'80s producer looks for new sound

Howard Campbell, Gleaner Writer

The burly frame of producer Garfield Phillips stood out in the control room at the Mixing Lab studio in Kingston, where he conducted a recent recording session.

Best known in music circles as 'Sampalue', Phillips has been doing the studio rounds lately. He is preparing to relaunch his Diamond Rush label with a roster of established and budding acts such as Luciano, Marcia Griffiths and roots singer Brando.

Diamond Rush was among a flood of small labels that emerged in the dancehall during the late 1980s. Though it enjoyed minor success with songs by Sanchez and Frankie Paul, Diamond Rush really took off in the early 1990s, thanks to a saucy deejay named Lady Saw.

Now in his mid-40s, the dreadlocked Phillips says he is no longer interested in just breaking artistes.

Changing the music

"Wi a come change the music to wha it was originally, which is the live sound," he said during a break from recording. "Wi nah try bus' no artiste, wi have a camp wid some youth who sing from dem soul," he added.

"Dem jus' need someone fi believe inna dem."

Brando, a journeyman entertainer from St Elizabeth, is one of the acts Diamond Rush plans to concentrate on in 2011. The other is Qshan Deya, a big-voiced roots act who hails from St Vincent and The Grenadines.

Albums by Luciano and Griffiths are already complete and, according to Phillips, scheduled for a summer release. They would be the first full-length sets released by Diamond Rush since Facts Of Life by Dennis Brown in 2000.

Phillips said he became disillusioned with the music business at the start of the new century, choosing to settle in upstate New York where he operates a restaurant. He pointed to the absence of quality productions coming out of Jamaica as the main reason for his comeback.

"Is a new year, the people looking for new things, new sounds," he reasoned. "Wi waan bring back the old vibe but in a new way."

Given his lineage, there is little surprise Phillips has a strong preference for live recording. His father is Phil Pratt (real name George Phillips), the west Kingston producer who had a series of hit songs in the early 1970s with artistes like John Holt (My Heart Is Gone and Strange Things), Pat Kelly (Talk About Love) and Gregory Isaacs (All I Have Is Love).

The younger Phillips moved into the music business as a show promoter shortly after leaving Wolmer's Boys High School in 1983. Later that decade, he began producing new wave dancehall acts which at the time included Sanchez and Beenie Man.

His biggest success, however, has come with Marion Hall, a bawdy toaster from St Mary also known as Lady Saw. Phillips produced her risqué dancehall hit, Stab Out The Meat, the radio favourites Find A Good Man and Give Me The Reason, as well as the albums Lover Girl and Give Me The Reason, which were distributed by VP Records.

While he would welcome similar success for his latest productions, Phillips is in no hurry to shop them to a distributor.

"Wi keeping wi options open 'cause wi waan get mileage outa what wi doing," he said.

"Just like wid Lady Saw, wi waan si some results."