‘Let your music speak.’ This popular, reggae band in Macon performs all over Middle GA

Before the Dean Brown and Dubshak band took the stage at the Macon Beer Festival on Oct. 14, very few people, if any, were dancing at the stage on Third Street.

Emily Amos, lead singer of the band, called a group of people to the front to be her dancers. As her new dancers started getting into the rhythm of the drums, more people came to the stage to dance. It wasn’t long before a crowd was singing to the music.

“I do enjoy audience participation because for me, it makes you put down your phone for a minute and actually be in the moment of what’s happening because they’re enjoying the music,” Amos said.

The current members of the Dean Brown and Dubshak band, also known as DUBSHAK and The DubShak Reggae Band, have been performing together throughout Middle Georgia for the past eight years. The group has become a well-known name that is consistently booked a year in advance. Their music can be found at thedubshakband.bandcamp.com.

“I think what sets us apart from all the other bands the reason why we stay booked so much is we have a huge range of music,” Amos said. “When you come see us, you’re never bored because within 20 minutes of you sitting there we’re going to sing something that you either know, something that you like, something that was in the Top 100 Billboard charts. You’ll never leave unsatisfied.”

Sandra Jarrett, percussionist and booking agent for the band, said the main reason their music covers all genres and artists is because they have four different generations in the band. She proudly said she is the oldest member of the band at 71. Then, there is Dean Brown, the creator and band leader. Amos is Jarrett’s daughter, and Amos’ son, Jimmy Rollins, is the saxophonist for the band.

“We’re just a different kind of band. The vibe is different. We’re very positive about life and stuff and that’s basically how we move,” she said. “I don’t care how many drinks you’ve had, if the music ain’t moving you, something ain’t lining up.”

The origin story

Dean Brown started Dubshak as a bedroom recording studio, he said. He started playing music as a child and focused more on writing and arranging music when he went to college at Fort Valley State University. However, he never thought he would play professionally.

“Personally, what caused me to play music was when I started to hear the early wave of reggae, I was still a kid, and I was hearing music by Third World and other artists,” he said. “I’ve just always been around some kind of music.”

Although he is from upstate New York, he moved to Georgia when he was 11. He made his way to Macon after college to work for WGXA.

Macon helped him find the confidence to start playing live. He played solo and with friends, but he kept running into the problem of people moving away.

“Macon is an amazing place, a lot of great musicians,” he said. “Music is something I’m always doing.”

Jarrett met Brown 20 years ago because he was playing with the person who performed at her daughter’s wedding, she said.

Jarrett became Brown’s Uber driver and drove him to different gigs. One day, she told him she had her drums in her trunk, and he invited her to play with him.

“A lot of things kept bringing us together, and when I started certain gigs, I would just call them. It was just like the best chemistry,” he said.

Jarrett also works as an actress, and she recently worked on the movie Possum Trot and an international commercial for Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA).

“I just kind of fell in love with playing the drums and stuff, and then I started hanging out with them and I found myself up on the stage with them,” she said. “I’m the percussionist in the band. I like noise.”

Jimmy Rollins was the next addition to The DubShak Reggae Band. He has known Brown since he was a kid, and whenever he would go watch Brown perform, Brown always asked where his saxophone was. Rollins finally learned that musicians must always have their instrument on them, and he played with Brown for the first time.

Rollins studies contemporary music at Middle Georgia State University, and he creates his own music and performs shows. He posts information about his music on his Instagram @iamjimmymrollins.

“I’m glad that Dean has given me a platform, a way to express myself, experiment, try some cool, weird things that you wouldn’t normally hear on the saxophone,” he said.

“That was a cool thing for me to see is for (Rollins) to kind of spread his wings, just to be able to play with any band tour and then come back,” Brown said.

After Rollins joined the band, Amos started as their lead singer.

“Emily’s vocals added like another dimension,” Brown said. “It was really stuff I just always wanted to add to what I was doing already... Once we got together, it’s still evolving. It’s still growing, and we’re still getting busier.”

Amos also owns The Naturalista, a natural beauty store in Warner Robins. She has been in business for 17 years and at her current location on Watson Boulevard for almost three years.

“My mission was to bring something like this to the Middle Georgia area and just let people know that you can have all natural soaps and handmade body products that actually smell and feel good on a consistent basis,” she said.

Brown also has ventures outside of being the leader of the band that include promoting downtown Macon and African culture. He works with NewTown Macon’s Business Improvement District, and he contributes to the Facebook group and blog of Taste of Africa Vibes, which has more than 59,000 members. Brown has also created a few film soundtracks, and he produces his own music.

A reputation to remember

The DubShak Reggae Band is known throughout Macon, and Jarrett said they are booked for about a year. However, she said they will fit more performances into the schedule depending on their time constraints.

In an effort to engage the audience in their performances, Amos started a game called the Wild Card. A guest gets to pick three cards: one determines the genre, one the artist and one the tempo. The band then plays whatever combination the person chose.

“It can get very, very, very challenging, but we’ve managed to pull it off so far,” she said, as the other members of the band chuckled remembering the challenging combinations of the past.

When Brown came to Macon, he knew introducing his music, specifically reggae music, to the city would be different for most people to hear.

“That was kind of the goal was to just, for this to be a vehicle to share new information, new music, new sounds and just kind of merge and balance with what’s going on around us. So, we meet a lot of musicians, and we play all types of music,” he said. “Everybody in Macon knows us, but there’s people who still come that haven’t heard us, and we want to sort of just give them the full package.”

The band plays a lot of day shows, festivals and small concert venues, and Brown would love to eventually do something with Macon Pops. Here are the band’s next five performances:

• Oct. 28, 8-11 p.m. at Amici at 174 West Washington St., Madison

• Nov. 17, 7-10 p.m. at The Tipsy Daisy at 132 South Hill St., Griffin
  
  

• Nov. 28, at Amici at 101 West Hancock St., Milledgeville

• Dec. 8, 8-11 p.m. at Amici at 174 West Washington St., Madison

• Dec. 11, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. at the Elaine H. Lucas Senior Center for the Jamaica Early Christmas Concert

They have a lot of musicians who want to join their group, but the group agreed that their current chemistry works for them.

“My whole thing, and I tell other musicians this, let your music speak, and then people will come to you and book you,” Brown said.