Paul “Groucho” Smykle

Sometimes you see a name passing by and realize that you’ve seen elsewhere too…
One that kept appearing at times in my reggae collection was of Paul 'Groucho' Smykle in different functions: engineer, producer, remixer, dub master, compiler, and even artwork (as ‘Dubmaster Productions’)!
He’s a bit of an enigma, despite those credits there are very few photos of him and he hasn’t released much under his own name either.
I probably first encountered Groucho in Sly & Robbie’s A Dub Experience’s liner notes where’s he’s described as the Wicked Professor Smykle responsible for laser mixes on top of the Rhythm Twin’s tracks as well as providing  a special solution of nitro rhythm!
Next was Black Uhuru’s The Dub Factor, where he performed similar magic but without fun liner notes.

He was also responsible for the awesome Raiders of the Lost Dub compilation I found out much later!
Searching the Net of a Million Lies I discovered that Groucho as a youth traveled a lot between Jamaica and London, was a fan of King Tubby’s work, dabbled a bit in art and eventually started working at Island Records, first as tape copier and tea boy!
In 1979 he got his first mixing experiences and in 1980 he overdubbed successfully bass, drums, & whole heap of things on The Twinkle Brothers’ Countrymen album for Virgin.
In the 1980’s he started remixing & producing African musicians such as King Sunny Ade, Ray Lema as well as Wally Badarou.
Grouch was probably the first remixer making a dub of African music!
His only album until now is Quantum Dub Force from 2001, a rather different kind of dub.
Since then he seems to have been less active but I still managed to find a couple of interesting remixes such as those for Manu Chao and Sidestepper!
As mentioned before, he’s someone not in the spotlight, doesn’t even have a website, but this compilation is imho a decent introduction to broaden your musical horizon!