Dub has been around since Osbourne “King Tubby” Ruddock and Lee “Scratch” Perry developed it in the late 1960s, but the sound is relatively new for Taiwan.
Taimaica Soundsystem — its name is a combination of Taiwan and Jamaica — wants to establish this Jamaican reggae/dub sound here. The band’s music is an organic hybrid of live sound with electronic manipulation. Membership has grown from three musicians to nine over the last couple of years.
“We like dub music and lots of other music genres — that’s why we have nine members,” Taimaica member Dahu Hu said in an interview on Tuesday. “We all have different music backgrounds and it’s good for us ’cause we like people to dance with our music.”
PHOTO COURTESY OF TAIMAICA SOUNDSYSTEM
The band has both electronic and live musicians, with founding members Allen Liu (劉培倫), aka DJ @llenblow, and Liu Ru-lin (劉儒霖) on bass and guitar respectively, Shorty Liu (劉力予), aka DJ Shorty, on dub control and sampling, guitar player Angus Chen (陳俊安), Dahu Hu (胡汶其) on synthesizer, and drummer Agoo Lwi (呂思緯). The horn section is John Du (杜則翰) on trumpet and saxophonist Jaco Cheng (張朝凱). The sole female artist and the band’s newest member, Bambam Lin (林以樂), plays the organ.
Dub has an emphasis on bass that the band adheres to. Hu said: “The song usually starts from bass, and when the bass line is clear, then we start to jam.” The beat must be manipulated to drive the rhythm, and Hu said that drummer Lwi is “a robot — he can maintain our BPM [beats per minute] in a certain speed so we can sync our DJ stuff and the laptop’s BPM.” The band also uses a lot of delay effect. The result is reggae-dub with elements of funk and drum ’n’ bass.
Taimaica appears tomorrow night at Underworld with danceable, soulful reggae artists High Tide and ska band Skaraoke; on May 24 at an outdoor benefit concert for Myanmar Cyclone Relief; and at the Peace Festival, Hoping for Hoping, in June.
That US assistance was a model for Taiwan’s spectacular development success was early recognized by policymakers and analysts. In a report to the US Congress for the fiscal year 1962, former President John F. Kennedy noted Taiwan’s “rapid economic growth,” was “producing a substantial net gain in living.” Kennedy had a stake in Taiwan’s achievements and the US’ official development assistance (ODA) in general: In September 1961, his entreaty to make the 1960s a “decade of development,” and an accompanying proposal for dedicated legislation to this end, had been formalized by congressional passage of the Foreign Assistance Act. Two
Despite the intense sunshine, we were hardly breaking a sweat as we cruised along the flat, dedicated bike lane, well protected from the heat by a canopy of trees. The electric assist on the bikes likely made a difference, too. Far removed from the bustle and noise of the Taichung traffic, we admired the serene rural scenery, making our way over rivers, alongside rice paddies and through pear orchards. Our route for the day covered two bike paths that connect in Fengyuan District (豐原) and are best done together. The Hou-Feng Bike Path (后豐鐵馬道) runs southward from Houli District (后里) while the
President William Lai’s (賴清德) March 13 national security speech marked a turning point. He signaled that the government was finally getting serious about a whole-of-society approach to defending the nation. The presidential office summarized his speech succinctly: “President Lai introduced 17 major strategies to respond to five major national security and united front threats Taiwan now faces: China’s threat to national sovereignty, its threats from infiltration and espionage activities targeting Taiwan’s military, its threats aimed at obscuring the national identity of the people of Taiwan, its threats from united front infiltration into Taiwanese society through cross-strait exchanges, and its threats from
March 31 to April 6 On May 13, 1950, National Taiwan University Hospital otolaryngologist Su You-peng (蘇友鵬) was summoned to the director’s office. He thought someone had complained about him practicing the violin at night, but when he entered the room, he knew something was terribly wrong. He saw several burly men who appeared to be government secret agents, and three other resident doctors: internist Hsu Chiang (許強), dermatologist Hu Pao-chen (胡寶珍) and ophthalmologist Hu Hsin-lin (胡鑫麟). They were handcuffed, herded onto two jeeps and taken to the Secrecy Bureau (保密局) for questioning. Su was still in his doctor’s robes at
RSS