Culver City Dub Collective: Dos

By: Forrest Reda

Culver City Dub Collective (CCDC) allows percussionist-songwriter Adam Topol to spread his artistic wings a little more than his day job as Jack Johnson‘s drummer allows. With longtime friend, guitarist and engineer Franchot Tone, Topol has assembled a truly all-star cast to create an album that sounds like it was plucked from the used vinyl bins in the dub section of a London record store.

Musician friends like Merlo Podlewski (bass), Koool G. Murder (keys), Chris Joyner (vox) and David Ralicke (horns) appear on Dub Operating System (DOS) (Everloving), which also features appearances by Ben Harper, Jack Johnson, Money Mark, Piers Faccini, Matt Costa, Studio One vocalist Winston Jarret and Bedouin Soundclash singer Jay Malinowski.

Multiple vocalists result in varying moods. “Everything” (with Joyner) sounds like it could be a theme song from a Bond film. “Bad Reaction” (with Malinowski) is dancehall at its best. “Big Long Gun” (with Jarret) is classic Jamaican roots reggae, and the remix of “Crying Shame” (with Johnson) transforms an acoustic folk song into a groovy single. CCDC’s in-house vocalist Chris Joyner measures up well with the other singers. With the presence of so many guests it could have been easy for this album to come off sounding like a compilation, but Topol and Tone are the drivers of this busload of talent and their vision results in a cohesive collection of artists creating high art. DOS is an exploratory trip through dub variations that can be the soundtrack to anything that you want it to be.

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