THE ENGINEER BEFORE THE ECHO Long before the word dub existed, before remix culture, before producers were recognized as artists, a child named Osbourne Ruddock was born on January 28, 1941, in Kingston, Jamaica. History would come to know him as King Tubby . He did not arrive with fanfare. There was no prophecy announced. But destiny was already tuning frequencies. Raised in the Waterhouse area of Kingston, Tubby grew up in a Jamaica where sound system culture was becoming the heartbeat of the streets. Loudspeakers, amplifiers, selectors, and dances were not entertainment alone — they were community, identity, and power. Tubby trained as an electronics technician and radio repairman , mastering the science behind sound. While others focused on selection and performance, he focused on signal flow, frequency balance, and clarity . He built amplifiers, repaired radios, and understood electricity with surgical precision. That skill brought him to the heart of Jamaican sound system cultu...