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Chinese Dub

Throughout July and August 2008, Jah Wobble, legendary bass player and contemporary renaissance man, toured the UK with his new project, Chinese Dub, a 22-piece Anglo-Chinese aural and visual spectacular. Combining his trademark dub with Chinese melodies and instrumentation, the maverick music-maker successfully married East and West sensibilities, proving once again that his creative adventurousness is far removed from others’ world music dilettantism.  The tour culminated in an appearance on the BBC Radio 3 stage at WOMAD in what was, for many media commentators and punters alike, the highlight of the festival.  

Chinese Dub, a studio album produced by Jah Wobble, includes singers Mongolian/Tibetan Gu Yin Ji and Wang Jingqi, from the Mao ethnic minority of China, part of Yunnan Province (both handpicked by Jah Wobble on a visit to China in 2007), internationally acclaimed guzheng player Zi Lan Liao, flutist Clive Bell, and Wobble himself, the Pagoda Chinese Youth Orchestra also features.

........Absolutely Fascinating Dub, and a huge audience, stretching  far  away from the BBC Radio 3 stage, roaring their approval. You have to see it live to see all the unusual elements of the mask theatre and everything else that goes along with it.
Radio 3 Womad Live

Jah Wobble gave the performance of the festival. ... Wobble,played forceful basslines that could have performed CPR two fields away....Dub and Chinese music proved a perfect mixture. The earnest folk melodies leavened the dub’s conceptual self-importance; the dub hardened the Chinese music against kitsch. As if to demonstrate the kinship, the band played Augustus Pablo’s “Java”, echoing with melodica and a guzheng solo dovetailed in as the rhythm dropped out. Midway,....Wobble brought on two mask-changing dancers. As they twirled and high kicked, red and yellow silk cloaks whipping around them, their masks constantly changed from one eyeblink to the next, expressions and colours and designs constantly transforming as hands flashed across faces. It was a moment of stage magic so surprising, and so inexplicable, that the audience was dumbstruck.

Financial Time - Womad Festival - Charlton Park

WOMAD's conversation piece this year occurred at the 11th hour, when Jah Wobble's dazzling, circus-like Chinese Dub Orchestra left us spellbound. As the musicians packed up a guzheng zither, Jew's harp, electric guitar, classical flute and Chinese percussion, Wobble unplugged the bass which had subtly driven the performance. Wobble is one of world music's most intelligently eclectic mavericks. He swapped the Invaders of the Heart for this project, but never abandons his passion for dub-reggae. His basslines and melodic, stomping and dub-echoey ? accompany music more Chinese than dub but even on 'L1 Dub' and 'L1', where the boat is pushed closest to Jamaica, Zi Lan Liao's tangy guzheng-picking complements the electric guitar's stark 1960s twang. The two singers with Mongolian and Tibetan backgrounds bring vocal riches without any off-putting shrillness. 'Walking the Horse' and 'Horse Mountain Song' are sung by Gu Ying Ji, evoking the Mongolian plains, and Wang Jingqu's richer voice, on 'Happy Tibetan Girl' is a rivalling high point. In 'Yellow Mountain' (and its dub version), Clive Bell's classical flute paints Chinese landscapes as Wobble and Zi maintain a fugue-like dance around the zither's ice-crisp melodies. Has the wandering bass player found his home?

Sue Steward - Songlines

For more reviews, check chinesedub Review.