| Sugar Minott has been singing positive roots music for over three decades. He has been an innovator, a leader, a mentor, a producer, a label owner and sound system operator in his many years in the business. His biggest hits, songs like "Oh Mr. DC," "River Jordan," "Herbman Hustling," "Rub A Dub Sound," "Devil Pickney," have become reggae standards and part of the canon of Jamaican music.
He first began working with Easy Star on Easy Star Volume One, when he recorded "Born In The Ghetto (Have Mercy)," a song Michael G had written with Sugar in mind.
Since then, Easy Star and Sugar have had a long, fruitful musical relationship and friendship. Easy Star has released four albums of material from his fabled Black Roots label. Hidden Treasures Volume One and Hidden Treasures Volume Two both document Sugar's tremendous skills as a producer, collecting 40 singles from Black Roots, including songs by Horace Andy, Tenor Saw, Alton Ellis, Garnett Silk, Barrington Levy and many others. Ghetto-Ology +Dub is a re-issue of one of Sugar's earliest self-productions, cut soon after he left Studio One at the end of the 70s. It is paired for the first time on CD with the complete dub version mixed by King Tubby and Prince Jammy. Rare Gems is a collection of some of Sugar's own hard-to-find recordings. Rare Gems won the 2002 INDIE award for Best Reggae Album. Sugar also had a song featured on the Can't Stop Us Now release, which he had recorded for producer Linval Thompson in the early 80s.
Sugar's most recent work with Easy Star is a brilliant vocal performance of "Exit Music (For A Film)" on the Radiodread release. Sugar's evocative voice took Thom Yorke's original lyrics and melody into spine tingling territory. |
