Some of Japan's top reggae musicians get together under the guidance of Masakazu Nagai to create a unique sounding ska album. Musicians include Masakazu Nagai, keyboardist with Ska Flames.

Reggae has always had a following in Japan, a trend that continues until today. Compilation of young Japanese reggae artists. These include Chee, Chehon, Rickie-G, Domino Kat & Romir, Nissin, Da Pump, Arare and more.


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Japan's dub pioneer is back with a new album of his cool trumpet dub doodling. New versions of tunes originally recorded by his seminal group Mute Beat, Bob Marley (Jah Live Dub, Sun is Shining) and Gregory Isaacs (One More Time) covers and even versions of What a Wonderful World and From Russia with Love, the theme song for the Bond film. Comes as a set with a 30 minute DVD of live performance, recording with interviews.

Kazufumi Kodama is back in a new guise as Kodama and the Dub Station Band. Not much change in the music though. More of the brilliant reggae/dub trumpet sound set over a cool backing from a brilliant band. 10 tracks.


Price:   £17.99

Latest album from trumpet player, with his usual cool, laid back dub sound. His trumpet lays over mainly programmed beats and synthesized sounds. Comes with an extra video clip and deluxe packaging envelope style booklet. Up to the usual high standard of this highly respected musician, who influenced a new generation of Japanese dub musicians.

Superb compilation of songs taken from throughout the trumpet playing dub master's illustrious career from his Mute Beat days to solo including fairly rare tracks such as Mute Beat's first singles, and every significant album since. Kodama has always been backed by talented musicians, including Takayoshi Matsunaga on bass, Gota Yashiki on drums, Hirofumi Asamoto on keyboards, and guests including UA, Rico Rodriguez, Hakase (Little Tempo) and many others. A great introduction to the work of a significant artist, still remembered for his scintillating show at WOMAD in the UK.


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Out takes and tunes that Kodama recorded for soundtracks. Features Tico from Little Tempo and Yoshie Nakano of the excellent Ego Wrappin. Atmospheric and brilliant from the dub trumpeter.

Heavy, dark dub from one of Japan's dub originators, with distinctive trumpet playing blending perfectly with dub instrumentation, includes bizarre trumpet solo version of 'O Little Town of Bethlehem', otherwise the album's centerpiece is Kodama's own composition, 'Requiem'.


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Latest album by dub outfit is heavy dub version of their 'From Creation' album. Probably deeper, rootsier dub than any other Japanese dub outfit, and collaborators with the UK's Asian Dub Foundation. Regular performers overseas including WOMAD and many other festivals around the world.

Dub master and trumpeter (ex-Mute Beat) Kodama releases an album of classy,swirling dub including guest vocalist UA on one track, otherwise instrumental. Fantastic stuff. Made a big impression at a WOMAD festival in the UK a few years ago.


Price:   £18.99

Best of compilation of Kazufumi Kodama's now legendary dub band. Strong melodies played on trumpet to heavy dub backing.

Kodama and drummer Yashiki Gota (drummer with Simply Red) live album from 1996 with ex Mute Beat members.


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Third album and first for five years from the hip hop / rap artist from Sapporo, Hokkaido. More of their edgy, experimental, dubby hip-hop. Includes guest vocalist Yoshie Nakano from Ego-Wrappin.

From Sapporo, Hokkaido, Tha Blue Herb are one of Japan's finest hip-hop / rap artists. Tha Blue Herb have developed their own creative sound and style, undeniably hip, but not pandering to the latest trends, with a strong electronic vibe attached to their pertinent lyrics. This album features 3 Tha Blue Herb tracks together with other artists they have signed to their own Tha Blue Herb Recordings label. These are the excellent Shuren The Fire, O.N.O., Jun Gold and Naohito Uchiyama. Jazzy beats, soul and dub feature on an album that showcases the very best in Japanese hip-hop. While Tokyo usually dominates musical trends in Japan, it's in the north, Sapporo, that hip-hop has come of age. Booklet comes with English transaltions of the lyrics.


Price:   £18.99

Tha Blue Herb from Sapporo, Hokkaido feature rapper Ill Bostino, producer O.N.O and live dj, DJ Dye. This is their first full album from 1998 that also comes with former vinyl only releases. Edgy political hip-hop that incoporates other styles and one of the originals of the Japanese underground.

Tha Blue Herb's second album released in 2002, more experimental abstract hip-hop with a strong electronica vibe.


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New album from the brilliant Little Tempo, mixing dub, reggae, calypso and more into a cool, club sound. 1. Little Journey 2. Tropical Rock 3. Yama to Umi 4. Ran de vou 5. Mellow Stone 6. Sky High 7. In The Rain 8. Dance Killer 9. Onsen Monogatari 10. Over The Rainbow 11. Hoshizora

To mark their 13th anniversary the super dub calypso band release a live album of some of their best know tunes. Little Tempo are not a studio based group, but are talented musicians who even in the studio prefer to play live, and here the energy of a Little Tempo is captured for the first time.


Price:   £17.99

A best of compilation of tracks from tracks from between 1999 and 2001. Includes a track from the film 'Muno No Hito' and elsewhere featuring the wonderful Eddie Reader and Linton Kwesi Johnson. Good place to discover the excellent dup/reggae/calypso sounds of Little Tempo.

Dub remix of Little Tempo's most recent album, 'Super Tempo'. Dub/reggae with trademark steel pan laying down the melody. Two tracks feature legendary trombone player Rico Rodriguez and percussionist Tony Uter. Excellent.


Price:   £16.99

New album from the steel pan reggae and dub outfit. Includes covers of Summertime and My Baby Just Cares for Me, alongside originals. Good, without breaking new ground.

Dub mix of their excellent Musical Brain Food album. Calypso steel pan and heavy dub mixture.


Price:   £18.99

Fantastic new album from the steel drum and dub instrumental outfit, one of the most original Japanese bands.

Strictly instrumental dub album of songs previously recorded by Little Tempo. In some ways more satisfying than their usual output.


Price:   £18.99

A kind of calypso club reggae dub band whose lead instrument is steel pan drums. It's a very nice sound, although their choice of songs to cover sometimes lets them down. Here the Beatles get the Little Tempo treatment.

Calypso/reggae/dub and club mixture.


Price:   £18.99

Excellent Japanese dub unit, includes unlikely guest vocalist Linda Lewis, plus Fresh Funky Four and Trio Esperanca. 12 tracks.

Japanese and Western pop songs end up as ska, reggae, rock steady and calypso tunes in the hands of this excellent reggae outfit.

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Excellent rock steady and dub band, includes songs by Bunny Lee and Joe Gibbs sung in Japanese.

Excellent Japanese Dub outfit produced by Kazufumi Kodama (Mute Beat), with 3 tracks given a dub mix by Dry & Heavy.


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Likkle Mai, used to be the female singer with acclaimed Japanese dub unit Dry & Heavy. Now, she has decided to go solo and releases her first solo album. It's decidedly more pop oriented than Dry & Heavy and she sings in Japanese (as opposed to English in D&H) on three tracks, perhaps in an attempt to popularize reggae with 30 something Japanese females. Perhaps not as cool as Dry & Heavy but a confident debut worth seeking out.

Tenth album from Japan's perennial high energy ska band.


Price:   £18.99

TSPO have for many years now been one of Japan's most exciting live acts.There are so many high energy workouts on this, it's exhausting just to listen. It's not straight Jamaican ska though, more rock ska such as their versions of Skaravan, Ska me Crazy, Tin Tin Deo, and The King of the Mosh Pit.

Excellent album of heavy dub mixes by including Chari Chari, Dub Squad, Dry and Heavy and others. Nine superb tracks.


Price:   £18.99

Brilliant dub outfit, who combine dub sounds with heavy electronic dance rhythms to stunning effect. Six pulsating tracks.

This exilerating CDbegins with Japanese festival (ondo) music before launching into a Japanese ondo raggamuffin workout. It continues in much the same vain, pulsating modern festival music, before going out on the same traditional note.


Price:   £18.99