Nick Barber’s Doof delivers Mysticisms’ latest “Dubplate”, number 7 in the marvellous, unmissable series. Nick’s probably best known for producing Goan trance back in the mid 1990s – a few of his releases featured on the Youth’s label, Dragonfly. The new 12, however, harvests four tracks from his 2010 album, Love Dub So. 

These tunes are trippy, and a little bit trance-y, but all very mellow gear. The ever-so slightly acidic Sticks And Stones, for example, is the stuff of mid-90s chillout rooms. One for refreshed ravers, still rushing and tempted to throw shapes, away from the  dancefloor. Gated arpeggios a-go-go. Mantra marries Sci-Fi laser blasts with head-nodding beats for a superior slice of trip hop / dub funk. Colouring comes in the shape / shades of cinematic strings, and chopped up electric axe, while its title is lifted from a sampled speech. Skunked On Planet Dub supplies some more straightforward skanking. Chunks of fragmented circuitry and percussion bombarding its banging bottom end. 

The main draw, though, is Baba, We Love Dub So, a brilliant cover of the Jacob Miller / Augustus Pablo 70s roots reggae classic, Baby I Love You So. This tune’s been versioned a few times, by King Tubby, Joe Gibbs – the latter, Chapter 3, a David Mancuso / Loft favourite – Dawn Penn, and most recently by Brighton’s Richie Phoe. Doof’s totally electronic take clearly lifts its cues from Colourbox’s 1986 shot, and actually sounds like a more ambient rework of that seminal piece of post-punk pop. Swirling synths washing the instantly recognisable b-line. Clipped keys mimicking Pablo’s Far East melodica. The rhythm, a muffled 4 / 4, that also twins the tune with the output of folks such as Original Rockers and Smith & Mighty. There are bent bottleneck blues notes, tabla touches, and the rattle of timbales, borrowed from Andrew Weatherall and Hugo Nicolson’s toy box. Similar to Richard Norris’ excellent Oracle Sound Volume 1, the package is completed by the digital bonus of an extended, 15-minute mix. A delirious dose of meditative musical medicine, a digi-dubwise float in a beatless bubblebath (I’m not sure how much of it’s analogue), this is a deep, deep drift. Not really repetitive enough to be hypnotic, but most definitely healing. I could imagine this soundtracking a soft focus Blade Runner love scene, and it’s also the perfect score for lying star-shaped on the floor, focusing on your breath, de-stressing. Roll a big bifter, run a hot bath, or both, inhale, exhale, and relax. 

Doof’s Dubplate #7 can be ordered directly from Mysticisms.