black ARK — Wikipedia

The Black Ark was the recording studio of the musician and producer of Reggae Lee “Scratch” Perry, who was created in 1974 in the house that Lee Perry had bought and in which he lived at 5 Cardiff Crescent, in the suburbs Chic Washington Gardens of Kingston in Jamaica. Electrically, the studio was designed entirely by King Tubby. Although this material was most modern at the opening of the studio, it became obsolete over the years but did not prevent the Black Ark from being the framework of the creation and recording of the most sounds innovative of the second half of the 1970s. It included a Soundcraft mixer, a tape tape -speaking 4 tracks , a grampian spring reverb and an echo module Roland Space Echo Re201, coupled with a prototype of Phaser Mutron Bi-Phase.

An example of Lee Perry’s inventiveness was his ability to record on a tape recorder 4 tracks so much that it outlined in sound quality the other Jamaican producers using the latest innovations. He constantly combined the tracks to release one and record new sounds over it. He used to integrate unusual noise into his titles, buried a microphone at the bottom of a palm to obtain a very low sound by hitting the trunk, using broken glass, crying of children, extracts from TV dialogues, or even blowing Watty Burnett in a cardboard roll to simulate a “Meuh” box. It is all these techniques and in particular the large number of sound layers that have made the sound of black ark is recognizable and unique. Paul Douglas mentioned, “Scratch had a particular sound and everyone was fascinated by his sound. He had this way of bringing things together; It was just sound and it influenced a lot of people. I even went to Black Ark with Eric Gale for this album Negril (album); I remember myself and Val Douglas, we posed a few tracks there, Eric Gale overwhelmed things on it, but honestly, I do not remember what happened to them. »Lee Perry and his studio were trainers by creating the reggae sub-genre called dub ^{[ first ]} .

In 1979, Lee “Scratch” Perry having already been disturbed for a few years, after his wife had left him, set fire to the studio which had enabled him to create some of the most innovative sounds of his time. According to family members, the studio was destroyed in 1983 because of an electrical problem, after an attempt to rebuild it. Lee Perry often said that he had destroyed him because of impure spirits Being in the studio (reference to unwanted people who often went to Black Ark).

Despite incredible music and vibes Magic of the black ark, towards the late 1970s, everything did not go well in the kingdom of Perry. Picnuts and vagabonds began to hit her nerves, and making music has become more and more difficult.

The fuel-fuel-marathon sessions with ganja and alcohol began to be felt on work. Island Records had considered some of his greatest recordings as insortable. Black Ark has also become the target of local bandits that have started to put pressure to obtain protective money.

Perry’s relationship with his wife began to fall into pieces. Polished and less polished requests failed to bring out the “weeds” of his garden; Soon, Scratch turned to larger methods to get rid of the undesirable Rudeboys. The Black Ark soon reached the boiling point, and a point of no return for Perry.

The black ark had stopped operating in 1979. Thrown physically, mentally, and spiritually, Lee Perry and his studio fell into pieces. His wife Pauline abandons her, taking the children with her. Perry finds himself on a stiff rope between imagination and reality, and the departure of his family seemed to drive it a little more in chaos.

A new and disturbing person emerged, and while Perry declared that it was a voluntary approach to clean the house of people he no longer wanted around him, the mood of the upset was clearly subject to concern. Visitors and journalists arrived at Lee Perry to find him venerating bananas, vandalizing the studio, and debit long and violent diatribes. Band coils were widespread on the floor, and the recording devices were almost unusable due to water damage that perfused through the holeed roof. The formerly powerful studio was now more or less a dumping ground.

In April 1979 , Perry received a visit from Henk Targowski, an impressario and the owner of the Black Star Liner, a production and distribution house based in Holland. Targowski wanted to distribute Lee Perry’s music, but was not prepared for the madness he met at Black Ark. With a few associates, Targowski decides to attempt a studio rescue, trying to put the studio back in working order. Funded by the Black Star Liner, the reconstruction work increased throughout the year 1980, the new equipment was ordered and installed. In the spring of 1980, however, the restoration project was abandoned, and the Black Star Liner team left Jamaica for good. What had been carefully rebuilt was vandalized, dismantled and destroyed by Perry.

In 1981, with its life and its studio in ruins, the upset left Jamaica and spent its New York time, and played in concerts of local reggae groups. A series of major concerts takes place, especially with the clash in New York in June 1982 . Perry then returns to Jamaica, and started soon after recording a new album, “Mystic Miracle Star”. It seems that after two years of confusion, Lee Perry found the form. However, the disaster was right at the corner of the street.

One morning in 1983, the Black Ark Studio was destroyed. The fire raged in the concrete structure, the temperature inside became so intense that the roof was finally blown away. The studio, a source of part of the most powerful music ever recorded, gradually falls into ruins. “The black ark was too black and too dread,” Perry explained later. “Although I am black, I have to burn it, to save my mind. He was too dark. He wanted to swallow me” the fiery destruction of the black arch has become a key point in Lee Perry legend. Lee Perry claimed several times that he had burned the studio itself in an access to frustration, but it is likely that we never know the exact cause of the fire-if it was lit by Perry’s own hand or caused by an electrical problem -but the destruction of the Black Ark Studio was complete ^{[ 2 ]} .