Bosco Mann


Bosco Mann Gabriel Roth is the bass player, bandleader, primary songwriter and producer of the band Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings. He is also a co-founder of the Daptone Records label in Brooklyn, and runs Penrose Studios in Riverside, California.

Early life

Roth was born in 1974 in Riverside, California. Gabe and his older sister, Samra, born in 1972, were raised in Riverside by their parents, Andrew and Diane Roth, both of whom practiced law in the community and worked on civil rights and discrimination cases.
Roth said his early aspirations were to be a math teacher, said he never wanted to be in the music industry, never really considered it to be a career option. He said that he just kind of fell into it, being in bands.

Career

After moving to New York City to attend New York University in the early 1990s, he launched the record label Desco Records with record collector/partner Phillipe Lehman. Roth also played, recorded, and wrote material for Antibalas and other bands on the Desco label, often under a pseudonym. After Desco folded, Roth formed Daptone Records with Dap-Kings saxophonist Neal Sugarman.
Roth is an outspoken proponent for analog recording, having once said, "Show me a computer that sounds as good as a tape machine and I'll use it." The distinctive, tinted glasses Roth wears on stage and in interviews are the result of eye injuries he sustained in a 2002 car accident which put him in the hospital for ten days and left him temporarily blind.
As a recording engineer and producer, Roth has won two Grammy awards: in 2008 for Amy Winehouse's acclaimed Back to Black album, recorded with The Dap-Kings at Daptone's House of Soul Studio in Bushwick, Brooklyn, and in 2012 for recording Booker T. Jones' The Road From Memphis.