King Tubby

The sound system and the studio

Osbourne Ruddock was born on January 28, 1941 in Kingston and died on February 6, 1989, aged 48. Treble says the name came from his mother's surname, Tubman. He studied electronics, and by the late 1950s was repairing radios and building amplifiers for Kingston sound systems from an electrical shop on Drumalie Avenue. The founding of his Tubby's Hometown Hi-Fi sound system is dated 1958 by Ableton and Reggaeville and 1968 by Wikipedia and Niceup, with U-Roy as its featured toaster. In 1961 or 1962 he built a transmitter and briefly ran a pirate station. In 1968 he became a disc cutter for Duke Reid at Treasure Isle, and in 1971 he opened his own studio at Waterhouse, with an MCI desk obtained from Dynamic Sounds and Byron Lee with help from Bunny Lee.

In 1973 a vocal booth was built in a converted bathroom, and he made Blackboard Jungle Dub with Lee Perry. By 1974 Bunny Lee was his foremost client, supplying hundreds of rhythms, and Steve Barrow wrote in Blood & Fire's liner notes that nobody had ever heard remixing done to the extent that dub was deconstructing these vocals. His 1975 records The Roots of Dub and Dub from the Roots, on Total Sounds, sold very well. Prince Jammy began working at the studio in 1976 and Scientist was among those he mentored; Pat Kelly and Philip Smart also engineered there. His equipment included the custom 12-channel MCI desk, a high-pass filter with a large knob, and a homemade echo unit and faders. Mixes were performed live, tracks dropped in and out as tape played.

He completed a new studio in 1985 and launched the Waterhouse, Firehouse and Kingston 11 labels, with 1988 top-ten hits for Courtney Melody, Thriller U and King Everald. Treble counts about 30 albums under his own name, and others include King Tubby Meets the Upsetter at the Grass Roots of Dub (1974), King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown (Augustus Pablo, 1976) and Sly and Robbie Meet King Tubby (1984). Mikey Dread said King Tubby truly understood sound in a scientific sense, and Wikipedia credits him as inventor of the remix concept later common in dance and electronic music. Tavares Strachan's bronze bust Ruin of a Giant was shown at the Hayward Gallery in 2024. The documentary I Am the Gorgon follows Bunny Lee.