Freedom” makes its CD debut • Includes some of biggest Jamaican hits of the late 1960s • Numerous tracks unavailable on CD for decades The dawning of the rock steady sound, late in 1966, eliminated the need for record producers to employ horn sections, a consequence of which was to significantly reduce studio costs. The development enabled a new generation of young, dynamic music makers to make a mark upon Jamaica’s recording industry and of these, few proved more successful or influential than Clancy Eccles. By the late Sixties, Eccles had become firmly established as one of the island’s premiere producers, having been a pivotal figure in the development of reggae during the latter half of 1968. The following year he scored his biggest hit, the rambunctious ‘Fattie Fattie’, which sold in huge amounts both at home and the UK, where a chart placing for the disc was only denied by the lack of recognition of sales from Jamaican music retailers. The single’s popularity prompted Trojan Records to issue Eccles’s debut long-player, “Freedom”, which gathered the best of his self-produced recordings as a singer. The album’s release coincided with a second LP of his work that showcased his most recent instrumental productions with top session crew, the Dynamites, along with a trio of tracks featuring pioneering DJ toaster, King Stitt, whose ground-breaking hit, ‘Fire Corner’, provided the collection’s title. Both of these seminal boss reggae sets feature on this essential 2CD compilation, which is further enhanced by 13 additional vocal sides from the late Sixties along with the remaining recorded works of both King Stitt and the Dynamites, from 1969: the year reggae went outernational
