Kiddie Ranks of Creation: - Sound System -

Kiddy Ranks – Selector for Creation Sound (historically), Firgo Digital Sound and Basic Sound.

Listen to an audio interview with Kiddie Ranks: 

Long time selector Kiddy Ranks arrives at the club as the crowd is bubbling sweet.

Friends are hailed up as he moves toward the control tower and identifies space for the two big boxes of records. Both boxes are huge and they contain pure dubplate. Kiddy has no CDs – he is a veteran of the music. He dips into his dub basket and pulls out a stack of dubs he plans to begin with. Kiddy eases back against the wall behind the spinning tunes on the turntables. Soon bottles of Guinness are placed on a stack of dubplates that are on the table. This does not bother Kiddy who says he has master copies of all his tunes. “Firgo time” – Kiddy throws down as he plays a chain of tunes that selectors all over the Earth could only dream of playing: Delroy Wilson, John Holt, Dennis Brown, Wailing Souls, Culture, and Bunny Wailers. This crowd is not used to the depth of selections and all take notice. The dance is transformed into a classroom as Kiddy Ranks educates the good people with graduate level musicology. The cassette is ejected and put into a pocket quick… never did hear that dance again.

Selector Kiddy Ranks aka “Kiddy” has been working as a selector from a young age and linked up as selector for classic sound Creation at an early stage in his musical career. Creation is owned by the only female sound owner in Jamaica – “Mother G.” In the days of live djs, Creation featured Dirtsman, Tippa Lee, Malibu, Lecturer, Ricky Trooper, and the great Papa San as the lead dj. The aforementioned Ricky Trooper is the same Trooper that worked as former Kilamanjaro mic man, who now owns Sound Trooper. Trooper - at the time, worked as a dj with Creation Sound. Kiddy was the first to have Ricky Trooper select music on a sound. As Kiddy says, “Ricky Trooper know tune! Him know early djs, selecting and the riddims too.”
Firgo Digital was named after its original owner - “Firgy,” in 1983 (approximately). The sound premiered in New York City and Kiddy was with Firgo from the very beginning.

Cliffy of Stereo One in Jamaica introduced Kiddy to Basic. At the time, Basic wanted to be a veteran artiste dub sound. Kiddy worked with Simon and Trashy P. as the Jamaican crew for Basic. At this time, Basic Sound is basic in Los Angeles.

As a selector for Firgo Digital and Basic simultaneously, Kiddy features foundation tunes, new tunes and “expensive dubplates.” Kiddy can feature original test press and specials. Kiddy categorizes his music in five stages: juggling, middle stage, hard core, oldies, and “intellec. dubplates.” All tunes are ready like hot bread at the “squeeze of the button” – as long as it’s Kiddy Ranks at the control!

Kiddy has been through war upon musical war, is not boastful. This is a competition and “love and music is guaranteed.” Kiddy has an appreciation for the music and the history and helps to maintain the backbone that does exist in the sound business. Kiddy comments on the business, “It’s just a joy.” There have been rough times. In preparation for a clash against King Addies sound, Kiddy was down in Jamaica recording well over a dozen of the biggest Bounty Killer tunes with Bounty. Kiddy was confident in a victory, Bounty tunes were guaranteed to win clashes at the time. Well Addies was aware of what Kiddy was doing and formulated a plan. Clashing against King Addies sound, Kiddy had all of his Bounty dubs ready. As the clash heated up, Addies pulled out the now-famous medley tune by Bounty entitled “20 Bounties.” That tunes erased all of Kiddy’s Bounty tunes – no repeat of tunes in the clash.

Kiddy Ranks continues his work with both Basic Sound and Firgo Digital and moves throughout the world selecting music at dances and sound clashes. A quality that Kiddy Ranks carries with him is that he shares his knowledge with others - he does not hide his experience. This aspect keeps the competition both wary and appreciative of his skills. Kiddy is one selector to keep track of as time goes on as he is surely to improve with age.

-Rich Lowe-

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