AMG Review of Ultimate Ranglin Roots

Steve Leggett
All Music Guide

A respected jazz guitarist, Ernest Ranglin is one of the foundation musicians for Jamaican ska and reggae, and his contributions at the legendary Studio One have earned him the right to cross genres at will. This collection is a reissue and remix of his 1977 album Ranglin Roots, with added tracks that more than double the length of the original release without breaking or shifting its tone. This is probably the funkiest of Ranglin's albums and horns predominate (played by veterans Cedric Brooks, Dean Fraser, Herman Marquis, Joe McCormack, Jackie Willacy, Todd Schwartz, and Mark Feinberg), with Ranglin's light, fluid guitar runs slipping in and out of the gaps in seemingly effortless fashion. Although he hints and occasionally leans on Jamaican rhythms, Ranglin is first and foremost a jazz player, and he creates on this, and his other albums, a sort of Caribbean pop jazz hybrid that is his alone.