JAH WOBBLE’S BEDROOM ALBUM @ 40

 

Marking its 40th anniversary this month is Jah Wobble’s second full length solo LP, Jah Wobble’s Bedroom Album, which was released in May of 1983. After the former Public Image Ltd bassist cobbled together his debut solo releases mostly from unauthorized remixes & augmentations of Metal Box outtakes, which allegedly hastened his departure from the band, Wobble was back with an intimate collection of material recorded in his home using a modest private recording setup.

Although it had been nearly 3 years since his debut solo LP, Wobble hadn’t been exactly dormant during that time. He’d released a collaborative LP/EP with CAN rhythm section, Holger Czukay & Jaki Liebezeit, two live cassettes albums with his band The Human Condition, a single with Ben Mandleson and a couple of solo 12” singles with A-side tracks that would later appear on the Bedroom Album. However, by the time he stared working on the Bedroom Album, he no longer had major label support from Virgin Records. As a result, Wobble set up his first independent imprint, Lago Records (aka WOB Records), which released a series of singles, EPs and LPs between 1981 and 1986, before Wobble temporarily retired from music in the late 1980s to work on the London subway system and deal with his substance abuse issues.

Fundamentally, the music created for the Bedroom Album contains the seeds for what would become Wobble’s trademark “world music” style, incorporating elements of Middle Eastern and Asian influences into his post-punk, dub-wise & reggae tinged style. Certain tracks even hinted at a slightly industrial kind of “musique concrète” approach. Whereas his debut LP & EP in 1980 were characterized by a kind of puerile & mischievous humor, the mood throughout this LP is far more somber, subdued and warm, reinforcing the sense of intimacy that was consistent with the concept of recording in his bedroom. The only outside musical contributions for the album came from “Animal”, Dave Maltby, who played guitar on and co-wrote several of the songs. He was also a member of the power trio, The Human Condition, along with Wobble and original PiL drummer, Jim Walker (1981-1982).

The album’s impact is hard to assess as no reviews or charting info could be found at the time of writing this. It has never been reissued since its initial vinyl release, though it does appear in its entirety on the two CD box set, The Early Years, released in 2001 on Wobble’s 2nd indie label, 30 Hertz Records, which continues to function as his primary musical outlet to this day. That compilation even features the same cover graphic as the Bedroom Album, created by Margaux Tomlinson. Unfortunately, it seems that the master tapes for the original LP, along with several singles included on that collection, are no longer extant as the audio included on the CD is clearly derived from vinyl sources. This makes the LP something of an outlier in Wobble’s canon of recorded work, which has become vast over the course of the past four decades as he has maintained an unprecedented level of productivity. With the aura of a lost musical relic, it captures a most enigmatic time in Wobble’s early career.