UK Dub started getting noticed in the early nineties. It gatecrashed its way onto the Reggae scene, trod on a few toes and caused a bit of a fuss before finding a little space to do its thing. Paul Fox was an artist who perfectly represented an aspect of UK style Roots and Dub. He was young, brash, raw and very English.

With all the new producers coming onto the scene you'd have been forgiven for expecting more singers like him to come through. It was something of a false dawn. The UK style music has expanded its influence around the world, but a meager number of new vocalists have been brought along for the ride.

 

If you blinked you might have missed Paul Fox's releases over the last decade, but 2008 has seen something of a resurgence from him. He's still singing and has his own studio in the rather unlikely location of Winchester in Hampshire. Its a cathedral city that's known for its public schools and romantic poets, but as I travelled down from London I knew that I was following in the footsteps of Michael Rose who recorded an album with Paul, that has been released this year. What was a legendary Rasta singer doing down there amongst the Hampshire hogs?

"It was an odd series of events. In January 2006 a friend of mine called The Outsider was on his way to a dance when he was phoned by the promoter, who asked him to pick somebody up from a tube station. It turned out to be Michael Rose. So they had a chat on the way to the dance and at the end he gave Michael a lift back as well. Michael was staying in London and didn't have any transport, so The Outsider agreed to do a bit of driving for him. Stuff like taking him to studios to do specials and driving him back again. After a few days The Outsider asked if he'd be willing to record a couple of tunes for us down here in Winchester. His first reaction was no!"

We talked in Paul's comfortable studio room at his house; it's a relaxing place to be and Paul tipped back in his chair and laughed as he remembered being snubbed by the Black Uhuru singer.

"He didn't want to go and work in some studio he knew nothing about. Eventually though, The Outsider convinced him and he came down to record two songs for us. That was still quite early in 2006. One of the tunes was 'Ceasefire'. I'm normally quite level headed. Everybody is just a normal person to me, I don't see particular artists as 'stars'. But I've been listening to Michael Rose since I was about fifteen! I couldn't believe he was coming down to the studio. I know that he's worked in some fantastic places and I was a bit nervous about him walking in here. But he wanted to do some pure digital stuff, was quite happy and turned out to be really nice to work with."

Paul revived his Sound Business label to release "Ceasefire' in 2006. It's a tuff tune, somewhat underrated at the time. Mr Rose is a prolific artist, but one of the things that lifts 'Ceasefire' out of the ordinary is the backing vocals that Paul supplied.

"He said "why don't you put some backing vocals on that tune that aren't using the same words I'm using?" That was lovely; being on the same record as Michael Rose! He was in England for about a year and we stayed in touch. I'd do a mix and then me and The Outsider would go over to see Michael in Notting Hill to play it to him. We eventually said that we had final mixes and were going to put it out. He was happy. Then he gave me a call and asked if I'd be interested in recording a whole album with him on the basis that he would be paying me this time. So of course I just said yeah! Absolutely! Come down and record an album."

 

Paul has a long standing collaboration with Jonah Dan and together they are the twin pillars of the group Shades Of Black. When I interviewed Jonah in September 2007 I heard that they had been working on an album with Michael Rose in Winchester, and made a mental note to find out more. I know from talking to other producers who've had the Grammy kid in their studio that there are usually stories to tell. Paul is extremely open and unaffected. He was more than happy to share his experiences.

"I used to drive up to London, pick Michael up, drive down here, do a day or an afternoon's recording, drive back in the evening, drop him off and drive home. Hard work. Seven or eight hours driving in a day as well as working in the studio."

The album 'Great Expectations' is a good deal more varied than I had expected.

"The only rhythm that was designed specifically for the album is 'Momento'. All the others were tracks that I'd been working on. The conversations we'd have on these driving trips between London and the studio, and the kind of music I was playing in the car would have some influence on what happened in the studio that day. The Nyahbinghi one came about because I just happened to have a CD full of Binghi tunes in the car and we were talking about it. So we did "Mama Africa'. When we recorded 'Letter To Myself', what we'd been listening to all the way down was Mary J Blige, Ashanti and stuff like that."

The fact that 'Great Expectations' avoids a predictable UK Dub blueprint is one thing. But Shades Of Black doing Reggaeton, as they do on 'Momento', how did that happen?

"Michael phoned me and asked if I had any Reggaeton tunes. I hadn't even heard of it! He asked me to put together a Reggaeton rhythm track, so I did some investigating, tried to understand how the tunes are put together and came up with that. He was happy with it."

Paul can also claim to be the first producer to put auto-tune on the legendary Waterhouse wail, ahead of the smash hits like 'Shoot Out' and 'Real Jamaican'. Opinion is divided as to whether its a creative use of the technology or a sacrilege.

"He said "why don't you try putting that effect on my voice?" Prior to that he hadn't used it before. I really like it, it sounds really nice."

British artists and producers have often spoken about the lightening speed that the Jamaicans are able to work at in the studio.

"Yeah, it doesn't take Michael long to work out what he's gonna do on a tune. He didn't want to hear any of the tunes in advance. I suggested that I give him a CD and he got used to the tracks, but he wasn't having it. he wanted me to put on a track, not ask him if he liked it, and he was going to sing on it. He'd have some notes and stuff that he'd refer to, but generally after listening to the tune for a minute we'd be ready to record an entire song in one take. Then we'd go back and fine tune some aspects of it. He did ask my opinion, but on the whole I just let him do what he was doing. To have something that's coherent, rhymes and has got a chorus; off the top of your head ... unbelievable! I'd be sitting here facing the computer screen, getting ready on the record button, clicking record and he'd be stood behind me doing his thing. I'd be concentrating on making sure all the levels were right, that nothing was going to crash and that there was no noise pollution. Then I'd suddenly get the realisation that its Michael Rose I'm recording!"

It's easy to see why Michael would feel comfortable working with Paul. he's completely unassuming, friendly and natural; and it's an agreeable environment.

"He left England not long after recording the album. Then Jonah Dan came to do bongos. Fellipe Souljah did a load of guitar on it and Fullness from the Dubheart band recorded the horns. I took my time, mixed it and decided to do a Dub album at the same time. To you and me the albums sound more organic than some of the UK productions we're used to, but what I was coming across when I was sending it out to people, especially in America, was that their ears are just not tuned to the digital thing. Third World, Bob Marley or Burning Spear feels natural to them. The UK thing sounds very digital, rigid and robotic. But Gerry McCarthy, from Rhythm Club Records in the States, liked that aspect of it and agreed to put it out. I'm glad we went down that route because it's reached more people than if I'd put it out myself. I don't really have the time to do any of the promotion or distribution legwork. It hasn't had a UK release yet, but RCR are talking about putting it out here later this year. It's available in Europe, America, Australia and Japan. 'Mama Africa' was pressed up on a 7" in Jamaica."

 

As a parting gift Michael recorded an extra track 'Babylon Kingdom Fall' which he said Paul could use however he wanted to. It's a killer tune that Jah Shaka played at his massive 'comeback' dance at Wembley.

"Me and Jonah pressed 750 copies because everyone was moaning about the scene and telling us that you can't sell many records. The copies just disappeared and we didn't repress it. Maybe some people missed it because it went so fast and you can't get it anymore."

In 1992 when Paul started recording, he was close to the heart of the UK Dub scene; voicing at Manasseh Studio in Brixton, having his tunes played on Joey Jay's radio show and setting up the Word Sound & Power label with Robert Tribulation. The seeds of this career had been sown whilst living in Jamaica for a year.

"Over here singing in public is an embarrassment or a sign of madness. In Jamaica it's quite normal. Here you say "how does that tune go?" and the usual response is "I'm not going to sing it". Ask the same question in Jamaica and they'll sing you a fantastic rendition. After a while I got used to that and having a little sing-song. When I came back to England aged twenty or twenty one I bought myself a little four track. I could sing vaguely in tune and I felt my voice wasn't anything to be embarrassed about. Becoming a singer was less to do with confidence for me and more with realising that there weren't going to be riots in the street if some people thought my tune sounded awful. You know, I thought it should sound OK amongst some of the other stuff that gets released. I've never put on an accent, I've always spoken in my natural voice. When I sing it's the same. I have a very English sounding voice. It means that in Reggae my voice is the odd one out. To some people that means I don't sound quite right. I never worried about it, I just enjoy singing."

Just like the new digital UK music itself, he had a sound that divided opinion. Like anything new, for some it was a change too far. Every wave of British Reggae has struggled with the issue of authenticity. Unlike UK Hip-Hop, UK Reggae has yet to become entirely comfortable with its own voice. Paul could certainly lay claim to his fair share of authenticity. He grew up in the London Borough of Lewisham, the breeding ground of amongst others Saxon and Jah Shaka soundsystems; Shaka is even his Mum's cousin. But there was little encouragement for a new generation of vocalists.

"Unless you were Jamaican or an established artist, people didn't seem that interested. It was from the point of view that they were asking how legitimate you were, how valid your experience was when you'd grown up in London. To a certain extent we're headed towards a situation where we won't have any singers because we don't invest in the here and now. I didn't disappear, but I drifted away a bit because of this attitude."

It all seems so irrelevant in 2008. Today collectors search e-bay for Paul's 'classic' early recordings and London is the 'authentic' home of a UK Dub sound that has conquered the world. Paul tours with Alpha & Omega, they've been in Italy, Croatia and Slovenia recently and will visit Switzerland, France and Sweden soon. And don't forget who was the producer of the latest Michael Rose album at the same time as 'Shoot Out' was the number one Reggae song in the Caribbean and the US; good timing or what?

"This year has been a flurry of activity for me because I've had the two Michael Rose albums out, a Dubstep tune, I've recorded some stuff for Tighten Up in France, a tune for Dan-I in Italy, a bunch of tunes for Alpha & Omega that are going to come on an album and I'm trying to get a Shades Of Black album together with Jonah that will be seven tunes from this studio and seven from Inner Sanctuary."

Paul now has to turn down some of the work he's offered because he hasn't got time to fit it all around his day job.

"I would have loved to make my living just from music, but I'm happy with the balance that I've got now. There is no pressure on me to make a certain kind of tune, keep a level of profile or anything like that. I made the choice to move out of London and the balance in my life has shifted towards family. I didn't do any touring for a few years and I did have a few doubts before my first show after such a long break. I felt a bit 'who am I?' kind of thing. But it didn't last and as soon as I started singing I thought, yeah, I love doing this."

Paul's very first album was called 'Ease Up The Pressure'. It just goes to show what good advice that was.

 

August 2008

 

Paul Fox Myspace: www.myspace.com/paulfoxshadesofblack

Paul Fox photographed by www.rainbowconsulting.co.uk