Friday, December 9, 2022

Duff Review: The End Times "Headlines" EP

The cover illustration features cartoon versions of Death and a woman reporter at a news desk, while a mob riots in the background outside their window.
Digital EP
East Sound Records
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

I wish I had first listened to The End Times' ferocious and bitter new Headlines EP before the recent midterm elections when it seemed like TFG's goon squad of fascist candidates were destined to ascend to the levers of power in many state and federal offices and drag our country closer to the straight, white, male, evangelical-nationalist, authoritarian hellscape they literally pray for. Lucky for us, the forces of sanity reigned (for now), so I have some hope for this country. My level of existential dread has waned a bit, though it's still lodged in some recess of my gut. The racist, anti-democratic creeps still lurk in large numbers among us.

If you caught The End Times' terrific self-titled debut (read my review), you know that their brand of Armagideon ska--horn-driven, aggro '90s style modern ska paired with body-slamming Fear-like hardcore vocals--was a good antidote/commentary on the horrifically cruel and morally bankrupt MAGA years. Their new EP Headlines continues in that vein, though is more generally focused on expressing white-hot anger/exasperation over humanity's abject failure to live up to its extraordinary promise. It's about dashed, stomped-to-death hopes about us all solving our problems and getting things right.

"Double Down" blasts people who out of denial, self-interest, idiocy, or tribalism swallow and parrot the most ridiculous beliefs/stances to justify their action/inaction. 

Can’t think back to a time when things felt so low
Can’t think back to a time when things seemed so impossible
I look around and corruption is all I see
I walk around and pollution is all I breathe
It all seems so dead to me

We like to think we can just turn and walk away (ha ha)
We like to think all our problems were all fixed yesterday
And we like to believe that there’s no shame - there’s no shame
We push beliefs that we don’t have to do anything
And we’re entitled to everything

And it’s all on a stage for the world to see


"Little King" pleads for the de-throning of the petty, selfish tyrant in all of our heads that keeps us from doing the right thing. And "Punishment" rails against the infuriating inevitability that the rich and powerful will never pay for their crimes. (Though I still hold out hope that a full reckoning is coming for TFG...)

The End Times bring their brilliantly powerful and tight live show to Otto's Shrunken Head tonight in Manhattan's Alphabet City (it's Headlines' record release party!). The Simulators (CT) and The Manipulators (PA) also are on the bill (plus DJ Yana Lil' Jerk!).

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Tuesday, November 15, 2022

Duff Review: The Ratchet Boys "Live from 1997-2001"

The cover features illustrations of the band singing and playing their instruments, as well as lots of donuts with sprinkles, a VW bug with a checkerboard stripe, and the front of the Phantasmagoria club.Eco LP
DCxPC Live
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

If you were still paying attention to ska in the early 2000s (after the '90s scene crashed and burned), you were probably aware of Michelle Chin's terrific DCska.com website, which was a reliable online source of news and reviews after the majority of ska zines faded away (here's an archived page from 2001). Depending on whether you were in the greater metro DC area (the DMV--DC, Maryland, and Virginia), you also might know that Chin and her boyfriend Dan Hess, singer for The Rachet Boys, promoted ska shows in the late '90s and early '00s through Rude in DC Productions--and more recently via BlueBeat DC. (For a phenomenal history of the DC ska scene in the '90s/'00s, see the article "Skank and File: An Oral History of D.C. Ska," published by the Washington City Paper in 2013.)

Joining a stellar collection of peers--The Pietasters, Checkered Cabs, Eastern Standard Time, and The Skunks--The Rachet Boys became one of the more dominant ska bands on the late '90s/early '00s DMV ska and punk scene. For several years, they also fueled a number of massively popular shows (booked by Chin and Hess) at an indoor soccerplex in Gaithersburg, MD called The Corner Kick. Just as the DMV scene began winding down around 2006, Hess was diagnosed with Hodgkins Lymphoma, and tragically passed away in 2007 at age 30.

A digital collection of The Rachet Boys' live recordings was released in 2019 by BOB Records. For fans preferring vinyl, DCxPC Live recently reissued this set as The Rachet Boys Live from 1997-2001 LP, with all money from sales (though not shipping) donated to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in Hess' memory. As one might expect, some of these recordings are more rough than ready, but they capture the undeniably winning live power of the band, Hess' charisma and humor (though not the donuts he used to toss to the crowd), and a whole lot of stage banter and crowd noise. The Ratchet Boys' sound falls in The Scofflaws/Skavoovie & The Epitones' modern (and slightly twisted) trad ska category (though they occasionally veer into punky ska). While this set contains two covers (Madness/Prince Buster's evergreen "One Step Beyond" and Symarip's "Skinhead Moonstomp), it spotlights The Rachet Boys' trove of excellent originals like "Montoya," "Farragut North" (a DC Metro station), "Shipwrecked," "Gator Bait," and "Brave New World" (paging Aldous Huxley!), as well as sillier but crowd-pleasing fare like "Blue Balls" (hey, the band originally was named The Skanker Sores).

This album is likely a must-buy for anyone who was part of the DMV ska scene and a fan of Dan Hess and The Rachet Boys (you can vicariously re-live those glory days!). But it'll also be of interest to '90s ska fans in general, who will be transported back in time on hearing these peculiar Third Wave ska sounds again.

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Tuesday, October 18, 2022

Duff Review: Smoke & Mirrors Sound System "Mala Salud: A Field Guide to Quackery"

The cover illustration features a woman with her hair in curlers applying a cream to her face. Various sales pitches appear in the background.
50-page, 8 x 10 paperback book and 7" flex disc
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

For much of our nation's history, Americans have been deluged with hearsay, humbuggery, and bunco. It's all a malignant but necessary component of our hyper-capitalist society where accumulating wealth and power means everything (it's the American dream!). Duping regular folks to win their cash, vote, and/or blind acquiescence to achieve all this is a feature of capitalism, not a bug.

One area that always has been ripe for exploitation is non-prescribed medicines (aka over-the-counter medication). These "patent medicines" originally were proprietary medications granted patents by the British royal family in the late 17th century--some of which were exported to the American colonies. By the mid-1800s, there was a thriving domestic patent medicine industry in the US, though most of these products never received government (or royal!) patents and were unregulated. Their "cures" for every ailment under the sun often involved alcohol, morphine, opium, or cocaine.

The peddlers of these fake cures eventually came to be known as "snake oil salesmen." The genesis for this phrase traces back to the mid-1800s when 180,000+ Chinese workers immigrated to the US (as indentured laborers) to build the Transcontinental Railroad. One of the traditional medicines they brought to the US was snake oil (derived from the Chinese water snake), which contains fairly high concentrations of omega-3 fatty acids that reduce inflammation and can treat arthritis. Word of the effectiveness of snake oil spread among the American railroad workers. Eventually, some decided to make and market a domestic version of snake oil made from rattlesnakes (which Choctaws and other Native American tribes used for sore joints, though the amount of omega-3 fatty acids in rattlesnakes is far less than in Chinese water snakes).

To help sell their products, these entrepreneurs put on traveling "medicine shows" (paging Mick Jones and co.!), which provided carnival-like entertainment as well as dramatic demonstrations of how their snake oils were made (using live rattlers) and their effectiveness (using shills in the audience who would be "cured" of a host of ills before the audience in real-time). By the early 1900s, the US federal government began to regulate food and drug manufacturers and discovered that Stanley's Snake Oil Liniment (which dominated this market) contained no snake oil at all (Stanley was fined and did not dispute the charges). Of course, this type of quackery didn't end there.

Inspired (and horrified) by the pernicious disinformation insanity of the last several years that is turbo-fueled by social media's hate/bullshit-pushing algorithms (ivermectin and chloroquine phosphate, anyone?), Smoke & Mirrors Sound System's whip-smart book Mala Salud: A Field Guide to Quackery offers dozens upon dozens of hilarious 1950s/1960s-styled ads for ludicrous medical cures and patently absurd products. (They remind me of the tempting but too-good-to-be-true ads in the back of the Spiderman comics I read in the early '70s, like the one that promised a seven-foot Polaris nuclear sub with missiles, periscope, and electrical panels you could sit/play in for seven bucks.) The illustrations by Michael Buchmiller and ad copy by Buchmiller and John and Andrea Roy are spot-on ("Don't let little Jeffrey fall behind in class. Brighten his day with Liquid Sunshine for kids! Stimulates faculties! Increases manly courage!"). Make sure to read Buchmiller's intro on page 3, as well as the copyright/disclaimer page. Both appropriately orient you for digesting this book.

The accompanying retro flexi disc features Smoke & Mirrors Sound System's wonderfully sprightly Latin ska instrumental (with fantastic surf and spaghetti Western guitar solos) "Mala Salud" (Spanish for "Bad Health"). Buchmiller's liner notes of sorts claim that its lyrics "are filled with every conceivable defense for these deceptive products and their marketing tactics." Of course, their absence speaks volumes.

I'll let Buchmiller and the Roys have the last word: "For more information about Smoke & Mirrors Sound System, use the internet or ask your cool friend."

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Thursday, October 6, 2022

Shots in the Dark: The Adjusters "Otis Redding Will Save America"

The album cover features images of a factory, children shooting water pistols at each other, and a large 1970s American car parked on a street.
Editor's note: Shots in the Dark spotlights Third-Wave ska releases that should have been massive hits on the scene but, due to bad timing, poor luck, or a fickle record-buying public, were lost in the fray.

(Appreciation by Steve Shafer)

The Band: The Adjusters, an overtly left-wing, mod-ish ska-soul band from Chicago who were heavily influenced by The Redskins (anti-fascist, socialist soul-rockabilly-punk skinheads, who released several singles and one classic album, Neither Washington Nor Moscow) and Billy Bragg (anti-fascist, socialist folk-punk rocker who still endeavors to write protest songs that are about both the personal and political, and has released a host of singles and albums, including my favorite Talking to the Taxman About Poetry, which sports the best-ever critique of Reagan's Cold War-era USA: "Help Save the Youth of America" (some of which is terrifyingly relevant again*)). This interracial, mixed-gender band was composed of Daraka Larimore-Hall (who is half-Jamaican) and Jessica Basta on vocals, Jason Packer on guitar, Matt Parker on organ/piano, Rench on drums, vocals, and samples, and Joshua Thurston-Milgrom on bass.

The Sound: The Adjusters' incendiary 1997 debut Politics of Style (Jump Up Records) veers between Stax soul, JB funk, rootsy reggae, and traditional (not 2 Tone) ska. Their 1998 follow-up on Moon Ska Records Before the Revolution (produced by Victor Rice) further refined the formula to greater effect with an even better collection of tracks (full disclosure, when I was at Moon Records I worked with the band promoting this record). 2003's Otis Redding Will Save America (blessed with a mind-blowingly good co-production by Rice and Rench) blended hip-hop, Big Beat, and trip-hop into the mix for a searing and unblinkered look at America in the years just before and after the Twin Towers fell.

The Release: The writing, recording, and mixing of The Adjusters' Otis Redding Will Save America  straddled one of the most dramatic paradigm shifts in American history: the immediate pre- and post-9/11 years. The relatively peaceful and prosperous Clinton '90s wound down with an absurd impeachment over lying about sex (and we didn't fully comprehend the portents of the 1993 World Trade Center attack and 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and how they would shape the next two decades). The first dotcom bubble burst and the Y2K freakout was (thankfully) a bust.

The George W. Bush years started badly with an election swung his way by the right-wingers on the Supreme Court and only went down from there. After apparently ignoring our intelligence service's red alert signals about the coming terrorist attacks, Bush led the nation into a particularly nightmarish and tragic period in the USA following 9/11. It all culminated in the appalling--and completely unnecessary and unprovoked--2003 Iraq War (that eventually killed around 4,500 American servicepeople, tens of thousands of Iraqi insurgents, and around 600,000 Iraqi civilians). Even as it was all unfolding back then, it was obvious that the George W. Bush Administration was lying that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and that Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 attack. They simply wanted to justify a preordained invasion of that country (when it was likely that elements within the Saudi government helped the al-Qaida terrorists carry out their mission).

The 9/11 attacks did more than murder several thousand Americans. They shook us to our core and unleashed our darkest impulses in our so-called War on Terror--leading us to abandon our laws and values to assuage our security fears and nurture our lust for revenge. And our country did more to destroy itself and betray everything that America purports to stand for than 12 hijackers could ever dream of accomplishing.

(Just as a reminder, here are some of the appalling lowlights of our War on Terrorthe torture--and waterboarding is torture--and indefinite detention of suspected terrorists; the use of extraordinary rendition; the illegal monitoring and wiretapping of Americans' e-mails and phone calls under The Patriot Act; the profiling and quasi-legal surveillance of American Muslims; the "unitary executive" theory and use of Presidential signing statementsthe Bush Administration's deliberate misinterpretation and shredding of our nation's laws; and does anyone remember that insane psych-op weekend when Americans across the country freaked out after the White House suggested that Americans buy duct tape and plastic sheeting in case of a dirty bomb/bio-chemical attack?)

The Adjusters believed that America--which has never quite lived up to its promise in the Declaration of Independence that all people are created equal and have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness--had not only lost its shit but had badly lost its way.

While the band was recording the album in Version City's spartan basement studio on East Third Street in Manhattan, one of the band members visited the restroom of the bar upstairs and noticed something written on the toilet stall wall (in what would become their own Smells Like Teen Spirit moment): Otis Redding will save America.

Eventually, The Adjusters realized that this phrase encapsulated everything they were trying to convey with this album. Otis Redding, the "King of Soul," had attempted to goad America into locating its conscience as it staggered through one of its most turbulent, violent, and hate-filled decades. He was one of the first Black soul singers who broke through to the white rock audience (see this video from the '67 Monterey Pop Festival) as an undisguised, undiluted, and unbowed Black man (in the 1960s, Black men accepted within white pop culture usually weren't permitted to be regular human beings who could express, or be the overt object of, sexual desire--see the constraints placed on Sidney Poiter by Hollywood). This was at a time when America was forced to come to terms with its white supremacist/Jim Crow legacy and recognize and support the equal/legal rights of Black American citizens; endure a string of devastating political and racial assassinations (JFK, MLK, Jr., RFK, Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, and many lesser-known Civil Rights martyrs); and muddle through an unwinnable, imperialistic proxy war with China and Russia in Vietnam that killed 58,200 young US soldiers (average age: 23) and millions of Vietnamese

To give some context to Redding's extraordinary and unprecedented impact on American society, check out this appreciation in The New Yorker: "Marching in place to keep pace with the beat, pumping his fists in the air, striding across stages with a long-legged gait that parodied his “down home” origins, Redding’s confident yet unaffected eroticism epitomized the African-American ideal of a “natural man.” White audiences of the time had never seen anything like it. The effect was so powerful that Bob Weir, of the Grateful Dead, said, of Redding’s performance at the Monterey Pop Festival, "I was pretty sure I’d seen God onstage"...In the way he looked and the way he sang and the way he led his tragically unfinished life, this princely son of Georgia sharecroppers was a one-man repudiation of the depraved doctrine of "white supremacy," whose dark vestiges still contaminate our world." (After over 4,000 documented lynchings of Black Americans from 1877 to 1950, the US finally has the Emmitt Till federal anti-lynching bill on the books, which was signed into law by President Biden and defines lynching as "a hate crime that results in death or serious bodily injury.")

To heal the nation, Redding pleaded with everyone to "try a little tenderness," which isn't just about relations between the sexes. The country needed (and still needs) heaping doses of empathy for white America to see Black Americans as their fellow human beings. But Redding also insisted that respect be shown to Black citizens in his hit song transformed into an early feminist and Civil Rights anthem by Aretha Franklin. Notably, Redding's posthumous hit "Dock of the Bay" underscored the loneliness and aimlessness of being rejected by the society that birthed and (reluctantly) fostered you.

While Redding never finished his journey (he died in a plane crash at age 26 along with most of the members of his backing band the Bar-Kays), his music and insistence on being his unreserved self in public on stage offered the hope that America could be a pluralistic society that embraced diversity and recognized everyone's rights equally.

For Otis Redding Will Save America, The Adjusters expanded their sound to further explore/honor Black American music beyond their mod-ska-soul mix and incorporated hip-hop and its musical descendants filtered through British subculture: trip-hop and Big Beat (Lionrock's "Rude Boy Rock" and Sly and Robbie's Drum & Bass Strip to the Bone by Howie B influenced this record enormously). Of course, practically all American popular music was created by Black American musicians: jazz, blues, R&B, soul, rock 'n' roll, and hip hop (Black music is one of the United States' most powerful cultural exports and a primary driver of our entertainment economy). And The Adjusters were about celebrating Black American music.

This expanded musical palette may have been a bridge too far for hard-line ska fans, but The Adjusters never comfortably fit within the confines of the '90s US ska scene, which skewed more towards punk rock (it's worth noting that in its original '76-'77 incarnation, punk stripped rock 'n' roll of its Black origins in R&B and gospel). And The Adjusters' overt democratic socialist stance and political activism through Modern Action and the Democratic Socialists of America was sometimes a sore point among the reactionary, almost libertarian (barf) elements of the ska fan base (even though some of our country's most popular social and educational programs--Social Security, Medicare, Veterans Administration, public schools, public universities, public libraries--are all socialist in nature). But The Adjusters never cared about discomforting the comfortable and privileged (see Daraka's comments about the 1998 Ska Against Racism Tour in the Chicago Reader**).

Like The Specials, The Adjusters wanted their music to move your body and their message to stimulate your mind. So, Otis Redding Will Save America is equal parts party soundtrack and political rallying cry--both essential for surviving desperate times. And it's one of the best albums that the '90s ska scene ever yielded.

Otis Redding Will Save America opens with "WTF Ska" an old school-sounding tune that's laid over a decidedly new school drum loop (this ain't downtown JA!). It's the instrumental version of "When Things Fall," which appears later on the record and is an appeal for solidarity across race and class lines in the face of injustice and adversity--and pretty much sums up the theme of the entire album. The Adjusters' superb and powerful cover of Gil Scott-Heron's "Gun" is about the fraying of the social contract (to the point where every one of your fellow citizens is a potential threat) and a society where violence and killing are both way of life and entertainment.

Everybody's got a pistol
Everybody's got a .45
And the philosophy seems to be
At least as near as I can see
When other folks give up theirs, I'll give up mine

This is a violent civilization
If civilization's where I am
'Cause every channel that I stop on
Got a different kind of cop on
Killing them by the million for Uncle Sam

But Saturday night just ain't that special
Yeah, I got the constitution on the run
Yeah, 'cause even though we've got the right
To defend our home, to defend our life
You got to understand to get it in hand about the guns


"Can't See the Light," an original, traditional-sounding rocksteady cut (that features Dr. Ring Ding), is about being comfortably numb and disconnected as the world burns around you--and refusing to take sides or even recognize right from wrong (and alludes to The Clash coming to terms with reality with this lyric: So safe and warm in your nice suburban home). "Master Blaster" is, of course, a Stevie Wonder cover. It's his 1980 reggae tribute to Bob Marley that incorporates part of "Jammin'" and celebrates Zimbabwe's hard-fought independence from their colonial British overlords and Black self-determination, in general (Jessica Basta takes lead vocals here and really shines).

Sounding like a lost Public Enemy cut from It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, "If You" is an extraordinary and wickedly fierce hip-hop track featuring the mighty T.O.N.E. on vocals and built on a sample from Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries" (most famously used during a brutal attack on a Vietnamese village just after the "Charlie don't surf scene" in Apocalypse Now). It offers sharp commentary on how bringing about real change demands so much more than performative gestures.***

If you're sick of seeing Black people gettin' shit
Raise your fist (raise 'em up, raise 'em up)
And if you're sick of seeing women gettin' hit
Raise your fist (raise 'em up, raise 'em up)
And if you're sick of seeing poor people gettin' dissed
Raise your fist (put 'em up, put 'em up)
And if you wanna do something 'bout it
You gotta do more than raise your fist to get pissed

The downbeat "Monkey Hate Reggae" is about a disaffected youth in a no-future rust belt town coming under the sway of a "right-wing libertine" and acting out violently as a result (shades of "Clampdown"). The ebullient "The Fightback, Part II" revisits and amps up this funk-powered Before the Revolution track, but recasts its lyrics to laud the massive antiglobalization protests at the 1999 World Trade Organization's meeting in Seattle ("Corporations split the world in two/Which side, which side for you?...You can't fight the man alone/Fuck with the people and the people fight back").

The instrumental booty-shaking dancefloor-filling portion of Otis Redding Will Save America is a collection of genre-bending trip-hop tracks packed with elements of reggae, funk, and hip-hop, plus samples galore (this entire album features some seriously deep grooves and crazy, next-level rhythms thanks to secret weapon Rench). The awesome "Mumia in Tibet" (which refers to Mumia Abu-Jamal) is like a drum 'n' bass mash-up with something off Jump With Joey's Ska Ba"Boomstick" borrows Musical Youth's intro to "Pass the Dutchie" ("This generation...rules the nation...with version!") for this fantastic percussive workout. And "Supergoodlookin" brings the funk for when you want to get down and funky ("...take it home if you like it/Finger-licking good/Take it home if you like it").

Otis Redding Will Save America concludes with the sobering reality of "It's Like That." The struggle for equality and social/economic justice is far from over and must continue at all costs, despite people's apathy and the considerable power of the forces perfectly happy with/exploiting the status quo: "Can't tell the rich man to stop scheming/But we can change this shitstem/If only we look past the horizon...You may not feel the situation/But give it a generation/It's not gonna look good to my grandchildren."

The Ugly Reality: The Adjusters' Otis Redding Will Save America was released just a few years after the ska meltdown at the end of the 1990s when the scene was abandoned by the wannabes and driven/shamed back underground. So, the audience to enjoy it and the scene infrastructure to promote it was largely gone. And it didn't help that Otis Redding Will Save America was only available as an import from Grover Records in Germany. Right after The Adjusters finished recording the album, Moon Ska went under (on December 17, 2000), but Bucket was kind enough to release the unmixed masters to the band so they could finish and issue the record elsewhere. After the album was released by Grover, plans were in place to tour Europe in support (Daraka was living in Norway at the time and other members of the band took leave of their jobs or quit), but everything was canceled at the last minute. The band broke up as a result--and none of the tracks on Otis Redding Will Save America were ever played live.

It's also incredibly ironic that an album about the battle for America's soul has never been released domestically. But perhaps worst of all is that these songs about racism, hatred, inequity, gun violence, and the longing to change the power structure of our economy and political system are still painfully relevant almost 20 years later, maybe even more so now than they were in 2003.

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Notes:

* I happened to catch Billy Bragg at The Beacon Theater on his brilliant first tour of North America in 1984 opening for Echo and the Bunnymen during their magnificent Ocean Rain tour.

** [From the Chicago Reader's "Ska's Lost Cause" article:] "The Adjusters’ Larimore was more skeptical. “Not talking about racism as a system, or racism as something that you should be actively fighting against, but talking about it like, ‘You shouldn’t be mean to black people,’ is just ridiculous,” he said. “It’s like the 2-Tone take on racism, which in the 2-Tone context meant something completely different. There you had a racially diverse scene where people were beating each other up, so going out and saying ‘Hey, don’t beat each other up’ was a progressive thing and part of the more socialist agenda of the people behind 2-Tone. But going to a ska crowd that’s 99 percent white and pretty solidly liberal–especially on race issues–and saying ‘Don’t beat up black people’ is like going out and saying ‘Don’t molest children.’ They might as well do Ska Against Incest.”"

*** Here are some of my favorite verses from "If You" worth quoting here:

If I'm a villain
Let's love the penicillin
I'm not sick with crimes
I'm sick with rhymes
New gang bang
I bang slang for fame
Guiliani, ha!, punany
The same thang...

And

Smiling faces lyin' to the races
You got a facelift, but you're still a racist
You might like your blunder
My hatred alone will rend you asunder
I've got a mind to triumph my will
Look in my eyes, got expression to kill
Syllogisms for your fascisms
You won't find me in your high-tech prisons
Damn!


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Much thanks to Daraka Larimore-Hall for filling in a few of the blanks and providing several corrections.

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Sunday, October 2, 2022

NYC Ska Calendar #6, Fall/Winter 2022

Thursday, October 6, 2022 @ 6:00 pm (DJ set); 8:00 pm first band

Subway to Skaville presents Joker's Republic, Rundown Kreeps, Eye Defy (NJ vs. CA Ska Punk Show), plus DJ Pitter Pat

Otto's Shrunken Head Tiki Bar & Lounge
538 East 14th Street (between Avenues A & B)
Manhattan, NY
No cover/21+
But please bring cash for each band's tip bucket

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Friday, October 14, 2022 @ 7:00 pm

NYC Ska Orchestra

Natty Garden
636 Washington Avenue (and Dean Street)
Brooklyn, NY
$10

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Saturday, October 15, 2022 @ 4:00 pm

Otto's Shrunken Head 20th Anniversary Celebration

Live music: The Bloody Muffs, Barbicide, Bikini Carwash, The Hipp Pipps, Recreational Outrage, The Electric Mess, Memphis Morticians, Crusier: Michael T's Cars Tribute, Frankie Goes to Dollywood, Labretta Suede & The Motel 6

DJ sets: Crystalblu, Suzy Hotrod & Shangri-La, Ryan Midnight, Yana Lil' Jerk & Connie T. Empress, Pitter Pat, Kool Thing, Greg-gory & Strange Jason, Captain Heartlock & January 1963, Mike Mortician & Mike Decay, Two Tone Timmy, Supermorgan

Otto's Shrunken Head Tiki Bar & Lounge
538 East 14th Street (between Avenues A & B)
Manhattan, NY
No cover/21+

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Thursday, October 20, 2022 @ 7:00 pm

Abraskadabra, Stop the Presses, Public Serpents

Trans-Pecos
915 Wyckoff Avenue
Ridgewood, NY
All ages
$15 in advance/$18 day of show

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Saturday, October 22, 2022 @ 6:00 pm

Suicide Machines w/Avail, Deadguy, Fuck It I Quit

Irving Plaza
17 Irving Place
Manhattan, NY
$48/16+

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Monday, October 31, 2022 @ 8:30 pm

Scientist, Coolie Ranx, Full Watts Band

Brooklyn Made
428 Troutman Street
Brooklyn, NY
21+
$20 in advance/$22.50 week of show/$25 day of the show

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Friday, November 18, 2022 @ 8:00 pm

Subway to Skaville presents: Stop the Presses "Got It" record release party with The Pandemics, Barbicide, plus DJ Ryan Midnight

Otto's Shrunken Head Tiki Bar & Lounge
538 East 14th Street (between Avenues A & B)
Manhattan, NY
No cover/21+
But please bring cash for each band's tip bucket

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Sunday, September 18, 2022

40th Anniversary Reissue of The Selecter's "Celebrate the Bullet"/"The Lost Interview: Neol Davies of The Selecter"

The CD and LP of "Celebrate the Bullet" feature a TV displaying static, while a gloved hand adjusts one of the buttons.
It's a little late, but Chrysalis is finally releasing the 40th Anniversary of The Selecter's dark and superb 1981 sophomore album Celebrate the Bullet on November 11, 2022. The album is remastered from the original production tapes and being issued on heavyweight clear vinyl and in an expanded, triple-CD deluxe version, which features a 20-page booklet with notes from the band; the unreleased "Deepwater" single and its dub; the Celebrate the Bullet BBC sessions; and an unreleased live concert recorded at Birmingham's NEC in 1980. (Pre-orders can be made through Townsend Music in the UK and Amazon in the US.)

If you need a refresher on this album, you can read my appreciation of Celebrate the Bullet from this 2010 post.

Also, below is a chapter relating to Celebrate the Bullet excerpted from my 2020 book The Duff Guide to 2 Tone

"The Lost Interview: Neol Davies of The Selecter"

Back in 2015, I was planning to expand a post I had written several years earlier reappraising The Selecter's Celebrate the Bullet [which is included in The Duff Guide to 2 Tone] to book-length. Hoi Polloi skazine's John Vaccaro had been incredibly kind to send me several contemporary articles related to the album from Sounds, NME, and other British music publications from his extensive print archives for my research. I also managed to arrange a series of interviews with Selecter founder, guitarist, and primary songwriter Neol Davies, and intended to talk with other members of the band who had composed songs for the Celebrate the Bullet, including Pauline Black, Gaps Hendrickson, and Compton Amanor.

That summer, I spoke twice with Davies via Skype, but during each session, our video calls were plagued by technical issues: the audio would often go in and out and inevitably degrade to static. Davies was generous and gracious during our interviews—and quite eager to talk about an album that he clearly felt never received its due—but was increasingly frustrated and distracted by the audio problems. I digitally recorded both interviews, but much to my regret didn't have them transcribed at the time. I had planned to set up additional phone calls with Davies, but, unfortunately, didn't, due to demands of work and life.

While putting together The Duff Guide to 2 Tone, it struck me that excerpts from my interviews with Neol Davies would be perfect for this book, but I have been unable to locate the audio files, which I thought I had copied to an external hard drive. Unfortunately, the device I used to record the interviews died several years ago and was recycled. However, I do have the notes that I typed up after my conversation with Davies on 8/13/15, which are as follows.

The cover of Celebrate the Bullet, which was designed by Davies' late wife Jane Hughes and John "Teflon" Sims of Chrysalis' art department (who, along with David Storey, created much of 2 Tone's iconic imagery), featured a gloved hand of a person who couldn't be identified as a man or woman, or black or white—they represented everyone. The fuzzy TV screen on the UK version of the album was meant to convey that the music and message was not being broadcast or given airtime in the mainstream media, and also expressed a dread of nuclear annihilation (when all transmissions will cease). Davies commented that the band was "angry with the world."

Hughes also designed the new Selecter "dial" or "eyeball" logo (used on the paper label for the album and "Celebrate the Bullet" single). It was greatly influenced by Soviet constructivist artists and "fits nicely as a paper sleeve for a single or album—and allows for text, too." Davies noted that it was simple, but "not so easy to arrive at."

Davies stated that, in contrast to The Specials, which was "very much a dictatorship with Jerry in charge," The Selecter was a real democracy. Each member had an equal vote and they based all of their decisions on whichever options had the most support. The band voted down Davies on who should produce their debut album Too Much Pressure. Davies had wanted Roger Lomas, who had produced The Selecter's first few singles, including "The Selecter" and "On My Radio" b/w "Too Much Pressure." In the end, the band opted to go with Charley Anderson's friend Errol Ross, but Davies and others were very unhappy with the results. As a consequence, Lomas was recruited to produce "The Whisper" single and the Celebrate the Bullet album. (A few years prior to this interview, Davies thought he had tracked down the two-inch reel-to-reel tapes for Too Much Pressure with the idea of remixing the whole album for a re-release, but the boxes were empty.)

According to Davies, the track "Celebrate the Bullet" is "a direct descendent" of "The Selecter" instrumental. The song is about recognizing "the seduction of the power of holding a gun in your hand and being enthralled by the power of a gun—but also being very anti-gun." When I asked him about Chrysalis' reaction to the controversy surrounding the single [the BBC had quietly banned the track over misguided concerns that it encouraged gun violence; John Lennon had been murdered a few months earlier and an assassination attempt had been made on President Ronald Reagan around the time of the single's release], Davies noted that the label gave their "full support" to The Selecter.

Davies felt that the "Celebrate the Bullet" single "should have been our 'Ghost Town'"—The Selecter's #1 record. Like that Specials masterpiece, The Selecter's "art and music was in synch with real world events and the zeitgeist" of those turbulent times. Davies said that he found it "mystifying that an anti-gun and anti-violence record would be banned during a time when people were being assassinated."

(Written exclusively for this book on June 10, 2020.)

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Sunday, September 11, 2022

Duff Review: "Blue Beat Baby: The Untold Story of Brigitte"

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Blue Beat Baby: The Untold Story of Brigitte, a new 30-minute video documentary by Joanna Wallace, does an excellent job of piecing together the largely forgotten story of Brigitte Bond, who inadvertently inspired the design of The Beat girl. While the average ska fan knows 2 Tone's Walt Jabsco was created by Jerry Dammers (and refined with help from Horace Panter and John "Teflon" Sims) and based on a photo of Peter Tosh from his early Wailers' days, far fewer are aware of the origins and background of The Beat girl.

In Blue Beat Baby, Wallace explains that Brigitte Bond was a popular Soho burlesque performer who showed up to welcome Prince Buster at Heathrow Airport in 1964 during his first tour of the UK (to promote I Feel The Spirit). In the process, she was photographed and filmed dancing with Buster in the terminal (most likely a calculated move to help generate press for her then forthcoming single and supporting gigs). A little over a decade later, one of these photos was re-published in Melody Maker in the spring of 1979 (see it above), just as 2 Tone started to rule the airwaves and charts. Cartoonist/graphic artist Hunt Emerson, who was tasked by The Beat to quickly come up with their logo (and later designed the covers of the first two Beat albums), spied the photo of the beautiful and fashionably mod Bond dancing with Prince Buster and modeled his striking--and now iconic--Beat girl illustration on her. Notably, neither Hunt Emerson nor anyone in The Beat was cognizant of Bridget Bond's claim to fame. Emerson was drawn to her elegant sense of style and the wonderful motion of her hips, arms, and legs captured in that phenomenal photo.

Employing archival newspaper clips, strip joint advertisements, and TV news footage, Wallace fills in as many blanks in Bond's story as possible in this compelling documentary. Her professional life on stage, in the press, and on the screen is well-covered here, but little is known of Bond's origins or fate (the trail goes cold in Italy in 1976). However, Wallace highlights several fascinating aspects of Bond's life, such as her (so-so) 1964 ska single on Blue Beat; the episode where she hijacked Billy Graham's attempt to minister/preach to the sinful denizens of Soho, which garnered her worldwide press coverage; and the fact that she is/was a gorgeous, transgender woman (which, refreshingly, didn't seem to be that big of a scandal in the UK at the time--many of her strip club patrons and admirers had no complaints!).

Both The Beat's Dave Wakeling and Emerson observed that after The Beat girl began to be featured on gig posters and Beat merchandise, the band's previously male-dominated audiences were flooded with female Beat fans (and there were far fewer fights at shows). Many girls even began to copy The Beat girl's style of dress. So, a crucial part of Bond's legacy is that her image helped welcome/make space for girls and women in the 2 Tone scene. (Then, as now, representation matters.) Perhaps the most significant unanswered question in all of this is whether Bond is/was aware of her consequential and celebrated place in 2 Tone history.

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On a related note, ska author Heather Augustyn provided research assistance for this documentary and she wrote a chapter on Brigitte Bond in her forthcoming book Rude Girls: Women in 2 Tone and One Step Beyond.

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Thursday, September 8, 2022

Skavoovie & The Epitones Release Back Catalogue with Bonus Tracks!

Members of the band are dressed in suits and pork pie hats, and strike cool poses for the camera.
(by Steve Shafer)

If you missed Ken Partridge's recent profile of Skavoovie & The Epitones, stop and go read it now. It's the best piece ever written about the band (I should know--I used to read and compile all of Skavoovie & The Epitones' press clippings during my Moon days).

But the big news is that on September 14 Skavoovie & The Epitones are re-issuing their brilliant 1995 debut album Fat Footin' in the digital realm (Bandcamp, Apple Music, Spotify) and are including two bonus tracks: a cover of The Skatalites classic “Beardman Ska” and an alternate version of their track “Riverboat" (both of which I think are from their 1996 Moon vinyl single).

Then in January 2023, they're releasing their sublime sophomore album Ripe (with bonus tracks), followed later in the year by a brand new compilation of live and rare cuts. And that's not all--there are plans in the works to press a 7" vinyl single featuring an unreleased live version of "Nut Monkey" b/w "9 Dragons." "Nut Monkey" cemented my love of Skavoovie & The Epitones--back in the day I was thrilled to feature this song on the first Skarmageddon comp I produced in 1994.

If you didn't know Skavoovie & The Epitones then, you need to know them now.

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(Also, subscribe to Partridge's Hell of a Hat substack feed for more long-reads about '90s era ska acts.)

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Wednesday, June 29, 2022

NYC Ska Calendar #5, Summer 2022

Dennis Bovell's giant head peers over an imagined cityscape made up of stereo speakers.
Friday, July 8, 2022 @ 7:00 pm

Vive Murak 2022 with Royal Club with special guest Deals Olan, Tone Zone Ska, The End Times, Mutate, plus Boss Selektah Diana and DJ Garrido

Soverign
173 Morgan Avenue
Brooklyn, NY
$30/18+
Info: (929) 414-3586

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Friday, July 15, 2022 @ 8:00 pm

Subway to Skaville presents: Dunia & Aram's "Bedfellows" album release party, plus The Penniless Loafers, and Bachslider (plus DJ Ryan Midnight and Boss Selektah Diana)

Otto's Shrunken Head
538 East 14th Street (between Avenues A & B)
Manhattan/Alphabet City
21+/No cover, but bring $ for band bucket

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Tuesday, August 2, 2022 @ 6:00 pm

DJ Gorilla presents One Last Ska Punky Reggae Party featuring Joystick, Skappository, Dub Corps, and Eric Daino

Bar Frieda
801 Seneca Avenue
Ridgewood (Queens), NY
$10/21+

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Friday, August 12, 2022 @ 6:00 pm (boat departs at 7:00 pm sharp!)

The Slackers

Rocks Off Concert Cruise
Skyport Marina
2430 FDR Drive (at 23rd Street)
Manhattan, NY
Tix: $40/21+

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Saturday, August 13, 2022 @ 6:00 pm

VP Records Presents Dancehall Meets Hip Hop 90s Style, Hosted by Ralph McDaniels (Video Music Box!): Slick Rick, Wayne Wonder, Shinehead, Red Fox, Lady G., plus DJs Jazzy Joyce and Peter Panic

SummerStage
Central Park (enter at Fifth Avenue & 72nd Street)
Manhattan, NY
Free!

SummerStage
Central Park (enter at Fifth Avenue & 72nd Street)
Manhattan, NY
$75-$125

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Thursday, August 25th , 2022 @ 6:00 pm

Burning Spear: The Fan Appreciation Tour, Keep the Spear Burning

SummerStage
Central Park (enter at Fifth Avenue & 72nd Street)
Manhattan, NY
$50-$90

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Saturday, September 24, 2022 @ 6:30 pm (boat departs at 7:00 pm sharp!)

The Pietasters

Rocks Off Concert Cruise
Skyport Marina
2430 FDR Drive (at 23rd Street)
Manhattan, NY
$39.99/21+

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Wednesday, September 28, 2022 @ 7:00 pm

Hollie Cook

Elsewhere
599 Johnson Avenue
Brooklyn, NY
$29.46/16+

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Friday, June 17, 2022

Duff Review: Smoke & Mirrors Sound System featuring Roy Ellis "More Than Unites" & "Dub That Unites" b/w Smoke and Mirrors Sound System featuring Monty Nesmith "Start All Over" & "Dub All Over"

10" color vinyl record (blue, red, and
The cover painting features Monty Neysmith wearing sunglasses and a cap.
black)
Jump Up Records/Grover Records
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

John Roy and the rotating cast of all-star ska musicians in his Smoke & Mirrors Sound System continue to be on a tear, reliably producing some of the best new ska and reggae music around. The latest proof of this is the stunning double A-sided 10" single that (sort of) reunites two of Symarip's main players, Roy Ellis and Monty Neysmith, both of whom have been releasing their own music as of late.

The magnificently fierce rockers-like cut "More Than Unites" (music: John Roy/lyrics: Tony Devenish of Rebelation UK) features Roy Ellis toasting and Dan Vitale of Bim Skala Bim singing of brother/sisterhood and solidarity in the face of fascism and hate. 

"Don't separate us by our language
For it's the same air that we breathe
No division by color or heritage
Where the skin cuts still it bleeds

For we are all one people
Under one sun and sky
And there is more that unites us
Than divides you and I"

I don't know about you, but in these days of unprecedented selfishness, lust for power, and never-sated greed that threatens to destroy everything (people, nations, the planet), I need as many songs like this as I can get my hands on (I've been listening to a lot of '80s-era Billy Bragg lately, like the Between the Wars and Accident Waiting to Happen EPs).

With "Start All Over" (music: John Roy/lyrics: Monty Neysmith), Neysmith sings--in a terrifically impassioned performance--of surrendering, regrouping, and giving things another go. In this wonderful rocksteady hymn to hope, resilience, and grit, failure is okay if you learn from the experience--and it doesn't defeat you.

"I'm leaving this life behind
I now realize it wasn't all that kind
Today, I see the lights are shining so bright
And it tells me everything is gonna be alright

I'm gonna pick myself up
Dust myself off
And start all over again"

In addition to all of the stellar musicians on these tracks (including Matt Parker, Eric Abbey, Victor Rice, Buford O'Sullivan, and many more), the great Roger Rivas not only worked his keyboard magic here but did the boss mixes and compelling dubs.

Whoever's keeping tally, add this 10" to the list of best new ska and reggae releases of 2022...

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For more about Smoke & Mirrors Sound System, read my reviews of their recent releases:

Sunday, June 12, 2022

Duff Review: The Untouchables "Hooked on a Feeling" b/w "Hooked Dub"

The picture disc artwork features an illustration of a rude boy playing a guitar and kicking one leg up in the air.
Artwork by CHema Skandal!
7" vinyl picture disc single
Jump Up Records/Specialized Records
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Originally recorded for Specialized Records' 2020 charity comp Blockbuster: A Tribute to Glam Rock (but it was delivered too late for inclusion), The Untouchables' new picture disc single is a cover of ("Suspicious Minds" composer) Mark James' "Hooked on a Feeling," which was recorded by BJ Thomas (1968), Jonathan King (1971), and Blue Swede (1974)--and received new life in the 21st century courtesy of the Guardians of the Galaxy movie soundtrack. While it seems like a stretch to put "Hooked on a Feeling" on a glam comp--this is a mega-catchy AM-radio pop track, after all--Blue Swede was tagged as a glam rock band and their version of this song (based on Jonathan King's 1971 arrangement) was a smash hit in the US, Canada, Australia, and the Netherlands.

The Untouchables' excellent, straight-up sincere take on this song is in the same vein as their 1985 hit "What's Gone Wrong?" (which UB40 wanted to buy from them before The UTs recorded it). But the UTs' crack rhythm section and horns really give "Hooked on a Feeling" some real umph--something that's even more evident on "Hooked Dub." Rude boys want to convey messages of love, too, but don't have to be soft about it.

Long-time UTs fans, no doubt, will remember and have collected several picture disc singles ("Free Yourself," "I Spy for the FBI," and "What's Gone Wrong?") spun off The Untouchables' Wild Child LP (which was also released as a picture disc). Their UK label Stiff Records was mad about this format and always paid such brilliant attention to the design of their releases and merchandise. Jump Up notes that "Hooked on a Feeling" is the first Untouchables picture disc released in 37 years. Let's hope we don't have to wait nearly as long for more UTs recordings, 'cause right now they sound so damn good!

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To read more about The Untouchables, check out The Duff Guide to the Untouchables. Also see my introductory chapter "1985: The Year American Ska Broke" to Marc Wasserman's book Ska Boom: An American Ska & Reggae Oral History.

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Friday, June 10, 2022

Duff Review: Victor Romero Evans "At the Club" b/w The Detonators "Lift Off" reissue

The paper label indicates the song title, band, and label (Special Request)
12" vinyl single
Special Request
1980 (2022 reissue)

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Remastered and reissued for the first time since 1980, the John Collins-produced/co-written 12" single featuring Victor Romero Evans' "At the Club" and The Detonators' "Lift Off" should be of interest to Specials' fans, as it's forever linked to their most brilliant release--the Ghost Town EP.

Back in the day, after the Evans/Detonators record was played on Radio One's "Roundtable" program and favorably reviewed (it also was #1 on Black Echoes' reggae chart at the time), Collins received a late-night call from Jerry Dammers asking him if he might be interested in producing The Specials' next recording. The band was very impressed with Collins' production (recorded on a four-track in the front room of his house and released on his own label) and, in the wake of More Specials' not completely welcome excursion into muzak/lounge and the hi-tech 24-track studio it had been recorded in (that offered Dammers too many choices!), The Specials wanted to capture a more authentic reggae sound for these new songs in a much simpler fashion. And they believed Collins was their man.

When The Specials' met John Collins, they didn't expect him to be white. Lynval Golding and Neville Staple told him, "We were expecting someone like Lee Perry; a wild rasta smoking ganja." Indeed, the seductive Lovers Rock of "At the Club" and mysterious outer space dub of "Lift Off" seem as if they could have come from the mixing desks of Dennis Bovell or Mad Professor, two of the top UK reggae producers back then--and now. (Trainspotters will be interested to know that Victor Romero Evans also played the part of Lover in Franco Rosso’s stellar 1980 film Babylon--an updated Thatcher-era The Harder They Come shot in South London, with a boss reggae soundtrack by Bovell, Yabby U, I-Roy, Cassandra, Aswad, Vin Gordon, and Michael Rose.)

Of these two tracks, the wonderful dub instrumental "Lift Off" is clearly the sonic blueprint for what Dammers wanted for "Ghost Town." It sports a clean, warm, roots reggae sound with electro percussion and trippy synth effects (shades of every B 1950s sci-fi film you've ever seen)--and features the same ghost synth that is later used to open and close "Ghost Town." (To these ears, John Bradbury's drumming on "Ghost Town" and "Friday Night, Saturday Morning" sounds like its programmed, even though it's not; but I think it's a combination of how Brad is drumming--reportedly influenced by Gregory Isaacs' "Night Nurse"--and how Collins recorded him.)

Specials' completists will want to snap up a copy of this (I ordered a copy through Juno.co.uk), but the Victor Romero Evans "At the Club"/Detonators "Lift Off" 12" is worth having in its own right. It's a fantastic slice of early '80s UK reggae that stands the test of time. 

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Thursday, June 9, 2022

NYC Ska Calendar #4, Spring/Summer 2022

Friday, June 17, 2022 @ 8:00 pm

Members of The Beat dressed in Harrington jackets, sport coats, and jean jackets are lined up along a fence facing the camera.
Strictly love and unity with The Beat

Subway to Skaville presents: The Freecoasters, Beat Brigade, Donut City (plus DJ Ryan Midnight & DJ Duff Guy)

Otto's Shrunken Head
538 East 14th Street (between Avenues A & B)
Manhattan/Alphabet City
21+/No cover, but bring $ for band bucket

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Friday, July 8, 2022 @ 7:00 pm

Vive Murak 2022 with Royal Club with special guest Deals Olan, Tone Zone Ska, The End Times, Mutate plus Boss Selektah Diana and DJ Garrido

Soverign
173 Morgan Avenue
Brooklyn, NY
$30/18+
Info: (929) 414-3586

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Friday, July 15, 2022 @ 8:00 pm

Subway to Skaville presents: Dunia & Aram's "Bedfellows" album release party, plus Bachslider, and TBA (pluse DJ Ryan Midnight and Boss Selektah Diana)

Otto's Shrunken Head
538 East 14th Street (between Avenues A & B)
Manhattan/Alphabet City
21+/No cover, but bring $ for band bucket

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Saturday, July 23, 2022 @ 7:30 pm

Subway to Skaville presents: Buford O'Sullivan & The Roosters, Ensamble Calavera, Not From Concentrate (plus DJ Ryan Midnight)

Bar Frieda
801 Seneca Avenue
Ridgewood (Queens), NY
$10/21+

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Tuesday, August 2, 2022 @ 6:00 pm

DJ Gorilla presents One Last Ska Punky Reggae Party featuring Joystick, Skappository, Dub Corps, and Eric Daino

Bar Frieda
801 Seneca Avenue
Ridgewood (Queens), NY
$10/21+

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Saturday, September 24, 2022 @ 6:30 pm (boat departs at 7:00 pm sharp!)

The Pietasters

Rocks Off Concert Cruise
Skyport Marina
2430 FDR Drive (at 23rd Street)
Manhattan, NY
$39.99/21+

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Wednesday, September 28, 2022 @ 7:00 pm

Hollie Cook

Elsewhere
599 Johnson Avenue
Brooklyn, NY
$29.46/16+

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Monday, June 6, 2022

Duff Review: Norwood, Angelo, and Chris Meet Eric Blowtorch and the Bodyguards "Too Many Dues" b/w Eric Blowtorch and the Bodyguards "Mercy"

The 45 sleeve features photos of Norwood, Angelo, Chris, and Eric.
7" vinyl single/digital
Bopaganda! Records & Tapes
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Fishbone's 1988 masterpiece Truth & Soul was largely an exposition on what it was like to be a Black American living in an unrelentingly racist America (see most of Truth & Soul's side two: "One Day," "Subliminal Fascism," "Slow Bus Movin' (Howard Beach Party)," "Ghetto Soundwave," and "Change"). When the album was recorded, a lot of the good that had resulted from the brutally hard work of the Civil Rights Movement and America's attempts at building an equitable and just Great Society was being rolled back during the regressive Reagan '80s. "Slow Bus Movin' (Howard Beach Party)," in particular, was written and recorded in response to the horrific 1986 death of New Yorker Michael Griffith, who was hit and killed by a car as he attempted to cross the Belt Parkway in Queens while fleeing a mob of white teenagers trying to attack him (acts of racial terror didn't only happen in the Jim Crow South). According to The New York Times:

"The events in Howard Beach began when Mr. Griffith, a construction worker, and three black companions traveled from Brooklyn to Queens to pick up his paycheck. Their car broke down late on Dec. 19 on a desolate stretch of Cross Bay Boulevard, and three of the four began walking into Howard Beach. As they were crossing the street, they were nearly bumped by a car in which several white teenagers were riding. Racial slurs were exchanged. The teenagers, joined by other young whites, confronted the black men outside a pizza parlor, New Park Pizza, and chased them.

Timothy Grimes, who was 18, escaped unharmed. Mr. Griffith was killed by a car on the Belt Parkway. Cedric Sandiford, who was 36, was beaten with a bat and other weapons...

...Jon Lester, Scott Kern and Jason Ladone were convicted of manslaughter and assault."

Flash forward 30+ years later and--while some things have changed for the better--much has not. Members of Fishbone (Norwood Fisher, Angelo Moore, and Chris Dowd)--plus Eric Blowtorch and the Bodyguards--still feel compelled to write and record songs about America's unrelenting racism and its abuse and murder of Black people. The terrific "Too Many Dues"--co-written by Eric Beaumont and Norwood Fisher--is an ironically chipper ska/jump blues cut that conveys some real anguish over the high profile murder of Breonna Taylor and permanent disabling of Jacob Blake (10% of the single's profits are being donated to Black Lives Matter). But it's also about the tragic inability of America to live up to its ideals and treat all people equally in every aspect of life--and under the law (we fought a bloody civil war over it and amended the Constitution several times in attempts to do so). 

"Breonna Taylor was a healer, but the jailer
Just had to invade her, viciously assail her
Every, every day here to the cross we nail her
The great experiment is a failure

What does a brother have to do
To reap respect already due
To stop the spiteful spew
To not be turning blue?"

On the flip side is the excellent 2 Tone-ish ska track "Mercy," which is a plea for the salvation of humanity, a mantra for our thoroughly horrific times, particularly in these fragmented United States of ours: "Mercy in destabilizer stormtroop’s face/Mercy, mercy when your blood boils over/Mercy to the driver in the bulldozer." It's a mournful track, like something off the Ghost Town EP, but interspersed with joyous and hopeful funk-soul breaks in the choruses. And it's protest music that's not about casting blame, but searching for something that can heal what's broken inside of us, so we won't be at each other's throats, and might even be able to begin to start caring for one other again.

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Tuesday, May 24, 2022

Duff Review: Horace Andy "Midnight Rocker"

The cover features Horace Andy in profile with grey dreadlocks.
Vinyl LP/CD/digital
On-U Sound
2022

(Review by Steve Shafer)

Like his superb collaborations with Lee "Scratch" Perry before his death (Rainford and Heavy Rain, which I reviewed here and here), Adrian Sherwood's latest effort with Horace Andy yields another masterpiece. Midnight Rocker is easily one of the finest albums in Andy's catalogue and certainly one of the best new roots reggae records you'll hear this year.

At 71, Sleepy's seemingly ageless voice remains in top form--always wonderfully expressive, whether conveying empathy for those suffering or passing along Jah's unyielding judgment on the wicked. He's backed by an all-star band, including Gaudi, George Oban (Aswad), Skip McDonald (Sugar Hill Records house band, Tackhead, African Head Charge), Douglas Wimbish (Sugar Hill Records house band, Tackhead, Living Colour), Horseman (Prince Fatty, Mungo's Hi-Fi, Mad Professor), and more. And Sherwood's virtuoso production--his first for Andy(!)--bathes everything in crisp warmth and life, and leaves plenty of space for Andy to do his thing.

Midnight Rocker contains a mix of new tracks and re-worked versions of Andy classics, some surely chosen for their heightened relevance today. The album opens with a fantastic rendition of Andy's plaintive "This Must Be Hell" (first released as a Tapper Zukie-produced single in 1978), Things may have been bad in the late '70s, but they have nothing on our everyone's-always-at-each-other's-throats times. This more sparse take on "Materialist" (which was originally produced and released by Niney the Observer in 1977) still packs a punch: "Material comes first in this society/You can't afford a car or a house, no one knows you" (and the track also warns of giving into vanity and acquiring too much). Andy's 1976 reggae lullaby "Rock to Sleep" is beautifully and hauntingly updated with cellos. And even Sleepy's much-revisited, Studio One/Coxsone Dodd-produced single "Mr. Bassie" is given a great new spin with this tightened-up take. (If you compare all of these versions to their originals, you'll be pleased to find that Andy has much more control of his singing, and his voice is arguably stronger and more nimble than ever.)

Like the reworked classics, Andy's new cuts are like late-night, pirate broadcasts of hope and warning--a rebel counternarrative for these entropic times. "Easy Money" (penned by Jeb Loy Nichols and Sherwood) is a melodica-driven sequel of sorts to his 1975 Phil Pratt-produced single "Root of All Evil" (key lyric: "It make friends/It break friends/Judas betrayed Christ for it!") that is an oblique critique of our capitalist way of life: "Tell me why/Did I ever start/To make money money/You did me wrong/You been cheating me/My whole life long." The stately "Today is Right Here" (by Sherwood/Nichols/Oban) reminds one that life is tenuous and fleeting, so you need to enjoy/be in the right now ("See that old black bird flying/See that fox on the run/They don't think about tomorrow/'Cause it might never come"). Despite its topic, "Careful" (by Leigh Stephen Kenny/LSK and Sherwood) is a bright and jaunty track about the pernicious disinformation we're swimming in daily ("All that glitters is not gold/All that's written is not so/Pictures, scriptures always told through the eyes of victors, all I know"). With all the turmoil, dangers, and moral quandaries to navigate these days, Andy pleads to Jah--over a Lover's Rock cut (written by LSK/Gaudi/Roydel Johnson aka Congo Ashanti Roy)--to "Watch Over Them." We need all the protection we can get.

One of my favorite tracks on Midnight Rocker is the cover of Massive Attack's "Safe from Harm" from Blue Lines. For all of Andy's past work with Massive Attack, this song from their 1991 debut--inspired by Martin Scorsese's neo-noir nightmare Taxi Driver (it's about Travis Bickle expressing his compulsion to protect the teenage prostitute Iris)--was originally sung by Shara Nelson. Yet hearing Andy singing it in this urgent, slightly futuristic dubstep-reggae setting (that rumbling bassline is ominous!), you don't think of Jodie Foster, but rather whoever means the world to you and you'd be devastated to lose: "But if you hurt what's mine/I'll sure as hell retaliate/You can free the world, you can free my mind/Just as long as my baby's safe from harm tonight."

While Midnight Rocker immediately appealed to me from first play on the turntable, I've been listening to it on and off for weeks now--and still don't think the album has fully revealed itself to me yet.

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