Socialist Roots Hi-Fi was a prominent Jamaican reggae sound system and record label owned by Tony Welch (aka Papa Roots) in the 1970s and early 1980s. It was originally named King Attorney (and before that Soul Attorney). The name changed in 1976 when Welch bought the set. Regular deejays included Ranking Trevor, U Brown, Jah Mikey and Nicodemus, alongside the regular selector Danny Dreadlocks. They received dub cuts from Bob Marley & The Wailers. After 1981, the group was known as Papa Roots Hi-Fi.
The sound system was strongly aligned with the Jamaican Peoples National Party and was instrumental in organizing local communities and attempting to promote peace at a time when Jamaica was racked by political violence. Socialist Roots record label released several records. The most successful was "Train to Zion", released in 1976, featuring U Brown and Linval Thompson. The peace song was one of the first 12" 45s issued in Jamaica.
Famous quotes containing the words socialist, roots, sound and/or system:
“I pass the test that says a man who isn’t a socialist at 20 has no heart, and a man who is a socialist at 40 has no head.”
—William Casey (1913–1987)
“Now fades the lasts long streak of snow,
Now burgeons every maze of quick
About the flowering squares, and thick
By ashen roots the violets blow.”
—Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)
“The sound of tireless voices is the price we pay for the right to hear the music of our own opinions. But there is also, it seems to me, a moment at which democracy must prove its capacity to act. Every man has a right to be heard; but no man has the right to strangle democracy with a single set of vocal chords.”
—Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965)
“Exploitation and oppression is not a matter of race. It is the system, the apparatus of world-wide brigandage called imperialism, which made the Powers behave the way they did. I have no illusions on this score, nor do I believe that any Asian nation or African nation, in the same state of dominance, and with the same system of colonial profit-amassing and plunder, would have behaved otherwise.”
—Han Suyin (b. 1917)