The Poetry of Dub

In Michael E. Veals book Dub he states that “although dub music is largely an instrumental medium, one of the most immediately recognizable sonic features of the dub mix is the way song lyrics are omitted and/or fragmented…”(P.64) along with “the interplay of echo and equalization enabled engineers to make simulated sound spaces as if they were continually morphing in dimension and texture”. (P.73) With in the first ten seconds of the song “A Rougher Version” by King Tubby featuring The Aggrovators we hear song lyrics but it is only about a 20 second clip of an echoing voice talking about being oppressed and humbling yourself, which is slowly being smothered by underlying rhythm of trumpets or horns that is coming forward. At the end of the snippet of lyrics the voice trails off in an eco that morphs into the underlying rhythm that is smothering it. The voice echoes back into existence about half way through the song. Stating only time will tell and not to end badly. Which the words are accented by the rhythm of random horns or trumpets that can be heard through out the song. The voice echoes back one more time towards the end of the song but the lyrics are sung and the echoing effect makes the words non distinguishing from one another and eco into each other making there own beat on top of the already slow and methodical tempo. Because of the use of the eco effect on every note in the song the beat is very jerky and almost gives you the feeling of walking around with something weighing you down. Which would make since that the feeling of the song matches the topic of being oppressed.