Clement S. Dodd

Studio One

By the time Heartbeat brought its first collection of Studio One music to the market in February 1983, the Jamaican label had already released over two hundred albums. The amount of singles (in all their permutations) that Studio One has released in its over forty-five years of existence in itself is staggering. This is also the label that discovered, and in many cases, helped create the legacy of artists who consequently became international legends, from Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, and Bunny Wailer of the Wailers to Burning Spear, Marcia Griffiths, and Freddie McGregor. But most amazing is the sheer volume of great songs that were produced at Studio One by Clement S. Dodd, a true legend himself. Clement Dodd started his first label in response to the increasing scarcity of American R&B material to use at the many dances that he held or played at in Jamaica in the late fifties. (There is good reason to believe he would have started recording for himself eventually anyway.) His early releases set the groundwork for the sound that became known in Jamaica as ska. Dodd’s Studio One ska recordings, anchored by the music of the legendary Skatalites, ruled the early dancehalls. Ska’s fever tempo cooled out in 1966, and the bass line became more essential as rock steady would carry the swing for the next 2+ years. Studio One was there with new singers and harmony groups. The Heptones, Alton Ellis, Marcia Griffiths, and Bob Andy sang some of rock steady’s sweetest notes over the contrastingly gritty musical accompaniment that Studio One is most remembered for. In 1968, reggae took over as Jamaica’s popular music with perhaps the first reggae song being Larry Marshall’s “Mean Girl.” The next year, future international sensations Burning Spear and Dennis Brown came to Studio One to record their own special brands of reggae music. Dennis Alcapone’s Forever Version LP was released in 1971 and the practice of DJs toasting over classic Studio One rhythms would dominate reggae for the next 25 years. By the mid seventies, the rhythm tracks for many of his big hits had joined the lexicon of Jamaican popular culture. Their usage helped establish the success of labels like Channel One and producers like Bunny Lee. The wholesale appropriation of these same rhythm tracks by today’s dancehall producers has only been matched by their brazen sampling of the original Studio One rhythms. When people go out to dance in Jamaica, the hits that they now enjoy are copies of the label’s earlier material. Song after song, thirty-five year old rhythms still charge through the charts as if they were brand new. If there weren’t so many masterful rhythms and bass lines in the Studio One catalog for others to use, the magic of today’s dancehall might not exist. It is important to understand why Studio One is so venerated. The obvious common ingredient in all the classic songs that Studio One has released over the last forty-five years is Clement Dodd. From his earliest days as a producer, he understood the complexities of making a hit. Mr. Dodd valued good singing, good songwriting, good horn lines and fierce bass lines. Most important, however, were his ears. He knew how to listen. Most other producers hear something and wish to be part of it, to just recreate. They are afraid to listen to young artist or new ideas – if it isn’t already successful they don’t want to know about it. Nothing was ever done at Studio One without the express approval of Clement Dodd. When the band would balk at recording a new artist with an unorthodox style, Mr. Dodd would tell them to bear with him and try it. Suffice to say he was almost always right. Clement Dodd passed away in 2004, doing what he loved, working in his Brentford Road studio. He was awarded Jamaica’s Order of Distinction, was introduced into the Reggae Hall Of Fame, and Brentford Road was renamed Studio One Boulevard, yet nothing speaks more eloquently of his contributions than the music of Studio One.