ire Feelings had received virtually no airtime on London’s Capital Radio and even less on BBC Radio One – the country’s biggest stations – but the demand from kids in discos and clubs made the haunting, echoing reggae 45 into a massive hit.
And it wasn’t just a “new” artist they were hearing – Edwards, a Jamaican, had never been anywhere near the British charts before – but an entire new genre, perhaps the first that genuinely fused both modern culture and the latest technology.
“I’d actually booked the studio that day to record Shorty The President,” says Edwards now, “and Shorty was late and I had this song in my head to do. So I dropped it. ‘Feeling High’ – and trust me, I was – and Errol Thompson, the mixer from Studio One was then working for me. And we had this big copper pipe I’d dragged in off the street and I whacked it, recorded it, just for the sound. And Errol said ‘I like working with you, you’re always trying new things’.
“So we recorded the song and the next day we mixed it and at one point Errol said, ‘Hang on, it’s different, it’s changed, we should start again’. And I said ‘no, no’, ‘cos I knew that if we started mixing again we’d never get it back. So we finished it and Pat Kelly mastered it, then I left a copy with my partner in the shop I had on West Parade, downtown Kingston. And she rang me that same evening saying, ‘Every time I play it the street block up!’”
I found this passage in a book called “Old Newbury” in the Newburyport Library (which is quite magnificent). It says: “From the very beginning, Newbury was Reverend Parker’s town, named for the community in England where he had last preached, and it was his family and neighbors who would form the core of the new settlement along the banks of the Quascacunquen River.” (now also called “Parker River”).
The destination board of Boston North railway station has familiar names for residents of Berkshire and Dorset in England.
The sign at Newburyport railway station. Newburyport, Massachusetts is a big maritime town with lots of 19th century buidlings. It is very neat and pretty – obviously wealthy. It has a museum and library, both of which bear witness to the migration of settlers from Wiltshire and Berkshire in the 17th century.
The main street in Newburyport, Massachusetts.
Newburyport marina fronting onto the Parker River.
Newbury, Massachusetts is a short walk away and, by contrast with Newburyport, is a small, quiet village. It has this fine Lutheran church. The sign says that the church has gathered regularly since 1635.
The “First Parish Burying Ground” is opposite the Lutheran church and contains graves with names familiar to residents of Wiltshire and Berkshire in England such as “Knight”, “Little” and “Freeman”.
The Old Newbury Fire Museum in Newbury, Massachusetts
The Old Newbury Museum in Newburyport
Sign for the Old Newbury Museum.
This finely decorated child’s cot is in the Old Newbury Museum and is said to have come across on one of the ships which brought the settlers across from England. I think it was the “Mary and Jane” ship but I cannot recall the name for certain.
Newbury Street in Boston, Massachusetts, is a very wealthy street with many up-market restaurants and fine clothes shops. It was so named to celebrate the Roundheads winning the 1643 Battle of Newbury. The Puritans who inhabited Boston were delighted with this victory.
