Phil Pratt worked at Studio One for Coxsone Dodd as a box-loader during the rocksteady period when Lee Perry was operating there, before moving to the United Kingdom in the early 1960s.
[1] Pratt returned to Jamaica in 1965, and as a singer, he recorded in 1967 a song called "Safe Travel" together with Hemsley Morris released on his own Wiggle Spoon label.
During the rocksteady period, he recorded singers such as Ken Boothe, John Holt and Pat Kelly, backed by session men such as Lynn Taitt, his productions appearing on the Caltone, Wiggle Spoon and WIRL labels before he launched his own label, Jon Tom.
More particularly, from 1971 to 1975 Pratt produced many DJs including Dennis Alcapone ("This Is Butter"), Dillinger ("Platt Skank"), I-Roy ("My Food Is Ration") or U Roy ("Real Cool") and Jah Woosh ("Psalm 21" and "Zion Sound"), but he remains mostly known for the singles he recorded in 1972 with Big Youth (among his earliest songs), "Tell It Black" and "Phil Pratt Thing".
Pratt set up his own label Terminal in London in order to release his productions worldwide.