Dubwurkz

Hosted by Sahara Dubwurkz will feature reggae artist doing dubplates live in the studio. Our program also features some interviews with such artists. Tune in and subscribe.

Dubs: What they are and why we need them.

What is a dubplate?

•A dubplate is an acetate disc.

•Usually 10 inches in diameter

•Used in mastering studios for quality control

•Dubplates are used in test recording before proceeding with the  final master .

The “dub” in dubplate is an allusion to the plate’s use in “dubbing” or “doubling” the original version of a track.

[1] The name dubplate also refers to an exclusive, ‘one-off’ acetate disc recording pioneered by reggae sound systems but also used by drum and bass and other electronic music producers, DJs and sound systems.

Dubplates will often be either unreleased recordings or exclusive versions or remixes of existing recordings. They are often used as a market research tool to assess the probable sales of a tune once it is released.

They are far cheaper to produce than a pressed vinyl record. However, because the material of the disc is very soft, the groove is worn out little by little with every playback. After about fifty plays the loss in sound quality becomes noticeable.

Vinyl dubplates are a recently developed format which allow extremely durable recordings to be made.