Vibronics

A Leicester apprenticeship

Vibronics formed in Leicester in 1995, out of a reggae scene small enough that, as Steve Vibronics has put it, "all the reggae heads just bump into each other". He came to the music sideways: friends playing in punk and new wave bands in the 1980s pushed him towards a guitar, and dub arrived later, after he moved to the city and found it playing across it. The collective has always centred on him and Richi Rootz, with a long cast of vocalists and players attached to particular records rather than to a fixed line-up.

The first proper exposure came through the Egg Experience '97 shows, which led to a deal with Zion Train's Universal Egg label. The sound from the start was digital rather than analogue-nostalgic — synths, samplers, hardware sequencing, following the direction Iration Steppas and Alpha & Omega had opened up in the north of England and London. Work with Jah Free on European dub conferences produced the debut album, Outernational Dub Conference Volume One, in 1998, and the early singles were picked up by sound systems rather than by radio, which set the pattern for everything since.

Running the shop as well as the studio

SCOOPS Records was the next step, and it is the reason the name has stayed in circulation without a major behind it. Steve Vibronics has been blunt about the appeal — "It's all about the joy of having your own label" — and the catalogue reflects a producer who can commission, cut and sell without asking anyone. It has carried Prince Alla, Tena Stelin, Ranking Joe, Madu Messenger, Parvez of Dub Factory, Jah Marnyah, Echo Ranks, Macka B and Michael Prophet, and by September 2025 the catalogue numbers had reached SCOOP084.

Vinyl remains the core format even as digital sales grow, and the releases are built for the format: a vocal cut on the A-side, the dub version on the flip, stripped for sound system playback. The Bandcamp page now lists more than 110 separate releases. Recent shop stock has included a Hustle EP with Ashanti Selah, an Indica Dubs meets Vibronics ten-inch, and a seven-inch of Pon Di Road with Richie Culture.

The studio work runs outwards too. Vibronics has cut records with Iration Steppas, and in 2019 joined Disciples and Conscious Sounds for the 3 The Dub Way series — three producers working at roughly the same cottage scale, pooling a release rather than competing for the same shelf.

The records that carry the name

The albums that established the sound arrived steadily through the 2000s: Dub Italizer in 2000, Dubliftment in 2004, UK Dub Story in 2008. The Return Of Vibronics followed in 2015. None of them tried to sound like 1970s Kingston; the pitch was always a dub made with the tools of the present, which is where the long-running "future sound of dub" tag comes from.

The outlier, and probably the most substantial single piece of work, is Empire Soldiers, made with the French producer Brain Damage and released in 2013. It was built around the experience of Anglo-Caribbean and Franco-African soldiers in the First World War — a concept record in a genre that rarely attempts them. It became a touring show as well, 49 dates across 2013 and 2014 through Switzerland, Romania, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Croatia, taking in Dour and Mundial. A live document, Empire Soldiers Live, came out on 22 June 2015 through Jarring Effects.

Talking to the rest of the scene

On 8 January 2020 Steve Vibronics launched Life In Dub, a fortnightly podcast recorded wherever the guest lives or works. His stated reason was the absence of anything decent in the space: "I've always been fascinated by the stories of the people behind the music, their experiences, motives and what we can all learn from each musicians' individual journey." The opening episode was Keety Roots on his London upbringing and his Black Legacy Recording label; Macka B, Iration Steppas and Mungo's Hi-Fi were lined up behind him.

It has kept going. The most recent run includes Prince Fatty recorded at his south London studio, the pre-amp builder Mark Mostec, Freedom Masses for the fortieth episode, and Sheffield's Sinai Sound System. Between that, the label and a Sound System Dub sample pack for Loopmasters, the Vibronics name now covers rather more than a production credit.

Where things stand in 2026

The release schedule has not slowed. Cold World, a first collaboration with the vocalist Tann I Browne, came out on 11 September 2025 as SCOOP084, an uptempo roots cut with the dub version on the reverse. Travelling / Revenge Dub, a ten-inch with Nia Songbird on one side and an instrumental steppers cut on the other, followed on 19 January 2026.

The thirtieth-anniversary marker landed on 15 June 2026 in two parts. One was a seven-inch, Vision From Jah, with Professa Natti returning on vocals. The other was 30 Years Of Vibronics, a limited cassette carrying twelve previously unreleased dubs drawn from across the three decades, including the original mix of Jah Light Jah Love and the original riddim behind Searching For Jah. It was sold as a physical object only — no digital-only option — and it has sold out.

The other development is geographic. After decades of European, Asian, Central American and Caribbean touring, October 2026 brings the first Australian run, and the Melbourne promoters are billing it explicitly as a Vibronics debut in the city.