10 standout songs featuring drummer Sly Dunbar

The Guardian highlights 10 standout recordings featuring Jamaican drummer Sly Dunbar, tracing his work from early reggae hits to sessions with artists such as Grace Jones and Bob Dylan. The list begins with Dunbar's recording debut on Dave and Ansel Collins' Double Barrel, an early 1970s single that went to No 1 in the UK and sold 300,000 copies despite British radio's disinclination to play it.

The Mighty Diamonds' Right Time is credited with making Sly and Robbie's name and popularising the new "rockers" rhythm; Dunbar claimed other drummers initially refused to believe he'd actually played the title track. On Junior Murvin's Police and Thieves Dunbar appears without Robbie, with Boris Gardiner on bass and tight fills underpinning Murvin's falsetto, and Dunbar also said he played drums on Bob Marley's Punky Reggae Party.

The piece covers Sly's work across definitive roots records and pop crossovers: he played on Culture's Two Sevens Clash, whose title track prophesises an apocalyptic event on 7 July 1977 "when past injustices would be avenged," according to the sleeve notes. Compass Point collaborations are represented by Grace Jones' Pull Up to the Bumper, where Sly's drumming is praised for marrying a reggae lope to an insistent dance pulse.