Scientist (musician)

Infobox musical artist


Img_capt = Scientist in 1980
Name = Hopeton Brown
Background = group_or_band
Alias = Scientist
Origin = flagicon|Jamaica Jamaica
Genre = Dub
Years_active =
Label = Greensleeves Records (originally)
Tuff Gong

Scientist, born Hopeton Brown in Kingston, Jamaica, 1960 (sometimes known as Overton Brown),Barrow, Steve & Dalton, Peter (2004) "The Rough Guide to Reggae", Rough Guides, ISBN 1-84353-329-4] was a protégé of King Tubby (Osbourne Ruddock), one of the originators of dub music.

Career

Brown was introduced to electronics by his father, who worked as a television and radio repair technician. He began building his own amplifiers and would buy transformers from Tubby's Dromilly Road studio, and while there would keep asking Tubby to give him a chance at mixing. He was taken on at Tubby's as an assistant, performing tasks such as winding transformer coils, and began working as a mixer in the mid-1970s, initially creating dubs of reworked Studio One rhythms for Don Mais' "Roots Tradition" label, given his chance when Prince Jammy cut short a mixing session for Mais because he was too tired to continue. The first hit record that he mixed was Barrington Levy's "Collie Weed".

He left King Tubby’s studio at the end of the 1970s and became the principal engineer for Channel One Studio when hired by the Hoo Kim brothers, giving him the chance to work on a 16-track mixing desk rather than the four tracks at Tubby's.Larkin, Colin (1998) "The Virgin Encyclopedia of Reggae", Virgin Books, ISBN 0-7535-0242-9]

He came to prominence in the early 1980s and produced many albums, his mixes featuring on many releases in the first part of the decade. In particular, he was the favourite engineer of Henry "Junjo" Lawes, for whom he mixed several albums featuring the Roots Radics, many based on tracks by Barrington Levy. He also did a lot of work for Linval Thompson and Jah Thomas. In 1982 he left Channel One to work at Tuff Gong studio as second engineer to Errol Brown. He then emigrated to the Washington, D.C. area in 1985, again to work in studios as a sound engineer.

He made a series of albums in the early 1980s, released on Greensleeves records with titles themed around Scientist's fictional achievements in fighting Space Invaders, Pac-Men, and Vampires, and winning the World Cup.

Half of his album 'Scientist Rids the World of the Evil Curse of the Vampires' is used on the soundtrack for the popular videogame Grand Theft Auto III. The tracks on the fictitious radio station 'K-Jah' are composed entirely of songs from this album. However, Scientist received no royalties for this and sued Rockstar Games unsuccessfully in a US court. The court ruled that according to precedent a recording mixer was not considered the author of a musical work, and so Rockstar were correct to treat the producer Henry "Junjo" Lawes as the copyright holder of the album. This ruling could be argued to neglect the fundamental difference between dub-reggae and other kinds of music - after all, the album is marketed as 'Scientist rids the world of the evil curse of the vampires': so the publishers and self identified licensors are prepared to attribute authorship to Hopeton Brown when it suits them, but not when it comes to paying him royalties. It can, however, be argued that Scientist was introduced to a much larger audience as a result of the licensing of his album to Rockstar, in which case he may have sold more albums as a result.

Partial discography

*"Introducing Scientist: The Best Dub Album in the World" (1980)
*"Allied Dub Selection" (1980) – with Papa Tad's
*"Heavyweight Dub Champion" (1980)
*"Big Showdown at King Tubby's" (1980) – with Prince Jammy
*"Scientist Meets the Space Invaders" (1981)
*"Scientist Rids the World of the Evil Curse of the Vampires" (1981)
*"Scientist Meets the Roots Radics" (1981)
*"Scientist in the Kingdom of Dub" (1981)
*"Scientific Dub" (1981) Tad's
*"Dub Landing Vol. 1" (1981)
*"Yabby You & Michael Prophet Meet Scientist at the Dub Station" (1981)
*"First, Second and Third Generation" (1981) – with King Tubby and Prince Jammy
*"Dub War" (1981)
*"World at War" (1981)
*"Dub Landing Vol. 2" (1982) – with Prince Jammy
*"High Priest of Dub" (1982)
*"Dub Duel" (1982) – with Crucial Bunny
*"Scientist Encounters Pac-Man" (1982)
*"Seducer Dub Wise" (1982)
*"Scientist Wins the World Cup" (1983)
*"Dub Duel at King Tubby's" (1983) – The Professor
*"Scientist & Jammy Strike Back" (1983) – with Prince Jammy
*"The People's Choice" (1983)
*"Crucial Cuts Vol. 1" (1984)
*"Crucial Cuts Vol. 2" (1984)
*"1999 Dub" (1984)
*"King of Dub" (1987)
*"International Heroes Dub" (1989)
*"Tribute to King Tubby" (1990)
*"Freedom Fighters Dub" (1995)
*"Dub in the Roots Tradition" (1996)
*"Repatriation Dub" (1996)
*"King Tubby Meets Scientist in a World of Dub" (1996) – with King Tubby
*"King Tubby's Meets Scientist at Dub Station" (1996) – with King Tubby
*"Dubbin With Horns" (1995)
*"Dub Science" (1997)
*"Dub Science, Dub For Daze, Volume 2" (1997)
*"Scientist Meets the Crazy Mad Professor at Channel One Studio" (1997)
*"Respect Due (Joseph I Meets the Scientist in Tribute to Jackie Mittoo)" (1999)
*"Mach 1 Beyond Sound Barrier" (1999)
*"Scientist Dubs Culture Into a Parallel Universe" (2000)
*"All Hail the Dub Head" (2001)
*"Ras Portrait" (2003)
*"Pockets of Resistance" (2003)
*"Scientist Meets The Pocket" (2003-2004)
*"Nightshade Meets Scientist" (2005) - featuring Wadi Gad
*"Dub From the Ghetto" (2006) (compilation)

References

External links

* [http://www.roots-archives.com/artist/86 Roots Archive profile]
* [http://www.xlr8r.com/content.php?uid=3B2F773B56B0FC66704ECB5249456966 XLR8R magazine story]
* [http://www.dubechoes.com "Dub Echoes", a documentary about dub's influence on the birth of drum n bass, electronic music and hip hop]