- Hello Fred, would you like to introduce yourself for our listeners and readers ?
Hello, I'm Fred from Tulitauko Sound and I've been playing as a reggae selector and lately also more on mike duties. When I got involved with reggae music at the beginning there were only records. When I started to build up the sound system and building my own speaker boxes, all the inspiration was coming from where reggae was actually born: the jamaican sound systems. Jamaican sound systems in the seventies were like the people's radio. It was the place where you could hear the reggae music that you couldn't hear anywhere else. It was not played on the radio at that time even if it was produced a lot of reggae in Jamaica. There were more american songs and more international stuff and not the real reggae. The real reggae was played on the sound systems. Before studios released new tunes they used to test them on the sound system, they gave the record to the sound man to run it on the sound and they could immediately see the effect that the tune had and if it was going to be a big hit. It was like a testing ground for the reggae music and reggae music really evolved around the sound system. Like in Jamaica, Tulitauko Sound System plays music that it is especially made for Sound Systems and dub-plates, special versions made for the sound.
- Tell us more about Tulitauko Sound System and how you founded it. Can you tell us more about this project ?
It was about 15 years ago when I was starting to go to sound-system sessions with sounds like Healing of the Nation and also before, Komposti Sound, from Helsinki. I was getting more interested about sound system and I started to build up my own speaker-boxes and little by little we started bulding our own sound system and play roots reggae music on it. Tulitauko was founded by me and two other guys : Vilhelm and Sutra. Then Sutra dropped out and I continued with Vilhelm for some years before Jah Equity came along from Switzerland where he had been running his own sound system already for many years. Jah Equity also produces his own material so he is also a producer and plays mostly his own productions in the sessions so he is the dub maker. Later on two other guys, Van Stouter and Ken-I, came along to join the sound first as helpers, because it is growing bigger and bigger and to move the sound we needed help and later they also started to play as selectors . Now that we are five It is easier to move the sound which has been growing so big that we need a truck to move it. The regular van it is not enough anymore. It's quite a heavy and big project every time we put up the sound so it's good to have more arms.
-Which is the vision behind Tulitauko ?
First there was just the love for reggae music, then the desire to spread the positive and conscious message and to promote roots and culture reggae music to the people. It's a sound system so we're selectors and operators and we bring different vocalists and players of instruments, mainly from Uk and Finland, to sing and play on the sound.
-What do you want to achieve through it ?
The main thing is to spread the message, to spread the conscious vibe and make it grow. Play music that have a message of positivness and one love message and music that make you come close into yourself because inside everyone there is goodness and reggae music is like a call; when hear the message and the truth in the words you will also awaken yourself. So we're spreading this conscious message.
-What do you think about the roots and reggae movement here in Finland ? And in Europe ?
In Finland the scene is quite small if you compare it with for example, Sweden,where it is of course bigger. In Finland everything comes a little bit later but now during the ten years that we have been active the roots scene has grown and also reggae in general, you can listen to Jukka Poika and artists alike from the radio . Fifteen years ago there was maybe one or two Sounds in Finland playing reggae music and now there are more: a lot of smaller sounds coming up and growing like Ivah Sound and it's nice to see that the younger generation is also active. The reggae scene in a whole was coming out from Jamaica and they produced a lot of roots reggae in the 70s and 80s. Then in Jamaica in the 80s they started to develop digital dancehall riddims and "slackness" lyrics which fast became popular. At the same time in Uk, Jah Shaka (Zulu Warrior) , kept on promoting the roots , with his more orthodox rastafarian message. So now there's more roots reggae music produced in Europe and Uk and France and countries like this than in Jamaica. Reggae music has grow a lot in Europe, for example France is one of the biggest countries where they play also a lot of reggae on the radio and everybody listen to it. Reggae it's a much bigger thing there. But little by little it is also growing in Finland and during these ten years it has been nice to see this growth and how it evolves .
-Let's talk about the 10" vinyl record celebrating the 10th anniversary of Tulitauko Sound on the Ceasefire Sound label, produced together with Micho Dread from Studiored. Inside we can find two amazing songs: Leave Babylon by Ranking Joe and Never Expected by Kenny Knots. Would you like to tell us something about the collaboration with Ranking Joe and Kenny Knots ?
During the time we have been running the sound system, we have been bringing sounds and singers to Finland for shows and everytime we also try to go to the studio and record dubplates which are special tunes made for the sound system and not meant for release but only to play on the sound as unique material . Kenny Knots is a singer that we've been bringing to Finland a few times and on the last visit, we made a real tune with him and same it was with Ranking Joe. The riddim is a classical riddim which is played by a band from Helsinki, Suhinators and mixed by Micho dread.The recordig happened already more than five years ago so it has been laying ready to come out for some time. When Tulitauko turned ten years we thought that we have to get it out finally so we made a push and now we got it out so and we are very happy about that. We made five hundred copies of the record and the first 150 went straight to the Uk record shop and before we even had our own here in Finland they had them already sold out in the shops so that was nice.
-What's in the future of Tulitauko Sound ?
We want to make more sessions and build more boxes and keep on promoting reggae, roots and culture music . With the sound system it's a struggle to find a place where we can run the sound. It's not easy everytime , because if you go to the clubs it's really expensive and usually they wonder why you bring your own sound there since they already have a sound. So finding a place or venue where we can run the sound it is a struggle that we all the time are trying to solve. There were good underground places in Helsinki but many have been taken down and now there are not so many of them places left and that is a struggle too, but we want to grow up the sound and release also more records under Ceasefire Sound label.
-Where does our listeners\readers can follow you (social networks, websites) and where they can listen\buy your unique sound ?
You can find us on Fb and instagram.
Flavia M
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