Groovy Baby Company: BabyDub

Reviewed by GRAHAM HEPBURN

Herald rating: * * * *

I have to admit that I didn't think my 2-year-old would go for this. It sounded too good to be true: music that both adults and toddlers would enjoy.

Having been reared on a steady diet of rinky-dinky, low-fi tunes with repetitive lyrics sung in helium-powered voices, I couldn't see Sophie May suddenly embracing the slow, slinky beats of (largely vocal-free) dub reggae.

The Groovy Baby Company, a New Zealand outfit, claims that BabyDub will counter "the musical atrocities inflicted on Kiwi parents by overweight dinosaurs, impossibly perky tweens and wiggling Australians". Amen to that.

As any parent who has had to put up with endless replays of screeching nursery rhymes and their like in the home or (even worse) in the car will know, your child might be having the time of its life but you're descending into a teeth-grinding pit of despair. With all respect to the Love to Sing crowd and their ilk, if I hear the nerve-jarring sounds of Do Your Ears Hang Low? one more time I'll tear my ears off.

In contrast, BabyDub's 12 bass-heavy tracks lope along agreeably, with some subtle guitar picking here, horn arrangements there and a whole lot of echo and reverb thrown in. And they cleverly feature repeated samples of babies gurgling, giggling or saying things like "Good morning, Daddy" - even toddlers are aware of niche marketing and these simple devices mark this CD out as music for them.

Sophie May was instantly taken by the first track Hello Baby, which features a "Hello baby" loop with "goos" and "gaas". It caught her ears immediately and she started doing some spontaneous highchair skanking. Released into the sitting room, she started skipping about and shaking her booty, shouting, "Baby duk, baby duk". We were on to a winner.

While the music didn't have any calming effect on her - including the 26-minute finale Sleepy Dub - and isn't terribly challenging for adult reggae fans, it is a great leap forward in tunes for tots. There's endless scope here, though I'd have serious reservations about BabyDeath Metal ("Teddy is Satan, arrrrghhhhh").

And the verdict from Sophie May after one run through the tracks on a Saturday morning: shrieks of "More baby duk, Daddy".

(Rhythmethod)