World of Jamaican Music

Discover artists and hear songs from everyone on the site! Log in to Spotify in this browser to hear full songs. SourcesYour Voice

An illustrated map of the creators of Jamaican music and how they are connected.

Remembering Derrick Harriott (1939-2026), rocksteady singer and producer. Read his story →

The Revolutionaries

Band. Reggae, dub

Active
1975-1980s
Also recorded as
Sly & the Revolutionaries

The Revolutionaries were the house band at Channel One, set up in the mid-1970s by Joseph "Jojo" Hoo Kim to follow Skin, Flesh and Bones, and the band on which the rockers sound of the second half of the 1970s was built. The name belonged to the room rather than to a fixed group: it was the billing for whoever played on sessions produced there by Joseph and Ernest Hoo Kim.

At its center were Sly Dunbar on drums and, on bass, Robbie Shakespeare or Bertram "Ranchie" McLean. Around them were Ansel Collins, Ossie Hibbert, Errol "Tarzan" Nelson, and Robbie Lyn on keyboards; Radcliffe "Dougie" Bryan on guitar; Uziah "Sticky" Thompson and Noel "Scully" Simms on percussion; and a horn section of Tommy McCook, Herman Marquis, Bobby Ellis, and Vin Gordon, with Headley Bennett on some sessions. Earl "Chinna" Smith and Tony Chin sat in on guitar, Bernard "Touter" Harvey on keyboards, and Leroy "Horsemouth" Wallace or Carlton "Santa" Davis on drums.

A good deal of what they played was built on older material. Channel One's method was to re-cut the Studio One riddim catalog in a harder form. Sly Dunbar's four-beat bass drum pattern gave the results their character, and the Mighty Diamonds' Right Time (1976), produced by Hoo Kim, is the album most often named as the model. Dunbar said he had Philadelphia International's records in mind, and that "if wi have a good drum sound the studio would tek off"; Bunny Diamond called the result "heavy, rootsy." The Rough Guide associates the beat first with Augustus Pablo and then with Dunbar, and Bradley credits Sly and Robbie.

Channel One reissued the riddims as dub on its own labels, mixed in the studio by Ernest Hoo Kim and the engineer known as Barnabas; Reaction in Dub (1978) and Goldmine Dub (1979) are the best known, along with instrumentals such as "M.P.L.A." and "Death in the Arena." As a backing band they recorded with B. B. Seaton, Black Uhuru, Culture, Prince Alla, Leroy Smart, Gregory Isaacs, John Holt, the Heptones, I-Roy, Tappa Zukie, Trinity, U Brown, and Errol Scorcher, among many others.

The same musicians recorded as the Aggrovators for Bunny Lee, the Impact All-Stars at Randy's, the Professionals for Joe Gibbs, and the Black Disciples for Jack Ruby; the billing followed the producer. Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare first worked as a fixed pair in this band, and took the partnership with them when they founded Taxi at the end of the decade.

Last updated November 5, 2026

Connections

Notes

  1. The books differ on the year. The Rough Guide says the distinctive Channel One sound emerged in mid-1975 and that Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare "began playing together regularly in 1975," with the house band "built around" them. Steve Barrow and Peter Dalton, The Rough Guide to Reggae, 3rd ed. (London: Rough Guides, 2004), 156. Bradley says Channel One did not employ the Revolutionaries until 1976, when the Hoo Kims "took on Skin, Flesh and Bone as a group to become the backbone" of the band. Lloyd Bradley, This Is Reggae Music: The Story of Jamaica's Music (New York: Grove Press, 2001), 335, 354. Wikipedia gives 1975. "The Revolutionaries," Wikipedia, accessed October 5, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Revolutionaries.
  2. Bradley calls them "the Maxfield Avenue studio's house band." Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 358. On the brothers, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 156.
  3. The Rough Guide: "Bertram 'Ranchie' McClean sometimes took Robbie Shakespeare's place." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 157; see also Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 354.
  4. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 156-57; Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 358, which adds Headley Bennett to the horns. Scully Simms and Bobby Ellis are listed in "The Revolutionaries," Wikipedia. No source was read for Chinna Smith, Tony Chin, Touter Harvey, Horsemouth Wallace or Santa Davis sitting in.
  5. The Rough Guide says their rhythms "were mostly based on Studio One classics from the previous decade." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 157.
  6. The Rough Guide says the Revolutionaries' updates and the Diamonds' harmonies "more or less defined the 'rockers' phase." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 160; on the 1975 single and the 1976 album, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 157.
  7. Howard Campbell, "Revolutionary Sound," Jamaica Observer, September 14, 2013, https://jamaicaobserver.com/2013/09/14/revolutionary-sound, which names McLean as the band's core bassist and has Shakespeare on guitar on several sessions.
  8. Bradley credits Sly and Robbie with the rockers "rhythm pattern." Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 335. The Rough Guide associates rockers first with Augustus Pablo and then with Sly Dunbar and the Revolutionaries. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 449.
  9. On the Hoo Kims' dub albums, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 230, and on Ernest Hoo Kim's mixing, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 241; on Barnabus as an engineer, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 234; on "MPLA" and the other instrumental singles, Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 229. Katz dates "MPLA" to 1976 and says Robbie Shakespeare played piano on it. David Katz, "Sly Dunbar Obituary," Guardian, January 27, 2026, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2026/jan/27/sly-dunbar-obituary. "Reaction in Dub" came out in Britain on Cha Cha in 1978 and "Goldmine Dub" on Greensleeves in 1979, rather than on Channel One's own labels. "The Revolutionaries - Reaction In Dub," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/186984; "The Revolutionaires - Goldmine Dub," Discogs, accessed October 5, 2026, https://www.discogs.com/master/186981.
  10. The list of artists is from "The Revolutionaries," Wikipedia. The Rough Guide singles out Leroy Smart and John Holt. Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 157.
  11. The Rough Guide notes that several Revolutionaries "also played with Bunny Lee's Aggrovators," and calls Joe Gibbs's band "essentially the Channel One Revolutionaries, usually substituting Lloyd Parkes for Robbie Shakespeare." Barrow and Dalton, Rough Guide to Reggae, 157, 229. On the Impact All-Stars, Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 330. No source was read for the Black Disciples.
  12. Bradley: the Revolutionaries "hooked Sly Dunbar up with Robbie Shakespeare." Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 335. By the end of the 1970s the Roots Radics "had superseded the Revolutionaries." Bradley, This Is Reggae Music, 480. No source was read for the date of Taxi's founding.

World of Jamaican Music: the whole map