Big Youth’s reggae classic Dread Locks Dread is being reissued as part of the Black Story campaign. Out of print for over 20 years, the beloved dub album was remastered at Abbey Road Studios, London.

Dread Locks Dread was originally released in 1975 on the short-lived London-based KLIK Records. The album features performances from the legendary Skin, Flesh & Bones band, formed around bassist Lloyd Parks, drummer Sly Dunbar (pre Sly and Robbie), keyboardist Ansel Collins, and trombonist Vin Gordon. The album was produced by “Prince” Tony Robinson and Errol Thompson and was mixed at Joe Gibb’s legendary studio.

Dread Locks Dread includes a rework of Dennis Brown’s “Some Like It Hot” (“Some Like It Dread”), a version of Burning Spear’s “Marcus Garvey” (“Marcus Garvey Dread”), a take on the John Holt classic “Keep on Moving” (“Moving On”), and a dub of the Techniques’ rocksteady masterpiece “You Don’t Care.”

Three years later, Dread Locks Dread was reissued as a key release by Virgin’s reggae subsidiary Front Line. By then, Big Youth’s distinctive toast and political lyrics had found fans among punk and new wave artists, among them The Clash, via Don Letts, and Public Image Ltd, whose vocalist, John Lydon, traveled with Richard Branson’s A&R envoy to Jamaica to help sign artists to Front Line.

Dread Locks Dread arrives as part of Black Story, a reissue and rediscovery initiative created to tell the history of Black artists that shaped UK music. This year’s full campaign will arrive during Black History Month in the UK, and will include works by Gabrielle, Neneh Cherry, Rizzle Kicks, and The Joe Harriott Quintet. Black Story launched in 2023 with a series of 10 iconic titles including Michael Smith’s Mi Cyaan Believe It, Linton Kwesi Johnson’s Forces of Victory, Ms. Dynamite’s A Little Deeper, and more.