Customer Reviews

Complete Upsetter Collection

5 star:		(3)
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This is about the cheapest and most complete way I know of to experience the brilliance of Bob Marley and the Wailers' collaboration with Lee Perry and the Upsetters. Six CDs with nearly everything recorded by the Wailers with the Upsetters earns this CD set 5 stars alone. The sound quality, while nothing close to audiophile quality (and never will be), is also much improved over the deceptively named JAD Records CD set "The Complete Wailers 1967-1972 Part 2", which was not complete by any stretch. The improved sound could be due to the Trojan set using tapes a bit closer to the master tapes instead of DAT copies (although the dubs sourced from original 45s seemed to sound better on the JAD set).

There are a couple of problems with the set that really annoyed me. One was a sloppy edit point that marred the track "Reaction". If I could repair it seamlessly with wave editing software on my home PC, then Trojan should have been able to clean it up. The other is, while you are treated to two different takes of Duppy Conqueror, both have had the majority of their lyrics excised, rendering them unlistenable. But all in all, these were three tracks out of 110 total. I'll live with the mistakes.

If you plan on getting a "bootlegged" set of old Marley tracks get this one. But be warned that some songs have many versions (Small Axe has 7 different versions i think). All of them are the best quality of "bootlegged" tracks.

Claims to be the complete collection of tracks with Lee Perry ... 110 tracks on 6 discs for a cheap price can't be beat.

NOT for the new or casual fan. Lacks info and background about the set, no linear notes and tracklisting is bare minimum info (packaging is similar to the other TROJAN collection box sets). Read "catch a fire" by timothy white for the history of these tracks.

For a more toned down set, get the "trenchtown rock" anthology by trojan. 2 discs with about 50 tracks.

If you're into DUB, you probably already realize that this
period: when Marley was working with Lee Perry, is one of
the crowning moments of glory in the history of dub...
but it has been difficult to find good clean recordings
of these dub masterpieces; and even when you find a good
collection, many of the dubs aren't clean; that is, they
still have vocals that can annoy dub purists.
That's why this collection is a real treasure. Not only
are all the dub tracks extremely well remastered, they are
all vocal-clean. A good example of this is the dub for
African Herbman. This excellent dub has been weakened in the
past by recordings wherein you can hear Bob's vocal in the
background...but not in this box-set. All the dubs
are clean and excellently remastered; which therefore makes
this the definitive collection. The next best thing would've
been to have a CD with JUST the dubs so you don't have to
program for them throughout all six discs...but hey, beggars
can't be choosers. I'm thankful to have, AT LAST, these
momentous DUBS cleanly & well recorded. Thanks, Trojan.