"Do You Remember the Good Old Days Before the Ghost Town?"

I recently came across several videos I shot at the last Electric Avenue show that I organized at Characters NYC before the pandemic. (Sadly, Characters shut down last fall--another victim of the plague. Linda and Finn made it a great place to be. Thank you for everything!). The Electric Avenue bill on July 26, 2019 featured Barbicide (read my review of their Fresh Cuts EP here), The Twilights (read my review of their Hear What I Say EP here), The Rudie Crew, and Beat Brigade (read my review of their Tomorrow's News EP here).

As you can see from the following videos, it was an amazing night of ska and reggae! Barbicide were terrific right out of the gate (it was their first show). The Twilights' version of Max Romeo and Lee Perry's "Chase the Devil" was epic! The Rudie Crew's "Radics in Space" tribute to the still very much missed Roy Radics really got the crowd going. And make sure to watch Beat Brigade's "Battle Cry" ("This is not a warning/This is not a test/Armageddon's coming...")--one of their newer (and brilliant) tracks--all the way through. Dave Barry and Ramsey Jones' performances in particular are mind-blowing.

These videos will whet your appetite for live shows. Hopefully, we'll start having them again later this year (go get your vaccine shot, if you haven't already!).

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