Nucleus Roots: Heart of Dub

We’ve been featured some amazing dub oriented records lately. Why? Because teachers LOVE to play Bob Marley in class. But his music represnts a small fraction of what this awesome style of music has to offer. (Deep respect to Bob) Dub tends to be more chilled out and instrumental, which is why it’s perfect for your class flow, or for just chillin’ out with a cup of chai late in the afternoon.

The ideology behind Nucleus Roots was to create a studio resource for the abundant and obvious talent existing in Manchester. The studio focused on reggae, as the studio grew, so did the catalogue of artists, arrangements and songs. The Nucleus Roots studio then created a platform for the artists in the form of the "Nucleus Roots band".

The Band was established in 1996 from the ashes of Manchester’s highly acclaimed punky reggae band, Community Charge. In the early days nucleus roots was a ten piece reggae band featuring some of the most respected musicians playing on the UK circuit, with P. Lush (bass), Richie Sliva (drums), P. Teck (keyboards and synthesizers), Steely and Gary (guitar), Mikey Congo (percussion), Clive Stuart heading the nucleus roots brass section, fronted by the wide ranging vocal talents of Moses and the explosive lyrics of Des Nia Lashimba.

With this powerful line up and a string of well received gigs under their belt, nucleus roots soon established a large fan base and acclaim from respected roots sounds. Manchester’s heavyweight sound system, Freedom Masses likened nucleus roots to the sound of Joe Gibbs.

In the Autumn of 1998, Potential Development an organisation based in Manchester offered nucleus roots a support slot with Leeds based sound system Iration Steppas. Due to the limited size of the stage at the venue, nucleus roots embarked on taking the studio out, incorporated a mixing desk plus FX for the first time live and invited an old Community Charge friend Dub Dadda to mix the sound. The gig was a great success and with this winning formula nucleus roots carved a new and exciting path to follow. In 1999 Continental Drifts approached nucleus roots to play at Glastonbury. The show was extremely well received and the band was subsequently voted the “best up and coming underground band” that year. This established nucleus roots as a force within in the UK underground circuit. Many major gigs followed both in the UK and Europe. The band have been a regular feature at Glastonbury playing the Firestarter Stage (1999), the Avalon and Greenpeace Stage (2000) the famed Jazz Stage (2002) and the anarchic Lost Vagueness big top (2003).

Unable to obtain a distribution deal in the UK, nucleus roots looked to the continent and secured themselves a deal with Too Good Distribution in France and Universal Egg for the rest of the European territories.

Nucleus roots have continued to evolve musically, productively and in stature. Having released four classic reggae albums they have become recognised for their unique and authentic roots productions.