Given the size of its West Indian diaspora community, it should come as no surprise that there are quite a few fine reggae producers in England. Fertile reggae scenes in London, Bristol, Birmingham, and other cultural centers have fostered the production careers of such important names as Neil Fraser (a.k.a. Mad Professor), Dennis Bovell (a.k.a. Blackbeard), Carroll Thompson – and Adrian Sherwood, who got his start as a freelance distributor of Jamaican records before founding a few small labels on his own. Eventually he organized – rather loosely – a conglomeration of expatriate Jamaican musicians and booked shows for them under the name Singers and Players. Their success led to a broadening of his contacts and associations, and in 1981 Sherwood created a label and studio he called On-U Sound. There he worked with his growing cohort of collaborators in varying combinations, producing singles and albums credited to Singers and Players, New Age Steppers, Creation Rebel, Dub Syndicate, and other bands, most of which shared members with each other and some of which only recorded a handful of singles.
The most durable of these ensembles was Dub Syndicate, the one constant member of which was drummer Lincoln “Style” Scott. Scott was also a founding member of the legendary Jamaican studio band Roots Radics; in that group, together with bassist Errol “Flabba” Holt, he had created a signature style that focused on deceptively simple-sounding but truly elephantine midtempo reggae grooves. These created a perfect test bed on which Sherwood could turn loose a variety of singers and other instrumentalists while exploring his own adventurous mixing ideas. Dub Syndicate released albums for several decades until Scott died under suspicious circumstances in 2014.
Other artists with whom Sherwood worked on an ongoing basis included Tackhead (an ensemble that consisted largely of former members of the Sugar Hill Gang, the studio band that was one of the primary architects of early hip hop), Andy Fairley (a spoken-word artist with a weird and unsettling vocal delivery), roots reggae crooner Bim Sherman, deejay Prince Far I, and the utterly unique African Head Charge, a band centered on percussionist and singer Bonjo Iyabinghi Noah whose sound was like a wild fusion of field recordings and avant-garde dub. He has also produced most of the albums by Little Axe, a solo project of Tackhead/Sugar House Gang guitarist Skip McDonald, whose style could be characterized as a sort of dubbed-out modern blues.
While On-U Sound was never a big moneymaker, over time Sherwood caught the attention of artists outside the reggae community who were attracted by his growing reputation for adventurous, heavyweight production. He would eventually produce albums and create remixes for artists as varied as Cabaret Voltaire, Sinéad O’Connor, Einstürzende Neubauten, Nine Inch Nails, and Simply Red. He has also released several albums under his own name, on which he called in musical IOUs from a wide variety of singers and players; he has also recorded several collaborative albums with dubstep legend Pinch.
The On-U Sound label has continued in fits and starts since its founding, releasing spurts of albums and singles and then going temporarily quiet before picking up again. Much of the label’s formerly out-of-print back catalog is now available via Bandcamp.