Many moons ago, I worked at a Jamaican restaurant, and one of the guys that worked there used to make me lots and lots of mix tapes. They were always fab, but, you know, they didn't come with liner notes, so I didn't know what a lot of the music on the tapes actually was. Unfortunately, it turns out that seven years in a storage unit is pretty hard on a cassette, and the tapes are no longer with us. What has always been good over the years, though, has been rediscovering tracks that were on those tapes and actually finding out what they were.
These songs remind me of that. I always think of them coming on one after another, because they were that way on a tape I had. That all made sense when I discovered they were from this record, 3 The Hard Way. The three in question are Cutty Ranks, Reggie Stepper and Capleton. I can't actually remember when I identified these songs, but I was reminded of them recently when I saw them listed back to back on a comp. I guess I'm not the only one who thinks of them as a unit. So, anyway, here we are, first up, Out a Hand by Cutty Ranks, and then Cu Oonuh by Reggie Stepper. And yes, once again, this is an audio experience, not a visual one. The videos happen to be exactly the same. Go figure.
