On-U Sound is a label inextricably linked with dub music, and the much-loved Starship Africa is arguably the definitive album-length dub record on the label. Originally recorded in 1978 (following the recording of Dub from Creation), the mighty Starship Africa was already envisioned as the debut album by one DJ Superstar, toasting over a series of rhythms performed by the basic Creation Rebel unit, with Misty in Roots' Tony Henry on superbly melodic bass. These original tapes have long since vanished - the project was cancelled and it would be another two years before Adrian Sherwood returned to them, while casting around for the maiden release by a new label he was involved with, 4D Rhythms (the immediate pre-cursor to On-U Sound). Remixing and re-recording the rhythms saw Jamaican drummer Style Scott (Roots Radics) recruited to play live over Charlie Eskimo Fox's original tapes (played backwards through the desk!); an additional half a dozen percussionists, drawn from whoever happened to be in the studio at the time, were also overdubbed. Rumoured to be the planned soundtrack of a Don Letts-directed film about ‘alien dreads from beyond the stars’ (!) it’s mixture of interplanetary sound effects and heavy, heavy bass pressure still has the ability to astonish.