Dub Side of the Moon is one of the great unlikely records. Easy Star All-Stars took Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and rebuilt it as reggae and dub, and instead of landing as a novelty it became a fixture, the kind of album people have owned for twenty years and still put on.
The live version comes to The Regent on October 21.
What makes it work is that the reinterpretation is serious. The band did not simply put a one-drop under Floyd's arrangements. They took the record's space and patience, which dub already understood better than most genres, and let the two sensibilities meet properly. Money becomes something you can skank to. The Great Gig in the Sky finds a completely different kind of ache. Us and Them was arguably always a dub record waiting for someone to notice.
Easy Star All-Stars have spent two decades touring this material along with their other reworkings, and the live show is a full band rather than a backing-track exercise. Horns, layered vocals, and live dub mixing at the desk. The echo and delay work happens in the room, which is the part recordings cannot capture.
The show is 18+. Doors at 7:00 PM, music at 8:00 PM. The Regent sits at 448 South Main in downtown Los Angeles.
The overlap between this record and cannabis culture requires no explanation and has never needed defending. Dark Side has been a headphone record for fifty years. The dub version is the one built for a room with a good system and people who are in no hurry.
October in Los Angeles is a decent stretch for shows like this, when the festival season has wound down and the mid-size rooms get the bookings that reward actually listening.
If you have only heard Dub Side on a speaker, the live mix is a genuinely different experience. Go for the low end alone.
Three nights later: Día de los Muertos at Hollywood Forever on October 24, the other LA night worth planning that week around.