After compilations on Junjo Lawes' Volcano label, Joe Gibbs and of course Randy's (the birthplace of VP Records on 17 North Parade), a retrospective of the work of Federal Records could not stay behind. Founded by Cuban-Lebanese Ken Roy Khouri in the early 1960s, Federal Records Limited was the first full-fledged pressing plant-cum-recording studio in Jamaica (active since 1949, when Khouri brought his first record press with him from Miami). Initially specialized in mento (the last song on this compilation, Lord Laro's 'Irie Tempo' is a nod to that early period), the label really started being successful in the rocksteady era of the late nineteen sixties. Hopeton Lewis' 'Take It Easy', widely regarded as the very first rocksteady song, simply couldn't be missing from the track list of this compilation. In 1981 Khouri sold Federal to Bob Marley who turned it into Tuff Gong, the name the studio has been operating under to this day. 'The Definitive Collection Of Federal Records' is a fitting tribute to the visionary work of a man without whom the Jamaican musical landscape probably would never have become what it is today!